girl in red joins Hattie Collins on PROUD Radio to discuss her new album, opening for Taylor Swift, collaborating with Sabrina Carpenter and more
Norwegian singer-songwriter girl in red joins Hattie Collins on PROUD Radio on Apple Music 1 to discuss making her new album ‘I’M DOING IT AGAIN BABY’. She also talks about making her album in different cities, collaborating with pop star Sabrina Carpenter, opening for Taylor Swift on The Eras Tour and how this experience impacted her record. Across the conversation they also discuss self-esteem and the rise of country music with mainstream artists.
girl in red talks self-esteem and writing ‘I’M DOING IT AGAIN BABY’...
I feel like I've lost a lot of my carelessness and my bombastic self-esteem that I had when I was younger, where I was like, "no, of course I'm going to do this. Of course, of course..." I was just wearing anything that I wanted to wear. I was not self-conscious in any way. Now coming into my 20s and now I'm 25, so I've been here for a little bit. I feel like I've just been very humbled by life and you just realise that you're actually not cool and I've had to find my way back to my youthful sort of self-esteem way of being able to write the song, to just be playful. Because most of the time I don't feel cool, but to be able to write something that's just unapologetically big and f***ing boasty like this, you just have to go back to that sort of carelessness. But it was hard because I don't feel cool.
girl in red talks starting her new album…
I remember one of the main things was that, "oh my God, I need to start thinking about this new album? Because I hadn't, for over a year basically, I hadn't been in the studio, on the back of the new album, I got a new girlfriend, I got a new apartment, and I was just living life to the fullest and just hanging out with people, friends, everyone, just living life. Then in 2022, I started to freak out a little bit. I was like, "Wait, I don't have any new material." And I was touring a lot, so I was struggling to come up with new material. So I think the initial beginning of making album two was like frantically, "I need new material. I need to start making album two." I didn't know it'd take so freaking long to make it either, because it was really hard to make this album, unfortunately, because I've had a very, very heavy writer's block actually, but I think I'm out of it now. I feel lighter, I feel better.
girl in red talks about the rise in country music with mainstream artists…
I've read only a couple of pages of Rick Rubin's book, on one of those pages he talked about how if you don't make your idea, someone else will. And sort of how we're all kind of a product of our time and if you're exposed to sort of similar things, I think that will lead a couple of people to have the exact same ideas. And I think that's quite interesting. So maybe Lana [Del Rey] and Beyonce and all these... like, Posty... all these other people have been exposed or gone through a similar subconscious thought process of coming to, "Banjo is cool. No, f*** it. That's actually really f***ing cool." So I thought that was quite interesting because all of Lana and all those things actually came out later and I was like, "No, Beyonce has a banjo on her song. Everyone's going to think I ripped her off." But actually I've had a banjo on this song for a year and a half.
girl in red talks opening for Taylor Swift on The Eras Tour and how the experience impacted the album…
I already pretty much had all the songs at that time, I had all the sonics built out. I just didn't have the words, which that's what took so long. I wouldn't say musically it did anything but with just where I want to take this album, it really inspired me, because she is just such a great person and artist and she has amazing artistry. She has, I don't know how many albums, 13, 14, 15, 20. Yeah, it's insane. I wouldn't say she impacted the album necessarily or the tour. I think Taylor has impacted the album because she has impacted me. But the tour specifically I think was kind of something. I was in Electric Lady in between shows in June last year with The Eras Tour, so maybe it has infused something into me.
girl in red talks collaborating with Sabrina Carpenter on ‘You Need Me Now’ …
I was just a big fan of her music, and apparently she had seen me play live, and then I sent her a video. I was like, "You know what? I'm just going to shoot my shot, see where it lands." We had already DM'd very briefly, and she was super down to be on the song. I sent her the song and then we FaceTimed here and there and kind of brainstormed ideas and kind of what we should do with the lyrics. I sort of had the melodies and stuff sketched out, and I felt like her voice would be so much cooler singing that than my voice would be. She only went into the studio once and recorded everything. She's such a pro. She just smashed it out and I got it back and I was like, "This is exactly what this song needed. It's so cool."
girl in red talks making her album in different cities…
I feel like New York definitely added a lot. Electric Lady is such an iconic studio, when you walk in there, you're like, "I'm going to give it my best. I have to make important stuff," because it's the smell and everything. It's just a whole sensory experience to be in there because up and down the hallways, there's this guy firing up Palo Santo and it's just such a weird vibe there. But I absolutely love it. Electric Lady, I made the bridge for, "DOING IT AGAIN BABY." I remember in Paris, I worked all day, maybe two, three days on this song called, "Pick Me" on the album. We didn't get anywhere with it. But the minute I got back from Paris and I got back from that trip, I realised where I had to take the song. I worked three days on something that was not happening. I don't know how much money we spent on that studio, but nothing out of that studio trip came out physically or recorded so that you can actually have proof that we were in a studio when we did record stuff. And then when I came to Bergen again, then we had the song figured out in a day. I think honestly, every single city has contributed... probably Bergen the most because that's where I was the most. But it's a cute city.
