Speaker 1: Pushkin. Singer songwriter Arlow Parks is a compelling new voice
Speaker 1: in music. Born in London, the twenty two year old
Speaker 1: snagged the Best New Artist trophy at the brit Awards
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty one, in part because of her breakout
Speaker 1: single Eugene, about an unrequited crush. Arlow's songwriting is a
Speaker 1: vivid exploration of the euphoria and heartbreak that comes with
Speaker 1: being young and in love. She pulls inspiration from a
Speaker 1: diverse palette of music, including Ethiopian folk, Radiohead, and Diggable Planets.
Speaker 1: She's found a way to expertly weave all of those
Speaker 1: influences into her work. This month, Arlo Parks will release
Speaker 1: her sophomore record called Mysoft Machine. She collaborated with producers
Speaker 1: who worked with Brockhampton, Sizza and Frank Ocean, and even
Speaker 1: produced some of it herself. The album unpacks the anxiety
Speaker 1: of feeling lost in your twenties and navigating the uncertainty
Speaker 1: of life with grace. On this week's episode, I talked
Speaker 1: with Arlow about how seeing black creators pushing the boundaries
Speaker 1: of popular music inspires her. She also explains how taking
Speaker 1: long drives around La shaped the sound of her new
Speaker 1: album and how she first started writing songs at just
Speaker 1: seven years old. Plus, we'll hear Arlow play three of
Speaker 1: her songs live from the Village Studios in Los Angeles.
Speaker 1: This is broken record liner notes for the digital Age.
Speaker 1: I'm justin Mitchman. Before we jump into my conversation with
Speaker 1: Arlow Parks, let's hear a live acoustic performance of her
Speaker 1: new song Impurities.
Speaker 2: Yesday, my chastis buzzing like a blue bocage, laugh like
Speaker 2: Julie up and not. She touched my leg to make
Speaker 2: sure I'm still fair. Already like a star like a star,
Speaker 2: already like a star, like a star. Already like a star,
Speaker 2: like a star. When you race, so my impurity, when
Speaker 2: you race, so my impurety find you embrace so my
Speaker 2: impurtyes or no feel clean? Why that you threw me?
Speaker 2: Bn was so intense that it was physical. M sure
Speaker 2: the rainbow and myself. You notice beauty and more forms
Speaker 2: than nos. Already a like a star like a star,
Speaker 2: already like a star, like a star, already like a
Speaker 2: star like a star. Yeah, find you him ride aw
Speaker 2: my impurevidies find you him bred are my impuivity, Find
Speaker 2: you him bred, So my impuvity enough feel clean.
Speaker 3: Don't hide the bruce when you norm watching. May don't
Speaker 3: hide the bruce when you norm watching. Maybe don't hide
Speaker 3: the bruise.
Speaker 4: I know it's hard to be a life some time,
Speaker 4: already like a star like a star, already like a star,
Speaker 4: like a star, already like a star like a star.
Speaker 2: When you him bray. So my impurvities when you him raised.
Speaker 2: So my impurvities when you him raised? Are my impurvities enough?
Speaker 2: You clean.
Speaker 1: Impurity. I've like listened to it, like it's a song
Speaker 1: that I find, like I repeat like three or four
Speaker 1: times when I listen because it's such like a feeling
Speaker 1: of just like elation and freedom, and that emotion really
Speaker 1: is so in that song that I just usually play
Speaker 1: it a few times because I'm like, I love that feeling,
Speaker 1: like if I could bottle that, you know, Yeah, And.
Speaker 5: That's exactly how it feels to me. Like I wanted
Speaker 5: to capture that feeling of like either you're coming back
Speaker 5: from a night out, You're coming back from the beach
Speaker 5: with people that you feel completely safe with and the
Speaker 5: sun is setting and everyone's just kind of quite serene. Yeah,
Speaker 5: and like a few people are dozing off and like
Speaker 5: everyone is just content, And that's exactly what I wanted.
Speaker 1: Those moments, man, if you could just like freeze them
Speaker 1: where it's like everything is like perfect. Yeah, and they're
Speaker 1: always like moments of quiet or something for like a
Speaker 1: big thing or a little bit whatever. It's just like
Speaker 1: it was just like whoa, Like life couldn't get better
Speaker 1: than this moment.
Speaker 5: Peace. Peace. And I think the biggest thing that is
Speaker 5: like hard about being human is that those moments do end.
Speaker 5: But that shouldn't be a reason to like not let
Speaker 5: them be, you know. Yeah, I think a lot of
Speaker 5: it is just accepting that even the most beautiful moments
Speaker 5: and the most painful ones, like at some point they
Speaker 5: will end.
Speaker 1: It's all transient, it really is.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I had no conception really how old you were beyond
Speaker 1: just knowing, Like when I first heard your music, which
Speaker 1: I guess was twenty eighteen, Yeah, but I was like WHOA.
Speaker 5: Like I was seventeen then? Yeah, I literally was seventeen.
Speaker 1: I mean not to stereotype what the art young people make,
Speaker 1: but it sounds very mature, you know, I think we formed.
Speaker 5: I think honestly, it's just because I spent so much
Speaker 5: of my life when I was growing up just practicing
Speaker 5: like it just what, just practicing writing, practicing, like just
Speaker 5: being a student of what I was seeing around me,
Speaker 5: and like making a lot of really bad, silly songs.
Speaker 5: I just at a very early age decided to dedicate
Speaker 5: my life to like the practice of writing and expression,
Speaker 5: not necessarily singing, but just like storytelling. And I would
Speaker 5: write every single day. So by the time I put
Speaker 5: out a song from the age of like seven or eight,
Speaker 5: I was like writing every day. And so yeah, I
Speaker 5: had a lot of experience in that way.
Speaker 1: What inspired that a seven or eight I don't know.
Speaker 5: I was just very curious and my imagination was just
Speaker 5: so like insane that I had. I needed a place
Speaker 5: to put all of that. And I just got a
Speaker 5: lot of joy from just like making up these little
Speaker 5: like fantasy worlds.
Speaker 1: More insane than the average seven or eight year olds.
Speaker 2: Maybe not.
Speaker 5: I feel like I just had that urge to put
Speaker 5: it somewhere. I feel like a lot of people maybe
Speaker 5: would like make up little games with their friends or
Speaker 5: you know, it would stay quite contained. But I always
Speaker 5: had this urge to write things down and to document them.
Speaker 1: Was anyone in your family writing or a writer.
Speaker 5: Everyone in my family is like like engineers and lawyers
Speaker 5: and accountants, Like no one is really remotely creative. My
Speaker 5: dad really likes jazz music and listens to a lot
Speaker 5: of music, but no one is like remotely creative in
Speaker 5: any way.
Speaker 1: Wow, if no one in your family maybe inspires you
Speaker 1: to do that, were you seeing art or hearing art?
Speaker 5: I grew up with the Internet and with YouTube, and
Speaker 5: my uncle gave me a collection of records and that
Speaker 5: was like an interesting way into the world of records
Speaker 5: and world building. And he had a really interesting taste
Speaker 5: because he's French and so there was a lot of
Speaker 5: like French music, French funk, but also like Elle Cool
Speaker 5: J and Tupac and like Shad Yeah amazing, and like
Speaker 5: it was such an eclectic mix of things. And I
Speaker 5: think that started it from me because I was like
Speaker 5: maybe like nine or ten and then growing up with
Speaker 5: the Internet on YouTube, I could just go down these
Speaker 5: little rabbit holes and like see you Radiohead perform at Glass,
Speaker 5: like see people like odd Future kind of like blossoming
Speaker 5: online and being like weird and black and like yeah crazy,
Speaker 5: you know. I was watching that rap Caviar thing that
Speaker 5: Tyler Creator did, like yesterday night beautiful, right, and it
Speaker 5: was so beautiful and I feel like I'm part of
Speaker 5: that generation because I remember seeing that, seeing the colorful
Speaker 5: clothing and like just that sense of energy and just
Speaker 5: these people being disruptors and making like weird stuff and
Speaker 5: I was like, I can do that.
Speaker 1: I don't know if they know how important that was
Speaker 1: for so many people by that point. I was in
Speaker 1: college at that point, and I remember feeling like, oh shit,
Speaker 1: like these are my people finally.
Speaker 5: You know, like yeah, exactly, And that's always what has
Speaker 5: kind of inspired me. And I think growing up, I
Speaker 5: always did have a sense that the music that I
Speaker 5: liked was an interesting kind of pod of music, everything
Speaker 5: from ambient music to like my Bloody Valentine, and then
Speaker 5: I also really loved like Diggable Planets, but I also
Speaker 5: loved like jazz music and like Ethiopian folk music. Like
Speaker 5: I just had this world of things and I was like, Okay,
Speaker 5: maybe I can distill this, Maybe I can create a
Speaker 5: kind of little collage almost of all the things that
Speaker 5: I like, because I didn't feel like anyone else had
Speaker 5: that specific taste.
Speaker 1: I'm trying to imagine what listening to Tupac in England
Speaker 1: and you're like nine or ten years old and it's
Speaker 1: like two thousand and nine, twenty ten and you're hearing
Speaker 1: pac Like, what was you know? I think a park
Speaker 1: I grew about here and I was like six when
Speaker 1: he was killed, so like that's that's my memory is
Speaker 1: like it was it was a bunch of chaos and
Speaker 1: then he was killed, and it was it was like, oh,
Speaker 1: you know, it was like almost scary. I just trying
Speaker 1: to imagine that vibe was.
Speaker 5: Like for you, I think for me it was. Yeah,
Speaker 5: it did feel like a world that was very alien
Speaker 5: to the one that I was living in. But I
Speaker 5: loved the fact that even though I hadn't lived any
Speaker 5: of the experiences that he was talking about, I could
Speaker 5: picture it, like it was so vivid the storytelling, and
Speaker 5: I think I've kind of carried that forward, that sense
Speaker 5: of like the spoken word and feeling like someone is
Speaker 5: telling you their truth, and that sense of rhythm and
Speaker 5: also just how that can kind of really bring communities
Speaker 5: together and move people. And yeah, I think I was
Speaker 5: just moved by the way that he painted these really
Speaker 5: vivid scenes of like a place that was so far
Speaker 5: away from where I was as a kid.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there is a lot of that in your songwriting.
Speaker 1: Like I know you're gonna play Eugene for us. That's
Speaker 1: the song in particular. Hmm that I When I hear
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh man, that's like that's really laying it
Speaker 1: out there.
Speaker 5: Like definitely, definitely that song is like I feel like
Speaker 5: it's the first time that I was really kind of
Speaker 5: like stripping myself bare in that way. But I think
Speaker 5: that the way that the song kind of traveled in
Speaker 5: the world and the kind of queer experience that it captured,
Speaker 5: I think it's kind of like what you were saying before,
Speaker 5: where I felt like it was an experience that only
Speaker 5: I had gone through, and then when I put it
Speaker 5: out into the world, people were just like holding up
Speaker 5: mirrors to themselves and being like, Wow, I this is
Speaker 5: what I lived, whether it was twenty years ago, well,
Speaker 5: this is what I'm in now. So I think that
Speaker 5: fear kind of melted away once I just started getting
Speaker 5: a reaction from people. But yeah, it's scary. It's always scary.
Speaker 5: It always feels very i don't know, just exposing, but
Speaker 5: I'm kind of used to it now because I'm doing
Speaker 5: it all the time.
Speaker 1: Here. When I knew we were going to do this,
Speaker 1: I was like, man, I should think of like what, like,
Speaker 1: what is it that attracted me to your music? I
Speaker 1: think there's a lot of things, but one of the
Speaker 1: main things was I realized was the writing. You know,
Speaker 1: people who are like songwriters, it can be obtuse and
Speaker 1: that can be cool, but it's like it and there's
Speaker 1: some mystery, so I think what you're writing, but there's
Speaker 1: also like some of it's really evocative, you know, like
Speaker 1: just even like on your first song, like your Coca
Speaker 1: Cola eyes. You know, I think I've thought about that
Speaker 1: phrase meaning three different things since the first time I've
Speaker 1: heard it. You know, the first time I heard it,
Speaker 1: I interpreted that one way was very vivid. It made
Speaker 1: me think of like a Coca cola bottle and like
Speaker 1: being like this person's like wide eyed. And then I
Speaker 1: was like, oh, it's like a person on cocaine. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but it's such an evocative line. And even your new
Speaker 1: song and Purities, there's there's some evocative stuff in there too.
Speaker 1: And the way you reference people.
Speaker 2: Like I love it.
Speaker 5: I can't stop myself.
Speaker 1: I love when you reference people, you know, Gerardrey Claire
Speaker 1: Dane's juliette Venot.
Speaker 5: Shit, it's like, oh wow, I don't know why I
Speaker 5: have the instinct to do that. I think when it
Speaker 5: comes to my taste in writing, it's something that I
Speaker 5: really can't explain, Like I guess it is just a
Speaker 5: mixture of my favorite writers and my favorite influences. I
Speaker 5: think a lot of it is just like a love
Speaker 5: of a film.
Speaker 1: When did you start loving film?
Speaker 5: I think, honestly, it was a little bit later in
Speaker 5: my life, I mean my short life, so probably when
Speaker 5: I was like in my late teens, I really started
Speaker 5: like throwing myself into film, especially like international film, like
Speaker 5: I never really explored like Brazilian film and Iranian film,
Speaker 5: and just actually really spreading out into different cultures in
Speaker 5: the way that they approach storytelling. And I think that
Speaker 5: really bled into the work because there was this sense
Speaker 5: of wanting to paint these scenes as they were unfolding
Speaker 5: in front of my eyes and picking out these specific details.
Speaker 5: And you know, the people who are listening to my
Speaker 5: music aren't like living my life, and maybe they weren't there,
Speaker 5: but there is something about like detailing, like the eyelash
Speaker 5: on somebody's cheek, or like what exact song was playing
Speaker 5: on the CD when this happened, and the exact tone
Speaker 5: of brown of the floor. Like I really love that
Speaker 5: sense of detail, and I think that happens so naturally.
Speaker 1: The details, little details really create like a point for
Speaker 1: like the for me as a listener to really all
Speaker 1: of a sudden be transported, you know, like yeah, it
Speaker 1: does like the hard work of getting me in and
Speaker 1: then like all the other things that are maybe a
Speaker 1: little more open for interpretation or whatever can kind of
Speaker 1: like now I'm like in a frame of mind where
Speaker 1: I can really interpret those things in an interesting way.
Speaker 1: You know, when you say like Claire Danes and it's
Speaker 1: like you're automatically like I know, I just it's like
Speaker 1: a shortcut. It's like I know what you're saying, Yeah,
Speaker 1: shorthand for like this feeling. You know.
Speaker 5: I think it's interesting to have also that balance right
Speaker 5: between those really clear anchors that are so specific and
Speaker 5: can't really be interpreted in any other way, and then
Speaker 5: parts of it that feel more fluid and that are
Speaker 5: just open. And it's like, you know, when you embrace
Speaker 5: my impurities and I feel clean again, like there's maybe
Speaker 5: a more obvious way to interpret that, but then it
Speaker 5: can like blossom into a million different ways of thinking.
Speaker 5: And I think I like having that balance because I
Speaker 5: think being specific as well makes it feel like it's
Speaker 5: something that you know, I've really lived and it is.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so yeah, yeah, that idea of like the personal
Speaker 1: being general too. We all feel like our experiences are
Speaker 1: so personal to us, but you know, human experience is
Speaker 1: in some degree limited, so like much of what we
Speaker 1: go through a lot of other people have gone through,
Speaker 1: just in other variations.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 1: It's an idea of like the personal sort of being.
Speaker 1: The more specific and the more per all you can get, actually,
Speaker 1: the more kind of broad appeal you're opening.
Speaker 5: Up exactly exactly. And I feel like the songs that
Speaker 5: have moved me and like moved the world in the
Speaker 5: biggest sense are the ones that feel like they were
Speaker 5: written just for you. And everyone feels that way, you know,
Speaker 5: which is kind of impossible, but that's how I feel.
Speaker 1: I was thinking about like Coachella's coming up. I remember
Speaker 1: seeing Radiohead there back.
Speaker 5: That's so funny is that that I was literally gonna
Speaker 5: be like Radiohead.
Speaker 1: Were you thinking of Radiohead?
Speaker 3: Ya? Radiohead?
Speaker 5: I mean, I just love Radiohead, so I'm always thinking
Speaker 5: about Radiohead, but yeah.
Speaker 1: When did you When did you get onto Radiohead?
Speaker 5: Probably when I was about seventeen, and I just fell
Speaker 5: completely in love. I feel like it really informed those
Speaker 5: first few songs that I was doing those first few EPs,
Speaker 5: because I was listening to songs like House of Cards
Speaker 5: and Weird Fishes and Videotape and and just like the
Speaker 5: warmth and the texture. I was like, how did they
Speaker 5: make instruments sound like that? There is this sense of minimalism,
Speaker 5: but everything is so intentional. Yeah, and then I kind
Speaker 5: of like blossomed into like kid A and listening to
Speaker 5: them uneasy I can thinking about the most electronic elements.
Speaker 5: Honestly my favorite bound of all time. And I've never
Speaker 5: seen them live, really never. I really really need to.
Speaker 5: I saw the Smile in.
Speaker 1: Copenhagen, but I haven't wanted to see them. Yeah I was.
Speaker 5: It was so good, like Johnny Greenwood like doing his
Speaker 5: like guitar with a bow and the bows just exploding,
Speaker 5: and he looks like the same age as.
Speaker 1: He always has, never change, wizard.
Speaker 5: I love him.
Speaker 1: We have to pause for a short break, but before
Speaker 1: we go, let's hear Arlo Parks play Eugene from her
Speaker 1: debut album Collapsed in Sunbeams.
Speaker 2: I had a dream week kissed and nurse. All the
Speaker 2: art of your eyes was fired. He hung a cigarette
Speaker 2: between your purple. We've been buys bird since thirty. I
Speaker 2: had your harber when you're two. I held the tackle
Speaker 2: both and you cry over ute. He was me, he
Speaker 2: is me?
Speaker 1: But have.
Speaker 2: I not been a little bit off? And last my mistay.
Speaker 2: I kind of fell half in love and you're to blame.
Speaker 2: I guess I just forgot that we've been made since
Speaker 2: day car don't know what to say, And now I've
Speaker 2: been a little bit off, and that's my mistake. I
Speaker 2: kind of fell half in love and you're to blame.
Speaker 2: I guess I just forgot that we've been made since
Speaker 2: You're a dunna to say. Seeing you with him burns.
Speaker 2: I feel it deep in my throat. You put your
Speaker 2: hand in a shirt, you play him records? I should
Speaker 2: you read him sill you play? I thought that that
Speaker 2: was often, you know. I like you like that. I
Speaker 2: hate that son of a We've ben bars birds since thirty,
Speaker 2: but that don't change the things. I oh when I
Speaker 2: see smile your teeth, that you chee yere I could do,
Speaker 2: but hey, I'm not been a little bit off and
Speaker 2: that's my misstay. I kind of fell half in love
Speaker 2: and you're to blame. I guess I just forgot that
Speaker 2: weeping May. Since day, I don't know what to say. Hey,
Speaker 2: I'm not been a little bit off and that's my mistake.
Speaker 2: I kind of fell half in love and you're to blame.
Speaker 2: I guess I just forgot that weeping May since day. Yeah,
Speaker 2: donna to.
Speaker 1: Say, we're back with more of my conversation with Arlow Parks.
Speaker 1: What was the first music that felt like your own
Speaker 1: music that like you kind of discovered and felt like this.
Speaker 5: Is That's interesting. I think I think the first people
Speaker 5: that I really clung onto were actually like sing a songwriter,
Speaker 5: like listening to like Carrion Lowell by Sophie Stevens, listening
Speaker 5: to Either Or by Elliott Smith, listening to Blue by
Speaker 5: Joni Like just these really kind of like emotional, especially
Speaker 5: when you're like fifteen and you're like going through it
Speaker 5: all for the first time. Emotions exactly, big emotions, Like
Speaker 5: everything felt on like such a massive scale, even if
Speaker 5: in the ground scheme of things, it's like a tiny
Speaker 5: minor inconvenience, and I feel like I really aligned with that,
Speaker 5: and I think that's something I've always kind of taken
Speaker 5: with me, that sense of being really like emotional and
Speaker 5: like you know, open heart surgery. Those lyrics always come
Speaker 5: from this really deep place and it's everything is kind
Speaker 5: of overflowing and brimming, and I think I've always taken
Speaker 5: that element into my music and then maybe moved away
Speaker 5: from it sonically, but always having that thread through like
Speaker 5: how I write, meaning like.
Speaker 1: You feel like the songs as you write them end
Speaker 1: up sounding very different from what the record sounds like.
Speaker 5: Yeah, no, I mean more that when listening to people
Speaker 5: like Elliott Smith or Joni I try and kind of
Speaker 5: carry that essence in terms of how they write, but
Speaker 5: the actual kind of sonic world always like moves in
Speaker 5: a million different directions.
Speaker 1: You got you. That's really interesting. Also interesting that those
Speaker 1: are two LA transplants.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that is true actually.
Speaker 1: Which I guess you've just recently moved to LA, right.
Speaker 5: Yeah, no, I have. And there is something about like
Speaker 5: reading like Joan Diddyon when you're in California, like how
Speaker 5: you know just everything alignes.
Speaker 1: I'm from California, but still It's like reading Joan Didyon
Speaker 1: in California or listening to Joni Mitchell. Listening as I'm driving,
Speaker 1: you know, I have to any time I drive, like
Speaker 1: up Laurel Canyon, I'm like, I got to think about
Speaker 1: Joaning and think about you know, the mamas and the
Speaker 1: papas or something like that. It's that effect, even though
Speaker 1: I've lived, jim all like it's never gone away, Like
Speaker 1: this is a magical place still, you know.
Speaker 5: I agree.
Speaker 1: Was a lot of your writing for your new record
Speaker 1: done here or was it?
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean that's kind of how I really got
Speaker 5: to start knowing LA. I was coming back and forth
Speaker 5: for sessions. So in London, I was working with Paul Atworth,
Speaker 5: who's like one of my oldest collaborators. But in LA
Speaker 5: I kind of started building this little community out of
Speaker 5: people who I really loved and trusted for the second record,
Speaker 5: and I started just having so much fun with my music.
Speaker 5: Like I just felt infused with this new energy when
Speaker 5: I was here and just driving around and like going
Speaker 5: to the beach, going to Big Bear, making weird little
Speaker 5: bands with my friends for the day, and just like
Speaker 5: really enjoying the process of making my second record. I
Speaker 5: suddenly felt like LA was an adventure that I needed
Speaker 5: to have, and I kind of made the leap quite randomly,
Speaker 5: And I feel so happy here. I feel so at home.
Speaker 1: Did you like set out to move here or was
Speaker 1: it did it just sort.
Speaker 5: Of it happened like gradually. Yeah, I just realized. I
Speaker 5: was like, I'm here all the time, but I still
Speaker 5: tell everyone that I absolutely don't live here, So maybe
Speaker 5: I should just.
Speaker 1: Be yeah, how did you find your community here? I
Speaker 1: feel like that's something that people oftentimes say that they
Speaker 1: struggle with.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, I guess I have an easy route
Speaker 5: in in terms of music and just being a fan
Speaker 5: of music before anything. And for example, like with Rameil
Speaker 5: from Brockhampton, I just loved his production and I loved
Speaker 5: all the references that I had kind of seen him
Speaker 5: pull from. And I knew he loved the Beatles, and
Speaker 5: I knew he loved like the Neptunes and pop music
Speaker 5: but also like folksy music, Like he just had this
Speaker 5: really intense love of music, and I could tell, and
Speaker 5: so I just said, like, do you want to just
Speaker 5: get in the studio? And the first day we met,
Speaker 5: we made impurities and I could kind of feel that
Speaker 5: we had this synergy and it kind of just branched
Speaker 5: off from that, like the same with Buddy, Like his
Speaker 5: chords on all the Frank Ocean stuff are absolutely beautiful,
Speaker 5: and I was like, hey, like I'm here, now, do
Speaker 5: you want to do something? And it happened like that,
Speaker 5: just so organically.
Speaker 1: Wow. So Impurities was the first session.
Speaker 5: Yeah, Rama, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1: Can you walk me through the creation.
Speaker 5: It's funny because with Ramil we always kind of make
Speaker 5: We always hang out and then like make music in
Speaker 5: the background almost. So we were just chatting for like
Speaker 5: five hours, driving around getting coffee, like listening to J Paul,
Speaker 5: and then he kind of pulled up this little sample
Speaker 5: and I was like, oh, I like that, and I
Speaker 5: sang over it, and everything just kind of came out
Speaker 5: and then we just went back to hanging out. Like
Speaker 5: it was just this like our little pool of magic.
Speaker 5: And I think I always know when I can really
Speaker 5: trust somebody, like the first session, if something that profound
Speaker 5: comes out, it means that we do have a genuine bond,
Speaker 5: because it does take a lot of vulnerability and trust
Speaker 5: to kind of allow someone to witness you in that
Speaker 5: like very soft and inward space. So I knew immediately that, yeah,
Speaker 5: we were going to make music together for a long time.
Speaker 1: When you heard that sample and you started singing over it.
Speaker 1: Were you singing the words as they turned out to
Speaker 1: be on the record, or you just so I sang.
Speaker 5: It always happens where I hear the chord or the sample, whatever,
Speaker 5: and then a melody will come to me, and I'll
Speaker 5: kind of voice note what I hear, put it into sections,
Speaker 5: like structure it out a bit.
Speaker 2: In my mind.
Speaker 5: And then I have my notebook, which is just like
Speaker 5: a collection of phrases and text and references and just
Speaker 5: things that I want to say, and then my heart
Speaker 5: just gets drawn to whatever's on that page. I'm like, okay,
Speaker 5: Like I just had written down something like impurities, clean
Speaker 5: like escalade, laugh like Juliet, but not like all of
Speaker 5: these little notes and then they just kind of the
Speaker 5: fragments form.
Speaker 1: This whole that's beautiful. So so just so I understand,
Speaker 1: So you'll kind of structure out just like a melody,
Speaker 1: So not even necessarily words could be just scatting or whatever,
Speaker 1: like yeah, vocals or whatever, you know, like, but you
Speaker 1: come up with what you feel like the verse. If
Speaker 1: there's a bridge Bridge of course. So it's almost like
Speaker 1: then you find what in you're writing in your book connects.
Speaker 5: To what this song exactly exactly, And I think it
Speaker 5: didn't always happen that way around, but just with this record,
Speaker 5: I started finding this almost like I know, it felt
Speaker 5: cosmic the way that melodies were coming to me, and
Speaker 5: it always came first, so I kind of started like
Speaker 5: weaving the words into what I had melodically to create
Speaker 5: a story.
Speaker 1: Did you do as much driving home in London?
Speaker 3: No?
Speaker 5: Because I learned to drive here.
Speaker 1: So has driving impacted so much? Because you're saying that
Speaker 1: you were driving around five hours talking and then it
Speaker 1: sort of came to you like.
Speaker 5: For there was when I think about it, a lot
Speaker 5: of this record came to life in cars because there's
Speaker 5: a song on the record called Devotion, which is kind
Speaker 5: of inspired well, the name was inspired by the Mary
Speaker 5: Oliver collection of poems, but the actual music was like
Speaker 5: smashing Pumpkins, like Yola Tango, Deftones, my Blade, Valentine, Like
Speaker 5: I wanted to create something heavier, but I was going
Speaker 5: in and like, but then we're also listening to seventeen
Speaker 5: Days by Prince and I just loved the like drama
Speaker 5: of it, and I was like, I want to create
Speaker 5: something that's like so dramatically romantic with the backdrop of
Speaker 5: like these heavy, like smashing guitars, and we were just
Speaker 5: driving around and it just all came together and that's
Speaker 5: what we made.
Speaker 2: Day.
Speaker 1: That's the greatest. That's I mean, there's it's so hard
Speaker 1: to pick up, but severn the days, it's consistently I
Speaker 1: think the greatest print.
Speaker 5: Song in my mind is so special, so special.
Speaker 1: I just loved the groove he gets locked in.
Speaker 5: Have you heard the demo version that he has on piano? No,
Speaker 5: it's online and it's amazing, Like he's just like ripping
Speaker 5: the piano.
Speaker 1: I just got to hear that. I gotta hear that.
Speaker 2: I love that.
Speaker 1: It's interesting too, though, like it doesn't sound like this
Speaker 1: record's not necessarily like a dramatic departure. It feels like
Speaker 1: distinctly its own thing. It feels separate from the first album,
Speaker 1: but it doesn't feel like, oh, like clearly this was
Speaker 1: the first album written in the UK. Different thing, and
Speaker 1: like this is like, oh, this is an LA you know,
Speaker 1: this second album LA album, Like there's a lot of
Speaker 1: continuity between the two, and it's like all the things
Speaker 1: that I feel like I love from the first carry over.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I think I wanted. I definitely wanted to have
Speaker 5: that blank slate approach, but then also still recognize the
Speaker 5: fact that there are things about me that I do
Speaker 5: want to keep as a thread in terms of the
Speaker 5: way that I speak and the way that I kind
Speaker 5: of choose to tell stories about love or loss. But
Speaker 5: I did instrumentally just want to have complete free reign
Speaker 5: and you know, be able to really put more of
Speaker 5: my references into the music. Like I feel like people
Speaker 5: don't really know how much I love like IDM music,
Speaker 5: how much I love AFX men and Bards of Canada
Speaker 5: and ambient music, or you know, putting more moments of
Speaker 5: like ESG and like Zami and funk and the music
Speaker 5: that I really connect to. I think the first record
Speaker 5: had more of a sense of quite minimal warmth, and
Speaker 5: this one is more of a journey kind of through
Speaker 5: everything that moves me in that I love.
Speaker 1: We need to take another quick break, but before that,
Speaker 1: let's hear Allo Parks perform an acoustic version of her
Speaker 1: new song Blades.
Speaker 2: I'm exhausted watching light Clad Danes through the Dope Kitchen
Speaker 2: lie like blades, three boys, the parties of blades. We
Speaker 2: could have part when you were fighting with your sister.
Speaker 2: Don't think I realize how horribly I MISSA requed this
Speaker 2: flower inside me? Help?
Speaker 1: You know the I.
Speaker 2: I just don't to want or two because I only
Speaker 2: want to be. I remember there was something strangely romantic,
Speaker 2: you know, friendship win with true money. I worked in news,
Speaker 2: talking for hours on the grapher, walk into boxes, linking pancis,
Speaker 2: wearing a merchant pulse, and now I'm struggling and I'm choking.
Speaker 2: Oh my good hock. You know the I.
Speaker 1: I just don't want to.
Speaker 2: Because I'm I only want to be with you. I
Speaker 2: just missed your voice. Side were right? Call it when
Speaker 2: you're lonely like a nightcauseide I only want to.
Speaker 1: Be with.
Speaker 2: So I make my way over as the white Lightning
Speaker 2: six ss and you're with armored plumb red slacks and
Speaker 2: tequila fraser and you love the same hand or mouth
Speaker 2: because you hate your teeth and I love your teeth
Speaker 2: and I'm scared to speak. I I just go to
Speaker 2: wa too, because I only want to be. I just
Speaker 2: miss you. First side, very right? Cool it when in
Speaker 2: lone newly a night causeide only Wanna Be, Only Wanna Be.
Speaker 1: We're back with the rest of my conversation with Arlow Parks,
Speaker 1: who tells us about the inspiration behind her new song Blades,
Speaker 1: that she just performed live before the break. Tell me
Speaker 1: about making Blades.
Speaker 5: So I made that song with Pool at Worth at
Speaker 5: Church Studios in crutch and in London, and I feel
Speaker 5: like when I make music with Pool, there is just
Speaker 5: this real playfulness, Like I feel like we're just two
Speaker 5: kids running around banging on things and we just come
Speaker 5: up with beautiful music and neither of us really know how,
Speaker 5: because we were just in a fugue state all day.
Speaker 5: And this one came during what I call the Magic Week,
Speaker 5: which is where we got three songs in like four
Speaker 5: or five days for the record. And I just wanted
Speaker 5: to create something that felt euphoric, like this sense of
Speaker 5: freedom and this sense of like bittersweetness and having that
Speaker 5: balance between light and shade that I feel kind of
Speaker 5: colors the record. And we were listening to a lot
Speaker 5: of ESG and like we'd deep cuts that I found
Speaker 5: like on NTS radio, and he just started playing drums
Speaker 5: and I was like, hmm, what's that, and he was like, oh,
Speaker 5: I got this new sample, and he just started playing
Speaker 5: that sample, and then I started singing, and then the
Speaker 5: rest is a blur. Who knows, who knows what happened?
Speaker 5: But it was magic?
Speaker 1: What about like that? I'm a spoken word bridge.
Speaker 5: Honestly, I feel like I include those moments because there's
Speaker 5: so much more than I want to say that doesn't
Speaker 5: fit into the melody. It's just too much to say.
Speaker 5: So I'm just like, Okay, I'll passel off this little
Speaker 5: chunk where I can just continue the story. And I
Speaker 5: wanted it to almost sound like a stream of consciousness,
Speaker 5: like an inner monologue where you see someone across the
Speaker 5: room and you're kind of like, oh, I can see
Speaker 5: them laughing, and they're covering their hand with their teeth.
Speaker 5: Oh I remember how much she said she hated her teeth.
Speaker 5: Oh was she wearing the same perfume? Like that kind
Speaker 5: of inner yea rambling and then opening up into this
Speaker 5: like sentiment coming back to again and again that you
Speaker 5: can't live without this person?
Speaker 1: Would you mind reciting that little point?
Speaker 5: Yeah, So I make my way over as the white
Speaker 5: lightning zigzags and you're with armed plum red slacks and
Speaker 5: tequila fraser and you laugh the same hand on mouth
Speaker 5: because you hate your teeth, but I love your teeth
Speaker 5: and I'm scared to speak as I catch a whiff
Speaker 5: of her rose dip teeth.
Speaker 1: That's so cool. How much of the specifics in that,
Speaker 1: like the name particularly, like does that come from real life?
Speaker 1: Or like are you writing about real people?
Speaker 5: I'm writing about real people, but I often don't use
Speaker 5: real names because I'm scared. I was talking about this
Speaker 5: with my friend Rommy from the XX. We were talking
Speaker 5: about it, and I was thinking, I was like, well,
Speaker 5: when that person comes to my show, like I don't
Speaker 5: want them to know how much they hurt me, Like
Speaker 5: I don't want them to be able to recognize themselves
Speaker 5: and the music. But I feel like with this record,
Speaker 5: I just kind of let go of that fear because
Speaker 5: you do have to be real, and I feel like
Speaker 5: when you bend reality too much, it doesn't feel like
Speaker 5: a release to talk about it, So you just kind
Speaker 5: of have to be unfiltered as much as possible.
Speaker 1: What is that the reality of that? Though? So for
Speaker 1: your art, you feel like you have to for the
Speaker 1: sake of creating something real. You feel like you really
Speaker 1: have to throw your whole self into it, including the
Speaker 1: people around you, like your real life experiences. And does
Speaker 1: the reality of that ever like sort of settle in
Speaker 1: where you're like, damn, like I'm feel a little open now,
Speaker 1: you know.
Speaker 5: Definitely, definitely. I think when I write the song, I'm
Speaker 5: always like, oh, that exactly captured how I felt. And
Speaker 5: then I start to realize that it's not just for
Speaker 5: me and my three friends, and then it's going to
Speaker 5: go onto the Internet and everyone be able to know.
Speaker 5: But at the same time, when I think about like
Speaker 5: my favorite songs, I think about Says by Elliott Smith
Speaker 5: or like Biscuit by Portus Head or whatever it might be,
Speaker 5: and there is this sense of someone being open completely.
Speaker 5: That's why it moves me, Like, that's why I feel
Speaker 5: like it just gets me because that person has just
Speaker 5: been fearless with how open they've been.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a really advanced place to be where you
Speaker 1: can be that that open, you know, that honest with yourself,
Speaker 1: even just with yourself or anything, just you know the
Speaker 1: people around you.
Speaker 5: It is hard, you know, And I think it's interesting
Speaker 5: because when a lot of people tell their stories, I
Speaker 5: feel like there is that sense of kind of wanting
Speaker 5: to be the hero of a situation. I think it
Speaker 5: can be difficult to be like, actually I was wrong
Speaker 5: on this. Actually I was being jealous, or I was bitter,
Speaker 5: or I was being petty, you know, like being able
Speaker 5: to actually show the experiences three dimensional. I feel like
Speaker 5: that does take a lot of honesty, but at the
Speaker 5: same time, it feels so much more human when you
Speaker 5: hear that kind of song.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's also like I think back to being twenty
Speaker 1: two and just like the the ripples through your sort
Speaker 1: of social life that can be caused by like saying
Speaker 1: one cross thing or you know, one thing the wrong
Speaker 1: way or you know, it's just like, oh man, you know, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's just a scary thing.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it is scary. But at the same time, I
Speaker 5: don't know, I feel like when I have that little
Speaker 5: kind of nudge of fear, internally, I'm like, okay, I'm
Speaker 5: like preaching new ground here feels scary, but that means
Speaker 5: I'm doing something that is beyond what I did before.
Speaker 1: How do you balance moving to a new place like la,
Speaker 1: writing a record, touring, like just like the responsibilities that
Speaker 1: come with being a working artist, the press stuff like
Speaker 1: today you know having to come do this.
Speaker 5: I feel like I am someone who thrives in like
Speaker 5: how urgent this lifestyle is. Like, I feel like I
Speaker 5: find it really hard to slow down, and that's something
Speaker 5: I actually have to practice because I'm working every day
Speaker 5: pretty much, and I feel like I have to kind
Speaker 5: of really work at resting because I know that I'm
Speaker 5: always like moving and have quite like a frenetic energy.
Speaker 5: So I really want to do things that are like
Speaker 5: active rest, whether it's like cooking or going for walks
Speaker 5: or stepping outside of things. But I think because I
Speaker 5: love what I do so much and it kind of
Speaker 5: just soaks into everything that I do, I find it
Speaker 5: hard to kind of step away and find balance. And
Speaker 5: I think there are some things about being an artist
Speaker 5: that I really love and things that I feel find
Speaker 5: a little bit more challenging. I think I love being
Speaker 5: in the studio and being around people and collaborating and
Speaker 5: you know, being a creative soul because that's what I am.
Speaker 5: But I think sometimes having to explain the music, having
Speaker 5: to kind of break down my identity and why I
Speaker 5: made certain creative choices and who I am, I think
Speaker 5: that can be a little bit more tricky for me
Speaker 5: and just to be perceived like that, like I just
Speaker 5: want to be a little hermit.
Speaker 1: You only want to be able to kind of like
Speaker 1: put it out.
Speaker 5: Yeah exactly, run away exactly, that's what I want. That's
Speaker 5: my dream.
Speaker 1: Maybe that can happen. I feel like, you know, there's
Speaker 1: spend artists over time, some of my favorite artists, like
Speaker 1: I mean Prince, you know, just like.
Speaker 5: I think it's interesting though, because I remember my friend
Speaker 5: Ocean was talking about this where it.
Speaker 1: Was like.
Speaker 5: Ocean, wrong, he's like a writer, but no, my friend, yeah,
Speaker 5: my friend Ocean, Yeah, Ocean was talking to me about
Speaker 5: the idea of prayers and I was asking if he
Speaker 5: enjoyed it, and he had a really interesting perspective on
Speaker 5: it where he was like, Okay, it can be draining
Speaker 5: and tiring, but I like the fact that I'm given
Speaker 5: the opportunity to kind of set up the context for
Speaker 5: what I did and what I meant, rather than have
Speaker 5: someone come in and do it for me if I'm
Speaker 5: silent and I don't explain it at all. And I
Speaker 5: was like, I do actually like the idea of being
Speaker 5: able to what I wanted to do with my work,
Speaker 5: what I'm talking about, rather than having somebody come in
Speaker 5: and maybe just take things the wrong way or twist
Speaker 5: things or explain it in a way that I don't like.
Speaker 5: So I'd rather be there saying it.
Speaker 1: I guess that's a fair point. You're not allowing other
Speaker 1: people to sort of make determinations for you.
Speaker 5: Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1: It's frustrated as setting the records, having to do it
Speaker 1: or needing to do it. You're like an indie artist
Speaker 1: from the UK. Now you're in O, Like, do you
Speaker 1: find that the pressures of the industry can be like
Speaker 1: a little stronger or the currents can be a little
Speaker 1: stronger here? Then?
Speaker 5: I don't know. I feel like I'm quite good at
Speaker 5: just creating a little island of people around me, and
Speaker 5: I don't really know what's going on outside of that.
Speaker 5: I think, you know, obviously there's always a sense of pressure,
Speaker 5: but I kind of like the fact that I'm in
Speaker 5: this kind of new space that I'm navigating. I don't
Speaker 5: really have that much awareness of like whether it's like
Speaker 5: certain clicks or like how people work, or like what's
Speaker 5: the right thing to do or clout or whatever. I
Speaker 5: just don't really know what's going on, So I'm just
Speaker 5: in my own little way moving through the city, and
Speaker 5: I just feel like I've been lucky, Like I've just
Speaker 5: found a lot of good people, I think, who even
Speaker 5: if I do feel that sense of pressure, I can
Speaker 5: talk to and like feel accepted by and we can
Speaker 5: just sit down and have a coffee. And if I
Speaker 5: do feel like I'm under pressure, I'm burning out, Like
Speaker 5: there are a lot of people that are here to listen,
Speaker 5: and I know not everyone has that, so I'm happy.
Speaker 1: Do you find your parents kind of understand what you're doing.
Speaker 5: Over time, because it's been like five years now. Over time,
Speaker 5: I've managed to kind of try and explain the framework
Speaker 5: of what it is that I'm doing, but it's so
Speaker 5: hard to understand it from the outside, like even the
Speaker 5: idea of a photo shoot or traveling or all of
Speaker 5: these things. Like it's really difficult to explain like what
Speaker 5: it is that I do all day, Like I just
Speaker 5: like talk and sing and like fly around, and like
Speaker 5: you know, it's just like really hard to explain it
Speaker 5: unless you're doing it. And I think that's why it's
Speaker 5: good to have people who are both outside of the
Speaker 5: world completely where you can just hang out with them
Speaker 5: and they just don't really know what's going on and
Speaker 5: you can just be and then also having friends who
Speaker 5: are kind of embedded in that same world and you
Speaker 5: can understand each other.
Speaker 1: That seems pretty healthy. So you can get the like
Speaker 1: kind of the perspective moral support from the people know
Speaker 1: what you're going through day to day, but also the people.
Speaker 5: Who are just like, yeah, it was like okay, well, yeah,
Speaker 5: that's great.
Speaker 1: How do your parents like, do you do you Is
Speaker 1: there a line are they allowed to talk to you
Speaker 1: about like you know you me like or do you
Speaker 1: kind of just like it.
Speaker 5: Is what it is and I think it, Yeah, it
Speaker 5: kind of just is what it is. I feel like
Speaker 5: they just have this really strong understanding of the fact
Speaker 5: that like, yeah, I just kind of like write about
Speaker 5: what I need to get out and I show them
Speaker 5: the music and stuff and they're fans of it. But
Speaker 5: there is that like healthy boundary of they just kind
Speaker 5: of like, let me say what I need to say without.
Speaker 1: Asking too many questions, are being too.
Speaker 5: Involved exactly exactly.
Speaker 1: That's great. Well, thanks so much for playing and for talking. Yeah,
Speaker 1: for playing and talking in dissecting your music.
Speaker 5: Of course that's having me.
Speaker 1: Thanks to Arlo Parks for talking through the inspiration for
Speaker 1: her new album, My Soft Machine. You can hear all
Speaker 1: of our favorite Arlow Parks songs on my playlist at
Speaker 1: broken record podcast dot com. You can subscribe to our
Speaker 1: YouTube channel at YouTube dot com slash broken record Podcast,
Speaker 1: where you can find all of our new episodes. Broken
Speaker 1: Record is produced with help from Leah Rose, Jason Gambrel,
Speaker 1: Ben Talliday, Nisha Venkat, Jordan McMillan, and Eric Sandler. Our
Speaker 1: editor is Sophie Crane. Broken Record is a production of
Speaker 1: Pushkin Industrials. If you love this show and others from Pushkin,
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Speaker 1: stat Our themes expect Kenny Beats, I'm justin Richmond.