Queer Singer-Songwriter August James Hopes You Know What Venison Is

The Minnesota-born indie pop artist talks his upcoming EP “Venison Forever,” scene-setting in music and preparing to graduate from college and start his music career

Minnesota-born singer-songwriter August James’ wildest dream is to play The Armory.

“That’s honestly a major, major goal for me,” the 21-year-old from Falcon Heights says. “It’s not even close to the most iconic venue in the Twin Cities, but I think it represents a scale that excites me. A lot of artists I loved in high school played there, so I would love to.”

For now, though, James is finishing his economics degree at Occidental College in Los Angeles and preparing to release his second EP, “Venison Forever,” which is out April 25.

Judging only by the titles of the EP’s singles, “Prairie Eyes” and “Montana Riverbeds,” one might expect a country-inspired or indie folk sound from James, but in his own words, “‘Indie folk’ doesn’t mean much.”

Instead, James says he considers himself a pop writer first, taking songwriting and production inspiration from icons such as Selena Gomez and Lady Gaga, whose music he grew up with.

More recent standouts like Caroline Polachek’s 2023 album “Desire, I Want to Turn Into You” influenced James’ emphasis on place in his music, especially on “Venison Forever.”

“It’s honestly become one of my favorite albums ever,” he says. “That’s the most direct inspiration I drew from in terms of trying to establish a really strong world throughout the project.”

We agreed that “Sunset” on Polachek’s record evokes a sweeping shot of a Mediterranean vista in the summertime. James’ “Prairie Eyes” similarly brings to mind driving through endless amber waves in Big Sky Country.

James says a road trip last summer through Montana and Wyoming inspired the visual world of “Venison Forever,” even though he had written many of the songs beforehand.

“The American West is this sort of classic symbol for escape, but also this myth and something that’s tied to a really complicated history,” he says. “I liked using that symbol, especially being a queer artist. I thought it was conducive to the themes I wanted to write about.”

In that sense, there’s a “Brokeback Mountain” mood permeating the two singles — a yearning to escape into star-crossed queer love as expansive as the Mountain West. The EP’s title comes from the lyrics, “I’d eat venison forever / Just to keep you here,” evoking a level of devotion to someone that only comes from roughing it together.

James’ feather-light vocals also bring to mind the father of queer wistfulness in music, Sufjan Stevens.

Still, James says he doesn’t want his queerness to define him as an artist.

“It definitely informs the themes that I write about, especially on this new EP, but I don’t need to be known as ‘the gay singer-songwriter,’” he explained.

One might think James’ musical aspirations and love for the West are what brought him to Los Angeles for school, but really, he ended up at Occidental College because of a coin flip.

“I was considering going to Florida State University because they have a big circus program there,” James explained. (That’s right — growing up, James did work as a circus performer.)

Still, James admitted, “Coming to school here was the excuse to be in LA.” The odds ended up in his favor.

Economics might also seem like an arbitrary major chosen by aspiring creatives, but James says he only started focusing on music as a professional pursuit within the past year, even though he started making music on school-issued iPads in middle school (“shout out SPPS.”)

“I’m the most ‘in’ as I’ve ever been,” he says. “I could’ve studied music, and I’m sure it would’ve been beneficial in a lot of ways, but I’ve felt pretty capable without a formal music education. School was always gonna be separate from my music, and music is not my only interest.”

With new management and more experience working in the studios with producers, a path forward into the music industry seems to have emerged for James. But like many students in their last semester of college, his future is still largely uncertain.

“In a perfect world, I’m pursuing music in LA,” he says. “The hope is that the EP continues to forge the path I’ve been on and allows me to work with exciting people. But it’s also hard to live in LA, so there’s a good chance I’ll come home this summer, put the pieces together, then go back.”

James also says he could envision a life in the Twin Cities, but that the closeness to the industry in LA is tough to beat.

For now, he says, his mentality is: “We’ll see what happens.”

That’s not to say he’ll never return to Minnesota on tour, which he says is in the works.

One of these years, he may even be playing at The Armory.