Speaker 1: Welcome to Inside the Studio presented by I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: I'm your host, Joe Levy. Okay, fire up the strobe lights,
Speaker 1: get out the mirror ball. If you want, we can
Speaker 1: get on Amazon and order up a bubble machine. I
Speaker 1: just checked. They're pretty inexpensive. But let's get all that
Speaker 1: gear together because my guest to this episode is Kylie Minogue,
Speaker 1: whose new album Disco is a quarantine dance party in
Speaker 1: pretty much every sense, by which I mean it's not
Speaker 1: just an album guaranteed to get you up off the
Speaker 1: couch and onto whatever passes for a dance floor in
Speaker 1: the COVID bubble of your choice, but also that this
Speaker 1: album was recorded in part during lockdown. Some songs were
Speaker 1: written over zoom calls. Kylie had to set up microphones
Speaker 1: at home teach herself to use some recording software like
Speaker 1: Logic and pro Tools so she could capture her vocals
Speaker 1: on her own when she could not get to a
Speaker 1: studio to finish her fifteen studio album, And that fifteen
Speaker 1: studio album is also the first Kylie album on which
Speaker 1: she gets a credit for additional vocal production. Disco is
Speaker 1: update on some vintage seventies dance floor romance. Songs like
Speaker 1: I Love It and Missing Things celebrate the kind of
Speaker 1: fun that starts well after sundown and ends shortly before
Speaker 1: or after sunrise. And though the hasn't exactly been a
Speaker 1: good year, it's been a surprisingly good year for albums
Speaker 1: that chase that sort of after sundown, just before sunrise
Speaker 1: kind of fun. There's dualas future and nostalgia. With arrived
Speaker 1: at the end of March, so that's a dance party
Speaker 1: that we got just as the world was grinding to
Speaker 1: a halt. Lady Gaga's Chromatica got that at the end
Speaker 1: of May, Jesse Waars What's Your Pleasure came a month
Speaker 1: after that at the end of June, and now November
Speaker 1: has brought us Kylie's Disco. Maybe it's a little strange
Speaker 1: that a year in which dance floors have been off
Speaker 1: limits has also been a good year for albums celebrating
Speaker 1: the joys of dancing, But it's certainly worth remembering all
Speaker 1: these albums had their roots in pre pandemic times, and
Speaker 1: those pre pandemic times in only seem untroubled in comparison
Speaker 1: to the universality of our troubles these days, so it's
Speaker 1: also worth remembering that disco has always been a music
Speaker 1: of liberation, the same way that rock and roll was
Speaker 1: back in the nineteen fifties, when Elvis the Pelvis shook
Speaker 1: his ups and Little Richard first let loose the power
Speaker 1: of two D fruity. In all these cases, dancing was
Speaker 1: a way of putting liberation into motion, and Kylie actually
Speaker 1: talked about just this. I've found all these correlations between
Speaker 1: disco music and this year that disco was born out
Speaker 1: of darkness, it was born out of struggle and adversity
Speaker 1: and people trying to find a place to belong and
Speaker 1: be accepted and expressed themselves and all of that kind
Speaker 1: of stuff. People clearly have been creating just the sort
Speaker 1: of escapism and liberation that Kylie's disco album offers. I mean,
Speaker 1: it entered the charts at number one, making Kylie one
Speaker 1: of six artists who have topped the UK album charts
Speaker 1: in five consecutive decades. And those other artists are Paul McCartney,
Speaker 1: John Lennon, Paul Weller, Bruce Springsteen, David Gilmore and now
Speaker 1: Kylie Minogue. And I think it's fair to say that
Speaker 1: Kylie looks a lot better in sequence than any of
Speaker 1: those dudes, just like I also think it's fair to
Speaker 1: say that, like a lot of women making great pop music,
Speaker 1: she never quite gets the credit she deserves. And she
Speaker 1: started out in the late eighties pop factory of stock
Speaker 1: Akin and Waterman. Those are the guys who gave the
Speaker 1: world Rick Astley is never going to give you up,
Speaker 1: and early Kylie hits like Hand on Your Heart or
Speaker 1: her cover of Locomotion are in eternal sugar high. So
Speaker 1: Kylie's ability to turn that kind of start into a
Speaker 1: long lasting career that puts her in the company of
Speaker 1: Paul McCartney and Bruce Springsteen is pretty astounding. And it's
Speaker 1: a combination of determination, experimentation, and some glamour kissed reinvention.
Speaker 1: I mean, she spent the nineties being all sorts of
Speaker 1: different Kylie's Got Kylie duetting with Nick Cave, trip Hop,
Speaker 1: Kylie getting Loozy on put Yourself in My Place, all
Speaker 1: rock Higlie working with two of the Manic Street Preachers
Speaker 1: on some kind of Bliss, which I just played for
Speaker 1: the first time in a long time and it sounds
Speaker 1: like the theme song to a lost James Bond movie.
Speaker 1: And she did all of this before settling into playing
Speaker 1: old iconic Kylie by the two thousand and one album Fever,
Speaker 1: which gave us the immortal hit Can't Get You out
Speaker 1: of My Head. How immortal you can actually hear? Jesse
Speaker 1: Ware paid tribute to Can't Get You out of My
Speaker 1: Head on the title track to her disco album What's
Speaker 1: Your Pleasure, in much the same way to Can't Get
Speaker 1: You out of My Head picked up the robo disco
Speaker 1: sound of Georgio Moroder's Midnight It's Breast soundtrack. In other words,
Speaker 1: Kylie herself is now the kind of classic sound that
Speaker 1: she paid tribute to in two thousand and one, then
Speaker 1: she's paying tribute to all over disco. Kylie talked with
Speaker 1: me about how the roots of this new album go
Speaker 1: back to a pretty elaborate concept that accompanied the tour
Speaker 1: for her previous albums Golden, which she had recorded in
Speaker 1: Nashville and which she described at the time as Dolly
Speaker 1: Parton standing on a dance floor. And she also talked
Speaker 1: about what it was like to go from playing a
Speaker 1: concert in Brazil and really hitting her stride in March
Speaker 1: recording this album to having the pandemic shut everything down,
Speaker 1: and the challenges of making this kind of dance music
Speaker 1: with collaborators. She's never had the opportunity to meet her
Speaker 1: celebrate now their success with face to face. Here's what
Speaker 1: else she had to say. Kylie, welcome to inside the
Speaker 1: studio and congratulations on the success of Disco. We're talking
Speaker 1: just a couple of days after the album has gone
Speaker 1: into the UK charts at number one. So this makes
Speaker 1: it your eighth number one album and it sets a
Speaker 1: record of its own. You are now the first female
Speaker 1: artist to have a number one album in the UK
Speaker 1: in five separate decades. It's crazy, right, How does it?
Speaker 1: What does that feel like? I know I have to
Speaker 1: explain that I'm fifty two and it's been five decades,
Speaker 1: so it's it's um. It does sound like you started
Speaker 1: making records when you were two years. Someone on Twitter
Speaker 1: the other day said, wow, you know, five number ones
Speaker 1: in in five centuries? Wow? Five centuries an accomplishment you
Speaker 1: would you would mean making records in prehistoric times. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there are some days where it feels, you know, I
Speaker 1: may feel like it's been that long, but no, it's
Speaker 1: an incredible feat. I had no idea of this impending
Speaker 1: stat when I was making the album, which was just
Speaker 1: as well, because I've really kind of felt the pressure
Speaker 1: leading up to the release. But yeah, so late eighties,
Speaker 1: the first year of the ties um that's how they
Speaker 1: have managed to kind of shoehorn that statistic in there.
Speaker 1: But nevertheless, I'm really proud of it. Yeah, No, I mean,
Speaker 1: I love the fact that there's a there's another stat
Speaker 1: The Beatles, Elvis Presley, the Stones, Bob Dylan, they've all
Speaker 1: had number ones in five decades, but not consecutively, not
Speaker 1: five consecutive decades the way you had, right, So they
Speaker 1: really Beatles should really work on their consistency a little more.
Speaker 1: I think, yeah, oh yeah, well, gosh, amazing company. And
Speaker 1: to be the first UM female, the first solo female
Speaker 1: to do it's it's it's nuts. Yeah. Well, let's talk
Speaker 1: about disco and how it came to be, how how
Speaker 1: this party got started. So you you finished the tour
Speaker 1: for for your last album, Golden, I think in March
Speaker 1: of and then you were back recording just about six
Speaker 1: months after that, back in the studio, and the Golden
Speaker 1: tour did have a studio fifty four section. When you
Speaker 1: got to Locomotion, that song started with a little Donna
Speaker 1: summer shout shout out a little bad girls, Beep Beep two,
Speaker 1: two and and And is that where this disco idea
Speaker 1: started or was it something else for you? Well, I
Speaker 1: think it's been a lifelong love affair of disco anyway,
Speaker 1: but certainly leading up to this album, You're right, the
Speaker 1: Golden Tour in we had this loose narrative for the show,
Speaker 1: which no one in the audience needed to totally get,
Speaker 1: but just have the sense of. And so I'm gonna
Speaker 1: have to I've got to rewind a bit just to
Speaker 1: get to how we got to disco. Um. When we
Speaker 1: started rehearsals for the Golden Tour, just in conversation, we're
Speaker 1: trying to come up with this narrative, and we came
Speaker 1: up with this idea that what if Donna Summer had
Speaker 1: she was in Los Angeles and she had a gig
Speaker 1: that night in New York. I had to get to
Speaker 1: New York on the next night. I don't understand time
Speaker 1: difference in this moment, but you know, she's got to
Speaker 1: get to New York to appear at Studio fifty four.
Speaker 1: But the planes canceled, there's a storm, there's whatever. The
Speaker 1: flights canceled, and so our narrative was this kind of
Speaker 1: cross country journey and arriving at Studio fifty four. Thus,
Speaker 1: the penultimate part of the concert is our version of
Speaker 1: Studio fifty four. And every time I would get to
Speaker 1: that part of the show, not least because it was
Speaker 1: a home stretch. So it's like, Okay, I think we've
Speaker 1: made it through another show and everyone's kind of peaking
Speaker 1: it by this stage. But it just felt like such
Speaker 1: a it felt like home to me. I mean, I've
Speaker 1: never been to Studio fifty four. It's it's a fantasy
Speaker 1: for me. But I think it's so it's it's um
Speaker 1: imagery that the music that it's presence is still was
Speaker 1: strong that you can kind of, you know, insert yourself
Speaker 1: in a fantasy landscape to Studio fifty four. So yeah,
Speaker 1: that's what I thought, Okay, next album, this is where
Speaker 1: I want to be. So after the Greatest Hits Tour
Speaker 1: in twenty nine thing, that's when I went into the
Speaker 1: studio and yeah, disco became a thing for me. Yeah, no,
Speaker 1: quite evidently, So so that was the idea even you
Speaker 1: started in in about September of last year, and I
Speaker 1: think one of the first songs we heard the very
Speaker 1: first single, say Anything, I think came from the first session. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's exactly for the first session for the album. Did
Speaker 1: you have the idea in mind then? Did you think, yeah,
Speaker 1: we're making a disco album right from the start? Um.
Speaker 1: When I went in for that session, it was it
Speaker 1: was more it was more for fun and just to
Speaker 1: kind of settle myself. And I wanted to put um
Speaker 1: Biffs at it, Biff Standard and John Green together because
Speaker 1: I've worked with for a long time John just for
Speaker 1: a short time. Well, I was quite sure that something
Speaker 1: good would come of putting the three of this in
Speaker 1: a room together. Um. So yeah, I hadn't although disco
Speaker 1: is our dance floors on my mind. Um, I think
Speaker 1: with this particular session, I didn't want to label it
Speaker 1: as anything. Just let's get together and see what happens.
Speaker 1: And that's when Say Something was written. And then earlier
Speaker 1: this year, once we decided, okay, the album it's going
Speaker 1: to be called disco. This is the lane that we're
Speaker 1: going down. And for a while I was I was thinking,
Speaker 1: how how say Something going to fit into this because
Speaker 1: we didn't write that disco in mind, but we've felt
Speaker 1: like it had a bit of state of independence kind
Speaker 1: of feeling. I mean, we wish but you know, kind
Speaker 1: of could latch onto that in a kind of seventies vibe,
Speaker 1: and it turned out had enough to be in the
Speaker 1: disco theme. But I didn't go into that session saying
Speaker 1: fellas it's disco, right. But it's also so striking because
Speaker 1: it is the first single we heard from this record,
Speaker 1: and it comes from last September, so it's from the
Speaker 1: before times before we you know, before COVID. But thematically,
Speaker 1: when when you first heard it, you know that that
Speaker 1: opening line, we're a million miles apart in a thousand,
Speaker 1: a thousand ways, it felt so of the moment. It
Speaker 1: felt almost like it was created in reaction to to
Speaker 1: where we were. Yeah, I mean, I've heard a number
Speaker 1: of artists say similar things with songs that they wrote
Speaker 1: just before drama of I guess it's just a reminder
Speaker 1: of the power of music that making it is one thing,
Speaker 1: but how it translates and what it becomes in the
Speaker 1: real world is is something you can't predict. You can't
Speaker 1: you can't even really manifest. You just have to let
Speaker 1: it go and see what happens. First thing, I didn't
Speaker 1: know if that song would even make it on the album.
Speaker 1: It was so beautifully odd that I was I was
Speaker 1: kind of preparing to resign myself to potentially the fact
Speaker 1: that they would. They the label would say, yeah, we
Speaker 1: pould like it, but we just don't think it's going
Speaker 1: to hit the mark. So then when it was on
Speaker 1: the album and then selected as the first unanimously as
Speaker 1: the first single, I just I thought I kicked a
Speaker 1: goal through the posts. There we go. And then this
Speaker 1: year through Lockdown, when I finished was finishing the album
Speaker 1: at home and listened to that song in its in
Speaker 1: its stages because we added to it and developed it
Speaker 1: through this year, And there was one day I listened
Speaker 1: to it just outside, and I mean it just it
Speaker 1: was like we didn't we hadn't written it. It was
Speaker 1: like it fell from the sky and it was saying
Speaker 1: something that we needed to hear. It was amazing, I
Speaker 1: mean sad and wonderful and amazing. You know you you
Speaker 1: just mentioned the all the drama of do I have
Speaker 1: this right? Did I read that? Right before Lockdown started?
Speaker 1: You had a concert in Brazil? Yeah, I had in
Speaker 1: San Paula, like about just about a week before I
Speaker 1: did so, sixth of March. I'm not great with dates,
Speaker 1: but I definitely remember the sixth of March because we
Speaker 1: knew that there was uncertainty in the air, and I
Speaker 1: would say for the two weeks leading up to that gig,
Speaker 1: I was just waiting for the phone call saying canceled,
Speaker 1: We're not going, which would have been absolutely fine, of course,
Speaker 1: but yeah, we went, and it was just it was
Speaker 1: that last It was my last big show, and thankfully
Speaker 1: we all got there and back and everyone was safe.
Speaker 1: And that's great to hear how big those Brazilian crowds
Speaker 1: can be, cuge, how big a crowd was. It wasn't
Speaker 1: one of those mega, enormous, endless brazil million crowds. It
Speaker 1: wasn't like a rock and Rio or something like that,
Speaker 1: but it was a sizeable crowd whose passion. I mean,
Speaker 1: I don't think I heard anything four songs. I literally
Speaker 1: was looking at my band, looking at my sound monitor guy,
Speaker 1: just like I'm singing. I could I don't know if
Speaker 1: I'm singing remotely and key in time. It was just
Speaker 1: like this this wave of emotion. And I know they're
Speaker 1: famous for it, but we still hadn't quite prepared ourselves
Speaker 1: for it. So yeah, my last big show that I
Speaker 1: did is you know still ringing in my ears? Actually sorry,
Speaker 1: the last show full stop and just under the Wire too,
Speaker 1: because if that's March six, I guess that's about ten
Speaker 1: days before the stay at Home orders come down. And
Speaker 1: how much of the album was was done by that
Speaker 1: because you you were you at that point had the
Speaker 1: concept in mind and some songs finished. Yeah, So I
Speaker 1: would have been in the studio before going to sub
Speaker 1: polo and then for sure when I got back, and
Speaker 1: I would say even in those last a few days
Speaker 1: between arriving back from Spollo and the lockdown in London,
Speaker 1: I was we were I say we were. We were
Speaker 1: at a strong cantor not galloping, but a strong canter
Speaker 1: as far as the album goes like We've got you know,
Speaker 1: you work so hard every day and then I mean
Speaker 1: I get consumed by it. So I was in and
Speaker 1: out of studios until the day before Lockdown. Actually, I
Speaker 1: think maybe the day before Lockdown we wrote I Love It.
Speaker 1: But we were aware in various sessions and different writers
Speaker 1: that Lockdown was blooming. It hadn't been um, it wasn't
Speaker 1: the date wasn't determined, but we were aware of it.
Speaker 1: So it was definitely creeping into the writing process at
Speaker 1: that time. So two questions, what's that like, you're you're
Speaker 1: you're in a cantor you're you're making this record and
Speaker 1: it's a dance party record and then everything stops? And
Speaker 1: what were you feeling at that moment when things ground
Speaker 1: to a halt. Was there any sense of, oh, maybe
Speaker 1: maybe it's time for a sad singer songwriter record or
Speaker 1: are we really going to the disco still? I mean, what,
Speaker 1: how how soon were you back at work and what
Speaker 1: were your feevors? You know what. I'd have to even
Speaker 1: I'd have to look at emails and messages because it's
Speaker 1: a bit of a blur that time. As soon as
Speaker 1: lockdown happened and there wasn't There were no no planes,
Speaker 1: hard any cars. It was just that eerie silence, the uncertainty.
Speaker 1: We didn't know if this was this two weeks, three weeks,
Speaker 1: are we going to kind of go back to normal
Speaker 1: or so we all thought. We all thought a month
Speaker 1: would be a long time, like it'll be over a month,
Speaker 1: come on, Yes, So I think it was I want
Speaker 1: to say, maybe three weeks or so before I really
Speaker 1: started thinking about I could be wrong at the time
Speaker 1: that even now, time is very strange, you know, was
Speaker 1: was it this morning or was it six months ago?
Speaker 1: Which Thursday is this? Is this the Thursday that was yesterday?
Speaker 1: Or the Thursday that the same, right exactly? So anyway,
Speaker 1: I think when it became evident that we weren't going back,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm not going to see you in the studio,
Speaker 1: then I must have, you know, I wanted to carry on.
Speaker 1: I don't even know how this was decided, or whether
Speaker 1: I spoke to one of my producers and said, well,
Speaker 1: let's try and do remote. I actually can't remember it was.
Speaker 1: It's all a bit of a haze around there. But
Speaker 1: I did remember that I had a basic microphone and
Speaker 1: an interface somewhere. Thankfully it was in my home and
Speaker 1: I found it in a cupboard, which to me it
Speaker 1: was the first miracle. I had never used them before.
Speaker 1: So I was thinking, right, okay, it looks like it
Speaker 1: looks like that cable goes with that, and I think
Speaker 1: I could. I mean, I've never plugged I've never plugged
Speaker 1: it in. So I was sending pictures to one of
Speaker 1: my producers says, yeah, that looks all right, Yeah, you
Speaker 1: just do that that and that, and start on garage
Speaker 1: but garage band, and you know, we can at least
Speaker 1: get some demos done. We weren't thinking about remote recording
Speaker 1: like proper session recording, just carrying on the writing process.
Speaker 1: And so we did it like that for a little bit,
Speaker 1: and then it wasn't too long before one of my
Speaker 1: other producers, Timmy Brunilla, who's I mean, they're all a bit.
Speaker 1: They're all a bit often like anyway with their equipment
Speaker 1: and the gear and how you technically do this. But
Speaker 1: Timu was amazing. He arranged the mic for me, he
Speaker 1: was talking with the people in um where were they
Speaker 1: in nodding him? I think was a company that collated
Speaker 1: all the pieces together, sorted out the laptop with pro tools,
Speaker 1: with logic, with just the stuff I needed, and did
Speaker 1: test sessions with them. So he was like my my
Speaker 1: fairy team, my fairy princess. And he's a finish writer
Speaker 1: producer who worked on the first three tracks I know, Magic,
Speaker 1: miss a Thing, Real Groove, he worked on all of those.
Speaker 1: And do I have this right? You've never actually met
Speaker 1: him face to face? Correct. I was due to fly
Speaker 1: to l A for a two week writing session with him.
Speaker 1: In March, so obviously that didn't happen, so we did
Speaker 1: everything remotely. Yeah, I only know him from the waist
Speaker 1: up in two dimensional form. I cannot wait to meet.
Speaker 1: How did you first connect? Then you were going to
Speaker 1: go for a writing session in l A. How did
Speaker 1: how did the two of you come together to get
Speaker 1: even that on the calendar? That was from the song Magic,
Speaker 1: which my I and r Jamie Nelson got hold of
Speaker 1: and we all fell in love with that track. We thought,
Speaker 1: this is this is really good and also the real
Speaker 1: group and missed thing. So the Trifector, the first three
Speaker 1: songs um had seem Me on them, so that felt
Speaker 1: like I finished those with with the writers and producers.
Speaker 1: But yeah, we he was like we felt like he
Speaker 1: could be a conduit for us to access disco, but
Speaker 1: have it cool and have a kind of for one
Speaker 1: of a better way to say itause, I'm sure this
Speaker 1: has been used to thousand times and put my stamp
Speaker 1: on it and a modern stamp on it as opposed
Speaker 1: to it being a pastiche and cover. Because any disco
Speaker 1: songs you're going to reference, you can't. There's no point
Speaker 1: to do them again. They're just perfect and that became
Speaker 1: a bit of a you know, like something to contend with. Actually,
Speaker 1: you'd think, on paper, Kylie disco, Sure, we'll do this
Speaker 1: in no time, but actually it was it really required
Speaker 1: a bit of um, you know, chipping away, looking from
Speaker 1: different angles and how close can we go to it,
Speaker 1: you know, referencing Abba Begs, Donna, Summer Shake, etcetera, etcetera.
Speaker 1: Because what you wanted to make wasn't just a disco
Speaker 1: in a sense of, oh, we're gonna make a dance
Speaker 1: pop record which maybe has some thumb popping bass on
Speaker 1: a tracker. To you, you know you you were referencing
Speaker 1: and taking inspiration from a lot of classic grooves. I
Speaker 1: know you brought up Lionel Richie. You just mentioned Abba
Speaker 1: and I definitely hear that on a couple of different tracks.
Speaker 1: Donna Summer Studio fifty four is mentioned. You know, like
Speaker 1: the touchstones are all there, and if you've got to
Speaker 1: set those as your touchdones, you you you better get
Speaker 1: the group better be right. But you also wanted to
Speaker 1: be something more than we We would start some things
Speaker 1: and go, okay, let's get a baseline that's similar to
Speaker 1: blah blah, I kind of remember what but just didn't
Speaker 1: hit you know. So anyway, thanks to amazing producers and
Speaker 1: tenacity and as I say, chipping away and looking at
Speaker 1: it from different angles, we got there. And it transpires
Speaker 1: that the roots of disco are seventies my you know,
Speaker 1: I fell in love with disco back then, but then
Speaker 1: it morphed through the years and there's a bit of
Speaker 1: eighties electronica, um you know, some some parts of that
Speaker 1: then even some self referencing in early two thousand's when
Speaker 1: I had a bit of disc like a bit of
Speaker 1: electro disco then. So yeah, it's turned out to be
Speaker 1: a thankfully not just rooted in this, not just a
Speaker 1: tracing And it's so interesting to me be you were
Speaker 1: just talking about recording your vocals at home. You started
Speaker 1: out with the idea that you were going to work
Speaker 1: on demos, and you ended up with a vocal engineering
Speaker 1: and production credit on the record. Like you you had
Speaker 1: to learn a little bit of uh studio craft as
Speaker 1: it were. And I love the idea that your your
Speaker 1: studio seems to have been in a cupboard but then
Speaker 1: grew into a more sophisticated Yeah, it was in boxes
Speaker 1: in the cupboard. Yeah, I ended up I took delivery
Speaker 1: of one microphone that timod source for me from Finland
Speaker 1: that was broken in transit. You wouldn't know what to
Speaker 1: look at it. But yeah, we tried recording on that
Speaker 1: and it was just you know, like in Lockdown, everything
Speaker 1: took so much longer. Delivery vans were, you know, just
Speaker 1: to get a delivery of anything. So I completely understood
Speaker 1: that it took longer to get these bits and pieces
Speaker 1: and then for that part to a write, well a
Speaker 1: very important part to arrive and be broken. So we
Speaker 1: got a long story shot again, we got another one
Speaker 1: by the time. It's funny when you have these experiences
Speaker 1: and your home alone, so there's no one to share
Speaker 1: it with and to kind of share that memory with.
Speaker 1: I'm just thinking back to receiving all the other parts,
Speaker 1: your stand, your pop shielders, surround the interface, that top
Speaker 1: that like just all of it with you know, wrestling
Speaker 1: the boxes and up and down the stairs and where
Speaker 1: do they go, and it must all looked pretty hilarious.
Speaker 1: But when the microphone arrived in this box like a
Speaker 1: like a flight case, just like a little yeah flight case,
Speaker 1: and I swear to God when I opened it up,
Speaker 1: there might have been angels going. I was like, ah,
Speaker 1: there it is, like this is this is it? Unpack
Speaker 1: it and I just remember that you don't drop the microphone.
Speaker 1: Don't drop it. Tim's team is explained to me to
Speaker 1: make sure it's always off when you move. Just basics
Speaker 1: you get stuff. But I've never had to do it before.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I got it set up in my lounge room.
Speaker 1: But that's not that's not until I had already set
Speaker 1: it up elsewhere and had my first connection with Timy
Speaker 1: to test it, and he said, m that sounds terrible,
Speaker 1: like that's I just think small room. But I had
Speaker 1: to take everything out of the room to get the
Speaker 1: stuff into the room. It wasn't a size of a couvert,
Speaker 1: but small enough. So then I thought, okay, I'm going
Speaker 1: to move. I moved it again to the lounge room
Speaker 1: and then I had to kind of try and sound
Speaker 1: proof it enough. So I got boardrobe racks and had
Speaker 1: Dubet's I don't know if you call them dubets over there, dooners,
Speaker 1: Dubet's rug just kind of whatever I could. So you
Speaker 1: had to build a little a little pillow for it
Speaker 1: is it were to kind of dampen the sound of it.
Speaker 1: Thankfully it didn't have to be, because I've seen some
Speaker 1: great pictures through a lockdown of actors doing a d
Speaker 1: R where they literally kind of under two chairs with
Speaker 1: a dot on top of it. I didn't have to
Speaker 1: go to that extreme, but just just try and dull
Speaker 1: the room a bit for that for that additional dialogue
Speaker 1: recording that they have to create their own whisper room,
Speaker 1: which basically means you have to put a blanket over you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so I wasn't. I wasn't kind of hunched under or anything.
Speaker 1: I have my space, but yeah, what a what a
Speaker 1: crazy time. So again I didn't, you know, I didn't
Speaker 1: really know when we would finish. There was no date
Speaker 1: that we said it has to be finished by this time.
Speaker 1: And I've asked myself if I hadn't started recording before Lockdown,
Speaker 1: would i've what would I have written? If anything? I
Speaker 1: think it was easy for me to continue because, as
Speaker 1: I said before, we had our momentum and got the
Speaker 1: d n A. We've kind of broken the back of
Speaker 1: what's the soundscape of this album? This is it? We
Speaker 1: just need we just need to keep writing and writing
Speaker 1: until we think we've got all the songs. So I
Speaker 1: think that was the that helped me be that tenacious
Speaker 1: through lockdown and throw myself into it. Those are some
Speaker 1: of the rewards, are the pleasure of having a purpose
Speaker 1: of direction, something to do during this time. But but
Speaker 1: what were some of the challenges, Because you've talked a
Speaker 1: little bit, talked a little bit about working remotely miss
Speaker 1: the thing and having a bit of a meltdown working
Speaker 1: with him. Yeah, I will say, to me, write some
Speaker 1: amazing melodies, and I think the picture of his and
Speaker 1: he's got amazing voice, very unique equality to it. And
Speaker 1: so when I was finishing those songs with him, and
Speaker 1: we're going through singing it through and through before we
Speaker 1: got to recording, even then I said, do you think
Speaker 1: what about taking it down a half a tone or
Speaker 1: maybe even a full tone? Is okay, Sure, let's try that.
Speaker 1: We'll try it. And and then I've just got to
Speaker 1: call a spade a spade. And he's right, and I
Speaker 1: know it because I can hear it myself. It's like
Speaker 1: it's just not not hitting the same. But even though
Speaker 1: I was thinking this is a this is going to
Speaker 1: be just a more challenging song to sing parts of it.
Speaker 1: So when we got to recording it. We I would
Speaker 1: record with Timo, then he would work with his his
Speaker 1: co producer, Nico Study in l A. So this just
Speaker 1: this kind of triangle on that on those records, and
Speaker 1: a lot of that was really getting used to the
Speaker 1: remote set up, getting used to my mic, which he
Speaker 1: loved and sky adam so everyone loved that. You know,
Speaker 1: the setup worked. But for those from Mrs Mr Think particularly,
Speaker 1: I would like, I've never been closer to a mike,
Speaker 1: some kind of you say you right on, like I
Speaker 1: could not and literally could not be closer to them,
Speaker 1: like okay, okay, good go. And I was just one
Speaker 1: of those ones that was a bit of a challenge
Speaker 1: for me, and we, ah, now it's coming back to me.
Speaker 1: We did the vocals for that, they went to Nico,
Speaker 1: they came back to Team, they produced them, and then
Speaker 1: he said, now we've now we know what to do
Speaker 1: with this mike. Could we do it again? Could we
Speaker 1: re record those bits? And I was thinking, yeah, sure sure,
Speaker 1: because then he realized to get that sound on that song,
Speaker 1: you needed me really close on the mic. So we
Speaker 1: did it again. And when you're that close in the mic,
Speaker 1: there's nowhere to run or hide. It's like every every
Speaker 1: teeny thing you do, you just I don't know, it's
Speaker 1: like it's like being enough so you mean, it picks
Speaker 1: up every noise you're making, your mouth everything, so you're
Speaker 1: so close. And it was a day that I was exhausted.
Speaker 1: I think we got back to rerecording it kind of
Speaker 1: near the end or having done. You know, I'm trying
Speaker 1: to remember four or five weeks in a row of
Speaker 1: really going for it and me kind of almost executive
Speaker 1: producing the album, myself setting updates and juggling people and
Speaker 1: kids and deliveries and foods and not my kids, them
Speaker 1: and their kids, and acknowledging the stress of lockdown, simultaneously
Speaker 1: knowing I'm one of the lucky ones I can work
Speaker 1: and and be creative. But still it um it did
Speaker 1: get to me at a point. And I think it
Speaker 1: just when we were doing the re record for Miss
Speaker 1: the Thing, because I was I felt a bit challenged
Speaker 1: by anyway. I didn't go the full cry, but Timu could.
Speaker 1: You know, by this time, I've spent many, many, many
Speaker 1: hours with Timu. And it's like that in the studio,
Speaker 1: whether you're in an actual studio or a remote studio,
Speaker 1: you can't. You can't hide what's happening in your real life.
Speaker 1: And I think it could have been any of my
Speaker 1: producers that you know, it's if you're working with good,
Speaker 1: understanding people and you're having a day where you just
Speaker 1: can't quite do it. So like timor I just I
Speaker 1: think what it did was just awful. Can we I
Speaker 1: might have to call it a day, And he's like,
Speaker 1: no problem, no problem. The irony is he used the
Speaker 1: vocals from that day, So it was more my mind
Speaker 1: that was messing with me than actually what I was singing. Um,
Speaker 1: So yeah, definitely with everyone I worked with remotely, we
Speaker 1: were all riding out a little roller coasters of emotions
Speaker 1: each time. Let me ask you about that about working remotely, because,
Speaker 1: as you say, when you're in a studio, it can be,
Speaker 1: you know, a long pressured situation. Some songs, some days,
Speaker 1: some nights can go on forever. But there are people around,
Speaker 1: and when you're working on a track, you can sense
Speaker 1: in the room whether it's working or not. But when
Speaker 1: you're working remotely, particularly on dance music, and there's no
Speaker 1: dance floor around or maybe nobody to dance, how do
Speaker 1: you know when it's working? Did you did you like
Speaker 1: test drive or test dance some of these songs or
Speaker 1: how did you know when they were right? Good question. No,
Speaker 1: there wasn't really a dance test, just the same way
Speaker 1: as usual, I guess, but it was. It was very
Speaker 1: weird not to be able to be in the room together.
Speaker 1: And even towards the end of like finishing up the album,
Speaker 1: we're still saying, well, maybe maybe when it's released we
Speaker 1: can have a listening party just the people who worked
Speaker 1: on it. No, we can't, so we still haven't had
Speaker 1: that moment, and I as and when we can, I
Speaker 1: would dearly love to have everyone who know all my
Speaker 1: producers who worked on this and co writers, just like
Speaker 1: to have our own really daggy disco, like the worst
Speaker 1: disco over but well, it would be the best thing
Speaker 1: ever for us. It's certainly know all the words. You
Speaker 1: deserve it if anyone deserves a dance party, celebration. I
Speaker 1: mean you guys who've made this record do. But you
Speaker 1: mentioned Sky Adams before, and I want to ask you
Speaker 1: about Sky. You worked with him on Golden and he
Speaker 1: contributed a lot to this record, and he worked on
Speaker 1: two my favorite tracks, U super No and Celebrate. You
Speaker 1: tell me about him. Tell me about working with him.
Speaker 1: How did you guys first connect and what is working
Speaker 1: with him? Like, we're first connected. I didn't connect with him,
Speaker 1: but he came into my life when the always great
Speaker 1: Jamie Nelson my A and R sent him the working
Speaker 1: tape of Dancing, written with Steve McEwen and Nathan Chapman
Speaker 1: in Nashville. So, yeah, Dancing originally in its in its
Speaker 1: work tape form was slower. It was part of my
Speaker 1: introduction to working in Nashville. They write the song. It's
Speaker 1: not always produced, it doesn't have what it's going to be.
Speaker 1: It's just here's the bones of this song, and then
Speaker 1: you can build on and produce it. Produce it. However,
Speaker 1: so Jamie sent that to Sky Adams, and I remember
Speaker 1: hearing that. I was with my girlfriend in South France
Speaker 1: and an email come through with Sky's rework of Dancing.
Speaker 1: It was one of those moments I just I knew it.
Speaker 1: I was so excited. I would not have ever imagined
Speaker 1: it like that. And the extra he puts some different instrumentation,
Speaker 1: and I mean he basically had he produced it. So
Speaker 1: that's the first time I had heard of Sky Adams.
Speaker 1: And then I went into the studio with him for
Speaker 1: Golden and he is so fast paced. He is, he's amazing.
Speaker 1: There's no there is no stop in that train, and
Speaker 1: I tell you, so, you've got to kind of get
Speaker 1: into Skyland. It's really fast. And a big difference working
Speaker 1: with him remotely in Lockdown is I got to see
Speaker 1: his face because there's a something I would never have
Speaker 1: thought of. But when we're in the studio, it's the
Speaker 1: back of his head with his amazing green and blue
Speaker 1: afro just and he's there and he has the music
Speaker 1: really loud, and sometimes me and the co writer will
Speaker 1: be like, Okay, it's so loud, but you know, you
Speaker 1: go with it. And so working remotely, I got to
Speaker 1: see his face on the screen a lot. That's so
Speaker 1: so the distance, the social distancing was more of a
Speaker 1: face to face experience in this case. Yeah, very Actually
Speaker 1: it really was. Um I mean, I wish it was other,
Speaker 1: but just something I would never have even had in
Speaker 1: my mind before. So with Sky before Lockdown, we were
Speaker 1: working in the studio a couple of collaborators. He works
Speaker 1: with a lot um and then I had a session
Speaker 1: with him and Megan Katone. So that was the first
Speaker 1: time I've met Megan and she's an awesome writer as well.
Speaker 1: So our remote sessions was sky Megan and myself, and
Speaker 1: even that we had to figure out how does this work?
Speaker 1: A two way zoom is okay, three way when you're
Speaker 1: listening to music is you're just not hearing the same thing.
Speaker 1: So we we ended up finding out way in our
Speaker 1: rhythm for the remote sessions where we'd all get together
Speaker 1: for the initial what are we doing today, figure out
Speaker 1: our melody, our concept, and then Scott'd say, right, I'm
Speaker 1: out and be back in half an hour. So Megan
Speaker 1: and I would carry on doing the lyrics and then
Speaker 1: we'd all, you know, we'd he'd come back into the
Speaker 1: session and we'd say, okay, this is what we got,
Speaker 1: what do you think? And then you know, just just
Speaker 1: like a normal writing session, and then uh yeah. Normally,
Speaker 1: Megan had a very easy set up at her place.
Speaker 1: She's a that's a trait, she's a songwriter, so she
Speaker 1: would be able to put down the demos. So at
Speaker 1: least we had ah by the end of the day,
Speaker 1: I kind of a sketch of what we were doing,
Speaker 1: and then later once we decided which songs that we're
Speaker 1: going to go on the album, then I'd record them.
Speaker 1: Miss guy, the disco sound is happen. I mean, we're
Speaker 1: having a moment in right, We're back to this and
Speaker 1: and I know you've talked about this. I know people
Speaker 1: have asked you about this, but that that desire to
Speaker 1: return to fund to do something fun. It's not like
Speaker 1: we just need it now in Quarantine. It's not like
Speaker 1: was the banner year that I want to remember either,
Speaker 1: if you know what I mean, Like it is a
Speaker 1: necessary sense of escape and relief, but it's also really
Speaker 1: poigned to hear these songs about connecting on a dance
Speaker 1: floor and finding love. And you know, at this moment
Speaker 1: when we can't connect on a dance floor anywhere else,
Speaker 1: how how how's it felt to you to have this
Speaker 1: kind of music in Yeah, I think that how can
Speaker 1: I explain this? A lot of the music could be hearing,
Speaker 1: maybe not so much now, but certainly in the previous months.
Speaker 1: Was of course it was done last year. So disco
Speaker 1: is having a big moment this year. I think that's
Speaker 1: the Zeke guys. That's like I didn't know that duo
Speaker 1: was making a disco album. She didn't know that someone
Speaker 1: else is going to make a disco album. Jessie Ware
Speaker 1: didn't know. Like, it's just it's surround, and I just
Speaker 1: think it's big because of this year. It's um, I
Speaker 1: don't know, I found it. Maybe you've heard me talk
Speaker 1: about this before, but I've found all these correlations between
Speaker 1: disco music and this year that disco was born out
Speaker 1: of darkness, that was born out of struggle and adversity
Speaker 1: and people trying to find a place to belong and
Speaker 1: be accepted and express themselves and all of that kind
Speaker 1: of stuff. And even I'm just looking at what we've got,
Speaker 1: like you know, starfields and all of that is trying
Speaker 1: to find the light in the darkness and either dance
Speaker 1: your way through it or so yeah, it's finding the
Speaker 1: light in the darkness and then going to And I
Speaker 1: don't know if this is too poetic, but it makes
Speaker 1: sense in my mind, and sometimes you have to latch
Speaker 1: onto poetic things anyway that you're that disco ball. It
Speaker 1: just needs that one light on it and then it
Speaker 1: refracts light everywhere. And and I think whether you are
Speaker 1: aware of that when you listen to disco music, well,
Speaker 1: if you're aware of it, you get it. But even
Speaker 1: if you're not. Perhaps it's just it's just part of
Speaker 1: it's it's being disco. I don't know that they're not
Speaker 1: all happy songs, but you can find happiness within them,
Speaker 1: or at least an understanding, you know, a lost sense
Speaker 1: of belonging. I'm not the only one feeling like this.
Speaker 1: You understand me. You have troubles. I mean, I've got
Speaker 1: this songs on this like Supernova, which is it's it's
Speaker 1: almost mumbo jumbo. That is total escapeism. Um. But yeah,
Speaker 1: something like to celebrate you is you're swaying and you
Speaker 1: feel kind of happy, but there's a there's a sadness
Speaker 1: to it, but you're you're going with it. I mean,
Speaker 1: I have to tell you, I was listening this morning
Speaker 1: and the lyric last Chance for First Dance popped out
Speaker 1: at me, and I got I got a little emotional,
Speaker 1: I got a little children that's in last Chance. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And I'm not gonna I don't think I'm ever going
Speaker 1: to make I can't make a Woe is Me album.
Speaker 1: That's not my life. I'm very grateful for everything I have,
Speaker 1: but you know, we're all human and we have emotions
Speaker 1: and we have to go through life. What the hand
Speaker 1: it deals as as some is. It's good and sometimes
Speaker 1: it's a little more challenging. But for everyone this year,
Speaker 1: of course, it's been a challenge. So yeah, I think
Speaker 1: we started talking about the escapism and dance music and
Speaker 1: the disco music and the joy that that's brought a
Speaker 1: feelth going off topic a bit, no, I mean this
Speaker 1: is this is exactly right. These are great things to
Speaker 1: talk about, and I think we're grateful to have from
Speaker 1: you a music that gives us a chance. Is the
Speaker 1: old saying goes to dance our way out of our restrictions.
Speaker 1: You know, it's the liberation of of movement and rock
Speaker 1: and roll and dance music and disco the way it
Speaker 1: liberates the body. That's that's where it all started. Yeah, totally.
Speaker 1: And when I look back at songs that were done
Speaker 1: in Lockdown or just prior to Lockdown, like I'm trying
Speaker 1: to paint the picture of moveing my home studio, just
Speaker 1: being so focused and working on things after the calls
Speaker 1: were finished or prepping for them. But it was it
Speaker 1: was one of my my coping mechanisms as well, to
Speaker 1: really throw myself into it. I mean, whenever it's writing
Speaker 1: for an album or fight trying to find the songs
Speaker 1: for an album. I'm pretty obsessive about it anyway. Just
Speaker 1: it's like, oh, I'm not in it's not stage moment,
Speaker 1: it's not a public moment. This is just focus focus,
Speaker 1: and I love it. I really really enjoy the challenge.
Speaker 1: So yeah, in Lockdown, I mean maybe I went even
Speaker 1: further with that or had nowhere to you know, it
Speaker 1: wasn't going out to go to the studio and come back.
Speaker 1: It was just there was always there. But I think
Speaker 1: of some of the lyrics that that we wrote, um,
Speaker 1: like like Supernova, it feels like we just want to
Speaker 1: get out of here. We just want to go being
Speaker 1: out in space where anything is possible and leave this
Speaker 1: this world behind. You know, everything's kind of magic and
Speaker 1: amazing out there in our minds anyway, and it's all
Speaker 1: it's all about possibilities, nothing stopping us out there. But
Speaker 1: I don't think that's what we were. I think it
Speaker 1: was I think it was coming from our subconscious at
Speaker 1: the time. We're just like, what are we doing? How
Speaker 1: can we make this song? Well, we're grateful to you
Speaker 1: for getting it out of your subconscious and and getting
Speaker 1: it to the rest of us, because we did need
Speaker 1: a chance to move around a little bit, get up
Speaker 1: off the cap a lot of it, even if we
Speaker 1: can't get all the way out there b pm on
Speaker 1: this album is it really gets going. It starts slow,
Speaker 1: it eases you in, then before you know, it's super over. Um.
Speaker 1: Then we'll just give you a little bit of a brightness,
Speaker 1: say something and then it pretty much gallops to the
Speaker 1: end and we wind you down with celebrate you unless
Speaker 1: it's the deluxe edition and then we have to get
Speaker 1: back out on the dance floor again. Yeah, well more, yeah, well, Kylie,
Speaker 1: thank you so much for being with us this is
Speaker 1: This has been terrific, and congratulations again and thanks for
Speaker 1: sharing the disco machic. Thank you so much. M hmmm.
Speaker 1: Inside the Studio is a production of I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: For more podcasts from my Heart Radio, check out the
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Speaker 1: your podcasts. M HM