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and then there's bananas as well like you really set yourself up you believe that God's funny he's like you're not going to be able to spell but you're going to teach the world how to spell bananas oh my God this Nick song is
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called The Alphabet Song forwards and backwards yeah watch me I can probably do it backwards no [Music] problem I don't feel nervous to talk to you I just feel like there's something about you like obviously you have this way of being able to like read people's
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souls and wanting people to like share and then recently like everywhere on my feed is like the Justin interviews and like they're so it's so powerful how how open he was with you and like it's so healing for people to see that you know
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what I mean so I just wanted to make sure that I came in with the right energy you know today the best I really appreciate that that was very very thoughtful way to start a conversation my feeling is to always try to make
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somebody feel really comfortable in the room and you gave me that gift so I really appreciate that thank you how are you I'm good I'm excited I feel like uh I feel like I got forwarded into the future and here we are what happen
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really fast like our rocket ship it happens fast because you're in it and you're so committed to it and I really in in the times that we've met and spoke I I spoke and I know that you apply yourself to the things you're passionate
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about your relationships you're all in your jobs you're all in you're creative your kids you're all in you put everything into it so you never it would never feel like 8 years it would feel like eight minutes it does and also when
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you have like we were talking about last time we spoke there was the huge um explosion of the life life got exploded and um and the pieces. came to an end yeah it was hard to clean that up it wasn't even there I'm still working on
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it and it's like the healing it just takes so much time and the evolution and so um but being able to do the music to kind of like I don't know soak up the blood a little bit is really is like one of those most incredible gifts that God
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gave me to be able to to do that but this time was probably the the most um like challenging in so many ways it always is right the songwriting thing but like to do it in my life now at this point in my life like just it was it was
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uh it took a long time yeah I can imagine when you've got when you've got people in your life that a new chance to build something really special and really human with somebody and and and to add a lot of value to your life
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there's a there's a desire to preserve that but it's inspiring you right so you got to write about it but it's like oh man how I write about this and preserve it at the same time for me was that a balance you were trying to strike
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there's so many layers to it and what's so great about doing it is this point like being able to talk about it it's that even helps me even more like with my life but I think there was a lot of guilt about like I don't know if you're
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a mom like or if you have children and you're trying to balance yourself like which is you know got to be less important because the child child's life is your that you're they're your responsibility and the older they get
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the more you realize oh my gosh like if they're not good I'm not good like that's it like I got to figure this out and it goes really quickly and so for me to like take the time selfishly out of my life to be like okay I already rung
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the Bell like 40 times at the top of the mountain and I won I'm going to go try to win again and like make a record like do art it's like I felt very like selfish to do that like and guilty like okay I'm going to they're at I'm going
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to run to the studio and try to like be creative and and you know also there was the pandemic that happen so it was like this weird timing of like starting again and and then like does anyone care do I care should I be doing this like why am
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I doing that like there's so many questions so grateful that you actually you know presented it in that way because we celebrate the Arts man I mean that's what I do I I listen to great music and I celebrate the Arts and the
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people who make it but there's something very real about taking step back from that experience and asking yourself like a is it going to move me because if it's not going to move me I'm just filling space and number two is this the right
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use of my time yes exactly such a powerful observation because we just assume that you made the decision when you a teenager and so you're just going to keep showing up and you're like yeah but life changes it does change and like
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your responsibilities change and your passions change and like I think I felt like you know there's so many ways I could put this like if I am G to do a show and take the time out of my life to do a concert like I would have to remove hollat girl to be putting in one of my new songs like there's only so much time like that's that's you ain't taking hollack girl out no one's waiting like I don't need to do it nobody needs a new one I don't
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I'm not waiting for a new one from one of my favorite artists you know what I'm saying so it's like ah yeah this is got a great line for this cuz someone said someone said to someone once and they Shar it with me kind of with me
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they said no one's waiting for your new record they're waiting for a great record I love that that's that's true and so I just kept having this itch and it was like I had planted the seed of hope that I would get to do new music
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because when I do new music it feels like I have a purpose in this world and it makes me feel like it just I there's it's hard to put words to it but you know it's that creative thing where you feel like you're actually doing
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something that's like worth something outside of being a mom and all the other things that are worth something but I so I I just couldn't stop even though there was nobody around me going yeah Gowen like nobody cared like it didn't M like
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I would just be like I want to I on a session and I didn't know who to write with like I didn't know who I was what I sound like nothing but I I went down like loads of different cacs did who who were in these cacs what were these cacs
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I had all these dreams I was like like I'm going to make a skull record like I'm going backwards I'm going to make a going backwards hey everybody I got great news I'm going backwards hooray she finally she's going backwards I know
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cuz the world was going backwards like everybody started listening to 90s I was like oh I know how to do that like I was like it felt very nostalgic it felt like like I need to make a happy record this world is not happy that's where we
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introducing SL yeah exactly exactly and I did a lot of Music at that time on Zoom like which was really weird I think also like some of the people I worked with Ross Goan hi you're like the most incredible like songwriter but some
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people are so almost too talented like to the point where I was losing like I couldn't keep up and the worst thing about that as well is at the end of the session right that it's fine if you can't keep up in the room cuz you got to
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you've got to find a way to hold your own right but then you just you Clos the laptop and then you just stuck in your own feelings of like what did I do there I didn't do anything did I do anything there I like well it's okay I've done
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stuff before maybe I could just be the person that doesn't do anything but just takes what other people do like I had that thought but then there's no fulfillment so fillment yeah that's why you do it we we we get it and it becomes
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ours and we get to do what we want with it and it becomes a part of our life that is that's one half of the trade but what I'm really fascinated when I talk to every artist about music that I love is the is the part of it that you get
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out of it which is that before we even get it you get this beautiful experience this fulfillment this like you say this purpose this idea of connecting your inner voice with your outer expression and that is like that is where the magic
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is right you didn't know what you were going to make and yet you finished it this time feels like kind of like the first time in the sense that because of all the stuff we just talked about it it wasn't really like it's each record has
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its own like feeling like okay when you put you know return of Saturn came out after this record that nobody was ever going to hear that took nine years really from the beginning of No Doubt to when um the tragic Kingdom came out it
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was like a girl that was dyslexic that didn't have any purpose didn't know what I was doing just was in love with Tony Canal like what can you know what I mean like and then got broken up with and then it was like all of a sudden I just
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wrote a song like I it was like someone saying Okay let me see if I can fly oh I can look you know I didn't know and that's how that record was written so then when I came back to do return to Saturn it was like I was famous yeah I
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was rich I was like no all over like I have to be a good writer and then you go back in and you try to like really like try you really try guess what you just did some really unexpected powerful develop identity development work and
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then everyone decided that's who you are and you're like wait I just figured that out myself I know it's true and you have to go through heartbreak to do it that's the hardest thing as well is like a lot of times those gifts that you have inside you don't recognize only present themselves when you're faced with this really sad or or traumatic situation that's life right I mean we have to suffer and that's it's what do you do with the
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suffering and that's that's the big I think the big test that we're doing down here yeah I do think that and yet there's there's a lot of lightness and I mean that as a compliment it floats this album it really floats in the way that
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great records show up at a moment and not everything needs to be a soundtrack to trauma or a soundtrack to to a deeper experience sometimes you just want to put something on and Float with it and I feel like you've captured that the sound
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of this record W that's so cool it's so fun to be able to have people hear it now like it's bizarre like yeah it's so cool that you listen to it thank you of course and all the playing on it and all the songs on it just there's a lot of
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chemistry at play here all the instrumentation is very purposeful when did you realize that that you at least subconsciously if not consciously landed on a feeling that you were going to try to capture on this record I knew that
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the songs that I had been writing weren't doing some of them are amazing they they were speaking to me but they weren't nobody was like having that thing so I didn't know if that was because maybe they just weren't good or
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if people didn't care I just didn't know but it was really making me get really like insecure and sad and then at a certain point it was really about getting in the room with the right person and it was just God's timing I think because I had been placed in um a
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session with this young girl let J cash who I had I got to know jcash through Adam Lavine because Adam I'm like Adam why do you you always have hits like I I don't understand have you sold your soul to the devil and and he was like a l
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questions here there's a lot of questions that we need answers to at some point actually by the way just FYI Adam yes Adam and then Adam was like yes J cash so then I called Cash and cash it took me like a while to get in with cash
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cuz he was with he's busy a busy guy and he sent the song called true babe to me and I was like yeah yeah I've never done people's songs that they just send me ever because again it doesn't fulfill me but I really like the song and I
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remember listening to it and I want to cut it I want to cut it and the girl that had written that with these guys Jack and Coke who are these amazing beautiful producers um and songwriters they they I got in the studio with them
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after true babe and it was at that point where I felt like they gave me enough space in the room to really like have to come with something you know what I mean and she was this young girl like oh my gosh my mom loves no doubt and
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yeah that's great and she grew up in La she's an artist um and Nico and she's she's like just confident young beautiful sexy talented and cool and like easy and of course she is your mom was a no doin and just I it was just a surreal
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thing and purple irises was born and once I knew that I just wanted to land in this sort of I was like kind of like echoing like the music I grew up on in the' 70s like I always picture myself in the back of the station wagon and my
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parents driving to church and like all the great like soft rock music that was the you know anything from holl notes to Chicago to like Fleetwood Mac like all of the stuff that was like music music right and so I wanted this record to
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have that feeling to it and so when purple AES was written I was like okay I landed this is the this is where I where I am and then the sort of like just even the idea of talking about the purple AES which was such a huge um I don't know
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like it just symbolized so much mine and Blakes like where we got to like as our love grew which we had found these irises on the ranch during 20 2020 and and we like I know and we like pulled them all out and we transplanted them I
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mean hundreds of them like it took it was like something you would never do if you weren't in Co right and we um as a family we did it and then they just years later like were picking them together like wow we really are we really found love like this is it help me understand the land right help me understand the land because I love I love Earth I love nature but I've never had a green thumb like I've never got myself into I don't dig I don't dig
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right but I had family members and friends who dig hard like they'll W away two days in the garden and just like it's Joy I want to get there like what what is the what am I missing I think um I was a kid that grew up with if my dad
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like cut the tree branches and we had to pick them up I was like I'm not having trees at my house when I grow up yeah cuz I'm going to have to pick up the branches you know but my mom used to garden and I would come home walk home
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from school and she'd be in her little short shorts like looking all cute like gardening I'm like what what is she doing what a waste of time you know um and then when Blake and I and I always loved flowers I just never had time for
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that ain't nobody got time to do that you know what I mean it's like I'm like so I basically we just started he did a lot of farm stuff because he he's like really into animals and he has this Ranch in Oklahoma I mean it's like
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thousands of Acres of just land and he since I've known him for 9 years like he he used to plant like all kinds of stuff for the animals like sunflower fields or you know um Alfalfa or he would be so into it like looking at the weather thing on the app like it's going to rain it's going to rain like it was like this whole game and um and once you start to see like during Co we were there so much that we actually got to see the seasons
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we started seeing the wild flowers we started SE seeing what was in Oklahoma that we never saw before and I was like hey maybe we could plant some zenas like and he was like flowers like that's a waste of time no animal's going to eat
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that like right that's so H as well like you just finally showed up you're like I've been sitting here with you watching you do this now for a while I think I'm going to contribute something of value he's like waste my time when those Zen I
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know what are you doing out here but we did it and we did it together and it was so fun and we did it on like a large scale like with a whole Cedar and like it was big like it was so exciting when they bloomed and um that's what that is
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such a met metaphor for our lives like every time you plant that seed and you just have this hope and you don't know if it's going to bloom you don't have really control all you can do is do everything you can to help yeah and so
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we just started in that was like our kind of where we came together in Oklahoma where we started to be like we started getting really into it and and and he he loved it as well so yeah that's how that's how our little hobby
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started we don't talk a lot about the great love stories of the modern age because I think a lot of times you know we feel they've all been told even though they they're unique to everybody and then there's also then this information age love is hard man it's
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hard to talk about because it's just so sticky and everyone gets really into like blah blah blah blah but this is just a great love story right I mean coming out of like the first time we properly spoke you were in it weirdly I
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have some like I've seen Paparazzi pictures of me coming out of your session that day and it's like I I have that when I see them I'm like like it's like that feeling you know um PTSD I think it's called yeah yeah God is so
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unbelievable and the fact that um that man Blake Shelton was just there right then at that moment like and and now we're in the future we can look back and go yeah that wasn't just a you know rebound all over me moment that was like
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a like that was like a god-given blessing and so it's just it's crazy because it's sometimes you can't really see clearly until you're looking back at everything that happens and then when when you look back you're like and you
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just look at it like what where were the blessings you're like wow that was a miracle that was a miracle that was a miracle that was a miracle that led to here you know yeah yeah yeah it's amazing and how we have this record and
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it's just a lot of joy and a lot of love wrapped up in this in this album I know that was another problem because yeah I people were saying like you can't just keep writing Blake songs like nobody cares like I was like but that's what I
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care about know that's my life it's very cute advice from people who know you really well and also I was very conscious of like editing it down to getting this really like handpicked bouquet of songs because I want to make
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sure it wasn't like a lot of my records I feel like are over too many songs no this is side A and side B this is a but it's all these angles at the love like it's not and that's why somebody else has ended up on the record because I
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felt like I needed to show how dark it was to get to how bright and how the love could grow and and keep you know growing but yeah the record is definitely um different angles on the same subject there's nothing for me this
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is the thing I really love about about love songs right again put it next to the subject as a whole as a human experience the music and the art that's created about it it's it's hard for people to First of what it's really hard
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to write about and be authentic I think you mean love songs yeah great love songs are really hard to pull off it's because they could be cheesy it can fall into something it's way too personal and way too vicarious for people to actually
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be able to enjoy whereas pain it's like oh no we're all addicted to each other's pain yeah easy that is easy oh you're hurting great yeah you know are you in love I'm not sure if I am or I know how that feels or I don't quite know and yet
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it's the thing we need and you okay you full cheese I'll go all in it's the thing we need way more of no I know and I miss like you know like an endless love like I miss I miss like what happened why can't we do that anymore
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yeah yeah yeah yeah you captured on this record I mean there's so many beautiful moments on here you know what was it like to actually what was the actual recording experience like when you were making these songs like cuz you really
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you bring an enormous amount of kind of true joy in your performance out on these records so what was the actual room like like two um recording parts to this so I had done like when you go in the studio to write I I like one session
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that I was doing was with um Henry who's circuit and my unbelievable I mean we're talking about like just take away his talent and him as a human like love love his energy like he was so welcoming to me you at a spot what a spot yeah
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amazing and it was just such a it's so cool to be able to go in with these you know amazing talented people and just be so it's so hippie like it's so like we're all sitting around talking and hanging and just waiting for that that
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thing you know and and we were we were talking and I don't know how it came up I don't know we were talking about flowers cuz that's like all I care about like the flower freak and he had some roses in the backyard that he didn't
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even know about that were like on the side of the hill or whatever and and and um I don't know if I'm getting the order of this right but basically at one point someone said something about empty vase I think it was the flower shop remember
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that flower shop in La called empty vase and I was like empty vase and it was like that's the song so then we like went and wrote the song called empty base and my point is is that like any song could be the song but then it can
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be produced in way that you want it to be produced and at the end of doing all of the music cuz you could come out with those demos and that could be the record cuz it's good enough like technically we can that's how people do it these days a
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lot but in my past it was like a band so you write the songs and then you get a producer and then you take them and then you work them up in the certain way by everyone's personality right coming in and and you cut it live and then you do
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overdubs and then you add in the the sauce of whatever that is right and that's just always how I've done it until did the solo period which was more like okay go in with the producer writer and then come out with like a a track
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like it was weird it's different it's just different that's more pop and I think that at the end of writing all the music and knowing oh my gosh I think I have the record now I was like convinced I knew that I couldn't put the record
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out how it was because it felt like me before like it felt me like me 2003 and I was like I I knew I couldn't repeat myself like I can't compete with that I can't that was me trying to be a 0s in 2003 wow man I wish more artists put
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their self aware I really do as a fan of music not as someone in my position I wish more artists weren't searching to try to recapture something and more accepting where they stand today in life and that's I mean it it's a really good
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example of I think why this record sounds so fresh because it it's you now it's me now like I I knew that I needed to be me now which kind of is a little bit of me childhood because of that music I was talking about in the ' 70s and then like
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um also just me being me and my story and then like going in and cutting it live feels like the past but yet I did it with a producer that makes zero sense for me to work with which made it so cool right and I got to work with so I
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was like fighting and it took that's why another reason it took so long cuz I was like I really think I need to re-record the whole record I mean and everyone's just going you've got to be kidding me there's no way but I knew that it was
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possible I just didn't know like Financial if someone would let me and I didn't know if I could really work with Scott Hendrick because he was like this country producer like I mean he's literally talk about a genius I mean
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it's like another level he hears things like I mean he can hear anything like you're like how did you hear that like he he's incredible and I knew that cuz I worked with him through Blake so I basically had sent him a couple songs
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like scarily like what's he going to do like is he going to be like these songs suck like I would never work with you like I don't I didn't know and it was over like a holiday period like weekend and I got a text back and he's like oh
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my God I can't stop listening to these songs and I was I I was screaming I was screaming I was like scri just wrote me isn't it cool that even after everything that you've achieved in your life and people would look at you Gwen and just
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go wow you know you really like you say you ring the bell so often and yet you still get that text and you go and it's the same feeling you got kid but I still have idols and I still have like I know that someone like Scott is so far away
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from what like but so not it's almost like how Blake was it was like Blake seems like on paper wouldn't been my best friend but yet he's my best tell me you know like and Scott was the same way I was like I know his quirky weird way
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of making a record is exactly what I needed to make this record come into full bloom like I needed um cons I needed everything to come together um all the songs needed to be consistent it needed to be an album and a statement
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and it needed to be live so he made it happen and we went to with all the songs we we first we cut everything on an acoustic guitar badly my voice was horrible and I was just singing them just acoustic guitar and me but the acoustic guitar player was incredible and what was so amazing at the recording process because I've never got to do I mean I've worked with no doubt and they're all really incredible musicians and they all have their own
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personalities and stuff like that but to be able to do it in Nashville with these these people that have made it their life mission to be the best at their like instrument right and they are the best like crazy like I mean talk about
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like hyperfocus on but is a punk kid right is someone who grew up listening to scar and punk and wanting to make a racket and you know you found popular popular music and you found success and fame really by being very authentic like
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you said you wrote a heartbreaking song that opened the world up to the energy that your band has which is undeniable and the chemistry has always been amazing from a Fan's point of view so but you're a punk Orange County was in Orange County like
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running around kicking cans and making a racket and then you're in a room with these players who are just like so dialed in was there any part of you that was like rough it up a bit not at all because I knew exactly the sound I
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wanted like we were listening to all those like yach rock kind of like songs I was like Christopher Cross like whatever you can do like you know what I mean like that's my guy I love Christoper M cross you kidding me so
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everybody had their like and everybody just listened we would gather around they never heard the song before and then we all listened to the acoustic and then they just all went in y and did it it was amazing it was spiritual it was
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literally spiritual and wow I couldn't even wrap my head around it because they were taking their own all of everything that that they were as a human being and put pouring it in and of course they they never in their life thought they
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would be doing qu stani record right cuz they were like what's happening right now what a thrill so it was just a really cool and we did the whole thing in two days so two days you must have wanted to go on carry on I did in fact I
25:26
wrote Scott yesterday cuz I found this song on my phone and I was like can we cut this one too like I'll try to find time to come and it's just it it was just he's just such an amazing person to work with and it was dream because he was tied up in all these contracts so he couldn't really work with me officially cuz he was with um another label and and and then he retired and four days after he retired we went in and cut it and the
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the name of the street that we cut on like the name of the street the studio was on was called Iris Street amazing so you bought him out of retirement after 4 days yeah his wife was like oh well I guess we're like all sitting there
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having Mexican food she's like I guess you're not retired it's so nice to to be able to catch up with you and hear you so excited about making music when you have so many outlets and ways to stay busy and stay fulfilled and it's clear to me
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that music really is and I'm not trying to be create a hierarchy for you I understand that what you do on TV you're again you're committed to that and there's lots of things that you do in fashion all kinds of wonderful things
26:23
but it's clear that you're still that kid who just wanted to sing right and wanted to make music I mean I think when I was a kid I was so unbelievably passive and naive and didn't know what I wanted to do like I had like this really
26:36
hard time in school I dyslexic I just my brother was so gifted and talented I just did whatever he told me to do did you get bullied at school do you have aough time I wasn't at all I I had this really like I was like a like nobody
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like I just floated through I don't know how like I wasn't cool I wasn't uncool I wasn't bullied I just sort of like I also had my older brother and he I just hung out with all his people so I was protected but you know I graduated 17
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and we had done the first talent show and had no doubt and so that was what we were doing and then I just I we were talk about this morning like I was in junior college and I I don't even know how I did it like I think that Tony
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helped me cheat my way through because I don't even know how I did got like the points to actually transfer to Cal State and it was during when I was in Cal State Fullerton so I was still living at my parents house I was like still I was
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probably 24 25 at that point so I had been going to college since 177 to then and at that point I was like okay I'm G I just was talking about this this morning to my makeup artist I was like I think I'm going to like just do art now
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cuz I really suck at everything so I'm just going to do art major maybe I'll find something in that yeah and I was doing like Studio classes like sixh hour like painting and I was like I'm going to paint the cover of the tragic Kingdom
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and and I like I was like it's going to look like an orange crate art like I know it is you know and during that semester we played on campus and so many people came that and we was it we already were so huge like a buzz but our
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record wasn't even out like we just had been bubbling it was this weird like God like it's going to happen now here we are 9 years in and and it got so bad that like we were never we were banned to be able to come back like they tore
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the grass up like it was a pit outside at the noon time concert and then people were like handing their peaches down to like get autographs in class the next day and I was like I'm in school right now like I can't find kidding and then I left M will you
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please stop signing autographs for the rest of the class but I ended up like leaving school like during mid semester and making the just a girl video and then that was it I didn't come home for two and a half years it was a rocket
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ship it was a rocket ship it was a rocket ship I had no idea what I was doing I did not have like an identity whatsoever until I wrote a song looking back on it now how did it affect the course of your life those just those two
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years I think it helped me to find my identity like I don't think I was truly like spiritually connected to God at that point to the point that I knew that I was chosen to do it I just kind of still was there was a lot of tension in
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the band there was a lot of like okay we're a band if we do an interviews like we all have to talk like there was a lot of like it was you know if you do a magazine cover like we have to be on it like it was a lot of fighting yeah the
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video for don't speak is a many documentary yeah I know and it's it's crazy because a lot of that stuff was going on and it I you could imagine like we were we were just thrown into it all of a sudden and it was it was wild we'd
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never been I'd never even traveled like I the furthest I'd been was Santa Barbara Catalina Island and San Francisco like I serious swear do you still have that first passport somewhere in storage I bet I do I hope I do wild
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I'm really bad at being keeping all my stuff organized but I I think it was just like every time something great was happening we're number one and then you know oh your boyfriend's got caught cheating on me like it's like there was
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always some major yeah thing happening and I think that's again life like it's just that thing it's a test it's like it's never it's it's a world that's broken it's never going to get you can never it can never be that good there's
30:18
a lot of Heaven in hell right there's a lot there's a lot of dichotomy and a lot of contrast in life and everyone's got their version of that I think a pretty good version of Heaven and Hell Is is achieving a success and reaching your
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dreams whilst you're in a band with people and it's not it's not great that's heaven and that's hell it was and there was like and that like an overall like it was hard um but at the same time it was incredible like there was we had
30:43
amazing shows we were like we I think that what happened to me during that time was as a performer there was a I was so out of my mind because I had been you know still like mourning the loss of the breakup my brother had quit the band
30:59
like I was kind of on my own floating right like I had no you can think about it like my ex was on the tour with me and I wanted him and you didn't have the protection that your brother had given you all those years I was just like
31:12
there by myself and then it would be like every time I would go on stage it would be such an angsty talk about like getting it out like I knew at that point because we had been playing so long we had this weird confidence that was so big
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it was like I knew that we were opening for Bush and the goooo dolls and we had a 30 minute slot and we were in an arena and we knew that we were going to slice it like by the end of the set we were we were we sliced the night like and we
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knew it every night like it was like this weird confidence and then like through the tour like it was like more people were showing up earlier you know what I mean like and it was just growing and growing and growing and that energy
31:55
that you had like you said with Tony which was I mean it's long in the past now but when you think back at that moment like you say he's in the band you're not over him it's still a thing do you think that contributes to this kind of like almost this anxiety that drives the band into a place that you just couldn't cerebrally imagine like it's just some chemistry that so I if I told you like really like how crazy of a mind game it was like
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between that going on and then like all of the you know all of a sudden there was likew bees everywhere like whatever they called them right I remember I'm sitting in my like tour bus right goody too shoes like my sister was pregnant so
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I was like I'm going to make her a baby blanket so I'm like I'm literally sewing cutting out circles and like making a quilt for my S like in this is me backstage like a little geek and I'm looking out the window of the tour bus
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and it was one of those shows where you could see people hundreds of girls walking and I'm like wait a minute like that girl looks like me and that girl looks like me and that girl looks like me and it was like all of a sudden it
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was like what like what's happening and then all of a sudden you know those girls were backstage like it it was a lot it was a lot of it was a lot of things but at the same time there was a lot of it was like a family you know
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what I mean like we loved each other and but it was dramatic and it was hard um but it was amazing so it's hard to like complain or say but there was truths to some of the craziness that had had gone on during that time that's the through
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line of this conversation pretty any conversation will have just this is it right it's not a normal experience and it shouldn't be and yet to BR to close a loop on this particular sort of moment in in time with you and I what a
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beautiful way to kind of light the fire again this year and to give people what we really wanted I felt like it was a gift actually a gift to you but I felt like you were gifting us it was amazing it was just like riding a bike and the
34:00
energy was just so positive and it was it felt like no time had passed and I mean when those when we cuz we like came up under the stage and that first show my legs were like jelly like I had like really prepped for the show because I
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knew that stage was like 250 ft like it was I was going to be dead like you know it's like how do you sing and dance that big up a stage yeah it's gigantic I just came up and the energy like it's hard to describe it because that way it was like
34:28
a tsunami of like love like just collapsing has made my my my knees weak like I couldn't dance like I was like and so that first weekend was just like so unexpectedly the the amount of love that we received it felt so iconic and
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like such a a moment I never thought I would experience so excited and then the next weekend I was like I don't even want to do it cuz how can you compare to what just happened like mik dropped like I'm done like I don't even want to go
34:55
back I was like I was Wonder week like if you have an amazing first week you're like it can only go down and then that show was like even more cool in some ways or different because there was Zero nerves it was like it was like in the
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moment you know what I'm saying cuz I wasn't like I wasn't I didn't care anymore but yet it was so incredible like I had such a fun show that and then it was over like that then it was over just like that I think the thing is is
35:21
that they like there there is such a chemistry between us like there it it's undeniable and it's it is that it that we do together that that you know I can't do without them and you know what I mean we we do together to live like
35:35
that's the Mad thing is like you you've given birth to this experience and people keep the experience alive even if you're not in it and it's like we've been living in it we love these songs we love this band like music is Magic right
35:47
it just keeps it just keeps moving yeah it's crazy how even like with this new record when once it was finished and it it even like spoke back to me more like I remember I was um doing a festival up in Canada and Scott sent me the whole
36:04
record and I was like this the first time you heard it yeah I couldn't I didn't want to listen I was scared to listen to it and I listened to it and we were driving in the mountains up and and and I was like I was so relieved like
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okay you know still needed to get like mixes and all that stuff but it it I did have demoitis a lot that's when music sounds the best cuz you've just you've just finished it you're in love with it yeah you're really close to it anything
36:28
after that it's tough but also like to re like reincarnate them into this new record but thank God that I did because I feel like now when time passes and you have the Gap it really does feel so the the liveness of it um and the individual
36:47
players and like what we did to create that sound is what what the lyrics needed to I can't even imagine what smaller my tear sounds like when not like this in a strange way like I don't know what a different kind of mod like a
36:59
different kind of texture or tone sounds like to that song it just feels like it's always been that that song was crazy too because at that point we had already written together so much and I was like oh my gosh you guys have to go with me to the ranch we'll go to Oklahoma and we'll we'll have like a riding weekend together and we'll cook and you can see you know see the house and cuz we at that point they knew every single thing
37:23
about like to see you again Blake he's like I swear I just met you yeah exact exactly so I did it we did it we all hopped on the plane and we brought cash and um circuit and Madison and and Nick long and it um we just it was like this
37:39
rainy night and and we wrote that song and it's crazy because yeah that was like one of my favorite songs that we wrote on the record so did you ever see yourself spending some some time in Oklahoma on a ranch planting and what an
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amazing life I know and it it I don't even like bugs or dirt or like I'm not like I'm not like like my nature is like you know Huntington Beach like yeah that's why I asked I'm like crazy you punk kid has ended up in this incredible
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life full of curiosity I think it's one of those things that I didn't realize I I would need or like so much cuz it's so um free like I can remember the first few times going there with him and I'm like he's like no like we can go do this
38:23
I'm like no Paparazzi are going to no there there's not like if there was a Paparazzi someone would shoot them just kidding you got there just kidding just before the Bomb by the way you snuck that in right under the door that stuff doesn't resonate out there right yeah like we go on like a pontoon boat not going to get there's nobody there like you could just be like totally disgusting and eat Doritos and like no one's going to like SC where do
38:53
you go from here as a as a as a musician as an artist with this album of body of work now back in the day the the the the traditional move would have been to put the band together and go out there and tour it now you as you asked yourself
39:02
some really tough questions when you're making this record like does anyone need it does anyone want it do I want it how do you are you continuing with that trajectory of sort of hard questions to yourself about what you do next there's
39:13
not like a super plan for anything but there's not a super no to anything like I think it's just going to see how it feels already it feels so good like it I I I'm dying to share the rest of the record and again like I said like even
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yesterday I was like oh maybe I can go cut this other song that I found on my phone like it's impossible to not want to continue to create music I mean for me like like you said like that the day that they're born and then that like
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repetitive listening to them back and then they the lyrics actually speak back and like cure you that is just something I'll never get over no matter how old or you know unwanted I might be in the world like I I feel like I'm always
39:54
going to want to do that but yeah it's really fun to share music and it I feel like so blessed that I got to do that and it's interesting I saw um Nelly Fado hey what's up shout out she did some she posted something yesterday about her
40:09
records that her favorite records and it was like I love return of Saturn which for me is a record that like it's one of those records that I can't even listen to it like I'm like I would even like hearing the like seeing the artwork why
40:22
because it was during such a tough time in my life and I I look at the songs and it's it's kind of like it was so experimental and so sort of like um I don't know like it's it's like if I would have got out then like things
40:35
would have been so different but I it's all in the album so it's very painful yeah but like so many people tell me about what that record did for them like that particular album which is just wasn't it doesn't seem like it was one
40:48
of our bigger records I don't know if it was yeah but every great artist who has any kind any any kind of Legacy in this life any continues to build something beautiful has that record has that I I sort of refer to them as almost
40:59
sacrificial whereas you've got to kind of go through the challenging aspects of making that to give yourself a future for you that future was some some no doubt but also a lot on your own that that album afforded you a life in a lot
41:11
of ways it was like me trying to be like really become a writer because I think the first record God was like going to just started dropping him down like little bombs like just girl spider you need these yeah here they are cuz I
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don't know how they were written cuz I didn't know how to write a song so they were just there all of a sudden they were just my truth they were just coming through like channeling them through me he was and then the next record was like
41:37
I'm going to start listening to like oh I'm going to read Sylvia Plath and I'm going to like be a poet and like you know what I mean yeah cuz I was like in my young like 20s like I had just went around the world and I really wanted to
41:49
prove to myself so I think there are some really great Like lyrics and it really does Express that time period but it's just I guess what I'm trying to say is it's so beautiful how it translates out there to the world when you let them
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go because it's it's one thing for me and it's something else for someone else and that's why having bouquet and now being able to do that again is just going to be uh efor for me this is an interesting line of questioning for me
42:12
because I have to I want to do this really thoughtfully and I want you to know that I I'm not assuming any role here I'm just asking because I'm curious that you went through such a tough time as a as a strong female figurehead of a band effectively
42:27
like an artist writing a song like just a girl is truth just pure truth and yet and now we find ourselves by no means fixed but in a place where if you just take a look at it on paper different world simple question how does that make
42:39
you feel as someone who gets a chance to live both lives to be there when things were really really challenging to try to make a statement and now to see some ground being covered at least I feel that way as a music fan I don't feel
42:50
like I was trying to make a big statement when I wrote just a girl at all I didn't think anyone would hear that song I was just I was literally observing what happened in my life as a female person like I think finding my
43:06
sexual identity like okay like I'm just this girl that looks in the mirror in junior high in the gym and goes am I ugly or pretty I can't like I don't know like you just as a little girl you don't know like am I trying to figure out who
43:19
you are and then you figure out ooh there's this band called madness ooh that's I'm going to get into SCA and then like all a said I'm going to dress like this and you're finding yourself you're finding your music you're finding
43:29
yourself through the music and I walk to school and someone whistles and I'm like what like someone just whistled like ooh and then you find your power you find this feminine power that you don't even know you had cuz you're you were a little girl and now you're not a little girl and that's kind of what that song was born out of like oh if I drive at night I could be killed because of cuz I'm a girl right like I need that's why
43:53
my dad wants me to be home you know I my brother protect gas at night like oh okay cuz I'm vulnerable I'm you know I'm prey so like I that's how the song was written it wasn't like I've had it up to here I'm going to tell you all about it
44:07
cuz there was no you to tell to like nobody was listening what I'm saying and no one was ever going to listen so I don't feel like I should get I I don't want any credit I don't feel like I deserve credit like I just think it was
44:19
literally a thought about my truth that must be one of the hardest things for all artists I think is to watch the CH the shape of a song change and not really recognize that shape anymore classic example beautifully thoughtful
44:30
answer to a question based around the fact that you know what you were going through versus what at least female artists are experiencing now is is different not better entirely but different and you're like hm not the shape of the song I wrote though which
44:43
is really interesting I think there was also a bit of like um a bit of that energy because back in the day when I was first in no doubt and we would be playing this is before people knew who we were and we were but we always were a
44:57
really big fish in a tiny tiny pond like I was the only girl in my like in that doing that kind of music in those in that small pond like and so there was a little bit of having to like keep up with the boys and the but
45:13
also not even keep up it was like the people that influenced me were like you know Angelo Moore from fishbone like this is a guy that is a living cartoon character like I remember seeing him at the Golden Bear and my brother we drove
45:26
down to Huntington to this little tiny club and they had like those Circle tables like bar tables right and it's like a little tiny stage small as this room and he literally jumped off the stage onto our table like I was like
45:38
amazing life changing yeah like we would go see James addiction you know we'd go see like The Untouchables we would go see um I'm trying to think like even like Red Hot Chili Peppers and those live bands that were influencing we're
45:51
all guys so for me it was like I want to be like that I don't care like I don't care that I'm a girl I'm a still going to have that energy cuz that's what I love you know we're in some we're in some anniversary territory right now
46:01
with you know love angel music baby and this is a record that we kind of touched on a little bit earlier in the conversation which was a step away from the band Dynamic and a chance for you to really explore your own world and
46:11
different collaborators I guess in a way was it the first time you really got to get an impression of how people saw you that weren't just your friends in the band like how does FAL actually see me what does he think I am cuz I think I'm
46:25
in this band he thinks something else well I got to work with forel with the band that's true that was like me and Jimmy like being like let's do something out like rock steady album was just such a free album where we the band was ready
46:39
to like collaborate so that was like the baby step to me collaborating I think because it was the first time it was like okay who are our heroes who can we go in with and write songs like Rick O Kasich and like you know we went in with
46:51
um um well for real was one of them that was like it was like a weird thing he ain't bringing holl back girl to the band right he a he ain't bringing that to the band he's not going hey guys I got a song it's called holl back girl
47:02
they're gonna be like is it no doubt though like that song was written crazily cuz we went in the studio he was doing one of his Fels where he had like every room at at the whole every room he was working and like he comes in with his
47:16
little scooter and then no doubt it's in there it's like all of us but how are we going to write a s with farell and all of us like that that's not how okay I'll sing this verse but he played us like five tracks and then we picked the one
47:28
that was the hella good track we were like we that one Fel feels the best for us or whatever let's all vote on it cuz we voted on everything that song was written so fast like I think that at first the band was like not really sure
47:40
or into it but um we did it and then that after that relationship with Fel I was like wow you're like from another planet but our planets somehow are in rotation like I don't know you're kind of like I feel like I have lamb you have
47:55
ice cream like you're like super inspired by Japanese culture I'm like it was like everything was like at that time we were almost mirroring each other like in in the way that we were outside thinkers I think in that moment one of
48:08
the most beautiful Outsiders of my lifetime I've I've ever been become a fan of I mean he's he's just he's unbelievable unbelievable so when I decided to do the solo record which I always called a dance record not a solo
48:18
record because it felt really weird to say a solo record that was like super scary but I just I again it was an idea that I didn't come with it just was in me like it would was planted I needed to do this but like all the music that was
48:31
popular dance music that I was ignoring in high school cuz I was so SCA that I was like way above that music you was still absorbing it right it was still the backdrop of my life and it was still I Lov that music so I really knew
48:44
exactly what kind of like I wanted to make an 80s dance record kind of um you know based on that kind of that really like that Lisa Lisa and you know Debbie Deb all that stuff so it was really clear so every time I would go in with
48:58
someone I'd be like Dallas Austin like I want to make this is the record I'm making I you know I was Jimmy Jam Cherry Le this is the record I'm making and we would just write these songs it was like a miracle if I think about like the
49:13
through line of this conversation just been so much fun I love you you too um is that you sat down and you were like I'm going to do the art of the cover and I'm going to knit my sister something and I'm going to design something I'm
49:26
going to create something like that's what's going to be my solution to life is I'm going to create things not just sing things and perform things or whatever but you design you're a designer and so when you go and do like
49:37
love do this album Like Love Angel music Baby You're like I know exactly what I'm going to design and then when you finish this album with circuit and all these amazing producers you're like I need to go that is the design of this record
49:46
does that make sense it does but it's not always clear you know and it's like a lot of prayer and a lot of like please like please show me the way like tell me what I'm supped to be doing I want to fulfill my purpose and you know that's
50:00
gotten that that prayer has gotten louder and louder through you know knowing that that I need that that's my destiny like also like finding out like accepting the fact that I have been chosen to do this like that that confidence or it's it's not even
50:15
confidence it's more like um privilege like you don't have to be humble about it because it's like it wasn't my idea I was just I was just chosen like to it's acceptance yeah because I didn't do any of it it was just ideas that were sent
50:27
to me and even with love angel music baby it was just it was just there in my head like given to me in my heart and it was way bigger than a record it wasn't songs it was a world yeah like I mean I wanted to do an animated movie I was
50:42
going to it was I was going to be like my record was going to be Hello Kitty but come to life in a world my world right and because my dad I grew up with my dad and he worked for Yamaha motorcycles which is a Japanese company
50:56
so so he would always be going to Japan always bringing back all these Treasures back then if you wanted to find out about Japan you would go get at the library up some pictures someone had to come back with some stuff yeah you
51:08
didn't like know about it so he was always telling me about oh I saw the Elvis's you know haruku or like and he would we would have dinner like we'd have our family dinner and we'd hear all these crazy stories about his travels
51:21
and so when I finally in the '90s got to go and be in Harajuku I was like coming home from me I was like whoa this is what I heard about my whole life and I'm walking down the streets of Harajuku right now and everyone had so much swag
51:35
style like it was like they were so out of control with the style I've never tried to dress better in my life than when I went to Tokyo this year every day I was like nope nope like I just you got to show up you have to it was just an
51:49
amazing time period because I had already traveled the world I had the success I did it with no doubt and then it was like to be able B to go and do this kind of fun record that was it was probably the most creative time period
52:02
of my life because I was not only doing the album but I got pregnant so I had the create creative like giving making a baby like giving birth and then in between the two albums I think the baby was nine weeks and Jimmy was like you
52:18
got to go in the studio m was like I'm nursing my baby right now cuz I I had literally gone on that I wasn't even going to tour the record and then I was like I had done like one live show in I think in England and I was
52:33
like I got I how can I not tour this like love angel I have to do something so I did a tiny little tour and Chaos when I was in rehearsals I found out I was pregnant chaos and it was C I was so sick like I would do cuz I'm dyslexic
52:45
and every time when I would do this song called serus that is it's like s e i r o u s I would think I was going to spell it wrong and I was like and then there's bananas as well you really set yourself you believe that God's funny he's like
52:59
you're not going to be able to spell but you're going to teach the world how to spell B oh my God this Nick song is called The Alphabet Song forwards and backwards yeah watch me I could probably do it backwards no problem but I I it
53:09
was interesting because I would just be so sick on that tour but anyways gave birth to the baby nine days later he's like you got to go in with this guy Aon he's an like a rapper he's here from Africa I was like what like what are you
53:22
talking about like no and then he's like if you anything you do in your life you've got to go take the session and I pack the baby up unbelievable and I walk in and there's acon and it was like hey what's up homie like all of a sudden
53:34
we're like best friends we write Sweet Escape and not only did we write the whole song and it's like we're finished and I was like I cannot cuz I was like I want to write something it's like I want like I want it like I want
53:46
it to be like rappy like and so he we did the Sweet Escape and he goes oh wait I have one more idea and he goes into the booth he's like [Applause] woohoo and at first I was like is this song cheesy like I don't know I don't
54:00
know if it's is this is this so cool that it's super cool Orange County kid is baring at you in your brain right now my hormones were all screwed up I had no perspective I swear my infant just looked me and went this is cheesy and then that was like
54:16
worldwide tour around the world with my baby and then the month I got home from that tour I got pregnant with the Zuma but yeah talk about like being creative that was definitely a very like Clear Vision whereas the last whatever eight
54:31
years of like writing wasn't clear like I just kept trying to compete with myself but there's a lot of creativity in nature and if you think about it there's a real there's a real like little a real nice meeting point here
54:42
for us to pause until next time which is that you know you did create a lot in the last eight years right you created a future for yourself a beautiful new relationship something that you could build a foundation upon continue to
54:55
create art and find your voice again you brought Joy back to People by reconnecting with your past that cleared the way for the future and you laid flowers all over the ground continuing to grow so I mean that's what bouquet is
55:08
Right bouquet is the sum of all of these beautiful healings and meeting points yourself with yourself yourself with nature yourself with Blake that's what I think that's what we're going to hear on this record I think that's my gosh
55:19
you're so smart that's what it is thoughful and cute and all of it thank you Winan thank you so so much you just Contin to like bring joy to us all and man what a gift to have you on this planet so blessed thank you guys [Music]