“I do not suppose it is caught as much as me but — how a lot my life has modified,” says Emma Hardyman, singer of the 2023 Tiny Desk Contest-winning band Little Moon. The Utah-based band not too long ago wrapped up the Tiny Desk Contest On The Street tour, headlining eight sold-out reveals throughout the nation. Whereas on the street, Hardyman caught up with NPR to mirror on the life-changing win and likewise share the story behind Little Moon’s profitable tune, “Marvel Eye.”

Hardyman tells NPR the tune was written throughout the time her mother-in-law was in hospice care. The melody got here to Hardyman as she and her husband Nathan Hardyman, who can also be a part of Little Moon, drove from Utah to Idaho to go to his mom.

Throughout this tough time, Emma and Nathan Hardyman had been additionally within the strategy of leaving the Mormon church by which they’d grown up.

“And fairly shortly, simply due to the circumstances, I noticed that this tune, this melody, was about loss of life,” says Emma Hardyman, who wrote the construction of the tune earlier than asking Nathan Hardyman to jot down the lyrics.

The couple had been additionally observing the disintegration of lots of the constructing blocks their Mormon perception techniques had been constructed on. “I’ve grieved previous variations of myself all through my entire life,” Emma Hardyman shares.

“I actually love the place Mormonism introduced me,” Emma Hardyman says. “It launched me to teachings which can be supposed to like all people, which can be supposed to include all people. [But] it could not observe me to how a lot I needed to take [those teachings] critically,” she provides, noting that lots of the Little Moon band members are queer. She says Mormonism did not align with how she needs to deal with folks ‘with out circumstances.’

Emma Hardyman additionally shares that she had many self-doubts about herself as an artist when she and Nathan Hardman met — however that he believed in her from their very first date. And in “Marvel Eye,” the 2 even discover peace in not having all of the solutions. Emma sings: “Is there a information that’s discovered not in understanding?” as she’s met with the nice and cozy hums of the band.