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A: The first track, or chapter, on this album... it was the first song that we wrote completely and recorded and as soon as it was done, I knew that it would open up whatever project I was going to work on next, whether it was just a personal one like the million other saved files on my computer, or well, what it came to be. This album.

The story behind this track is actually pretty funny. I wrote it at the start of quarantine when time no longer seemed linear and by that I mean when days and nights and weeks all started to blend into this mush in the so-called space and time continuum that we live in. Here's a little bit of some geeky, nerdy shit for ya.

It was around three in the morning I think, when I first started writing it. I was in this strange mindset, where everything just felt... almost hopeless. It was chaos reigning. I guess, entropy is the word for it, right? Maybe. But at the same time, you know, that night, this calm washed over me. I think weirdly, despite everything that was going on, I was doing the best I ever had in years. And I sat at this small keyboard in my childhood bedroom and I laid down the initial chord progression. The verse all the way up to the pre-chorus, the walk-down. Du-nu-nu-nu-nu... "I've got you and I know"... that one.

And as I repeated that, I felt it needed something else, so I transposed it to the guitar, this one right here and it just worked. I got the whole instrumental bit down in like, thirty minutes and I recorded them on my phone, actually.

The lyrics were a little harder, but I really enjoyed writing them. I think the hard bit was that, the song meant a lot to me even as I was writing it. And so, every time I wrote a line, I needed to make sure it was perfect. That it hit you just right.

So, I kept working on it until it was like 8 in the morning and I was just buzzed that I'd just written this whole song. I had to show it to someone, I was so proud of it. And I thought, hm, who better than my good friend Dorothea?

[

J: right, and this Dorothea, she's....?

A: she's not a real person, obviously

J: Wait, she's not?

A: Jack...

J: what?

A: You're not doing that same bit, are you?

J: What bit?

A: The bit! That you did, with the—

J: Oh! Right! That bit

A: Jack...

J: Dorothea's not real?

A, exasperated: No! Just as everyone has been speculating... and by the time this thing airs, I'm pretty sure everyone would have found out that it's Taylor.

J: You're kidding!

A: Antonoff!

J, laughing: I remember the first time I heard the song. I was on the phone with someone else and suddenly I hear your voice and I had absolutely no idea who this person singing was and I demanded to be brought closer and suddenly, there was Taylor singing, and a whole debate going on about how the song was going to go and then the high note at the end and I was entranced. Even then, there was this chemistry between the two of you... And it was like a rough play-through of the song, and the lyrics still hit you, really hard. I knew there was something really special about you, then.

A: aw, Jack!

J: yeah, and when we started working together, it was like just right, all these creative juices flowing and we made this incredible song together and from that song came a whole album. All thirteen songs

A: Hey, you know what?

J: What?

A: If the tide takes California, I'm so glad I got to know ya, buddy

J: We're filming this in New York

A: Jack!

———

A: the whole sequence of the medley from track two till... track five. It's about growing up. When you reach that point in your life when everything's changing, everyone's moving on and doing their own thing, from that childhood best friend who went off the college in Scotland, to your first serious relationship and ultimately figuring out you both want different things in life and end things you know, just before college starts, or just before you graduate college... it's about these certain checkpoints in life that truly define you and make up the next step in your story.

I've had quite a bit of those and actually each one of these songs had been written during those years. I was fresh out of college and everyone around me was moving on with their lives, even I was. But I'd sit in bed at the end of the day and I'd need an outlet so I'd write about all of my friends moving away, you know? I had a fight with a pretty close friend of mine and I journaled about losing him. A college party where you see an old friend and you catch up and realise that you can't remember when things suddenly changed and you couldn't say much besides a slurred hello to each other. You meet someone new, and you don't realise you had them until you lose them and they say goodbye.

I'd written about all these moments in my life growing up and I have them in these journals back home. And it didn't take much to dig them up, get back in that headspace, and write the songs. Sometimes, I just sang the words that my twenty-year-old self or so had written verbatim. Like, 'how the hell did I lose a friend I never had?'

I still remember writing that line in red ink. It was... that's a pretty personal song. I can't even remember what the fight was about. Anyway.

And this all leads to uh, this big climactic event in your life. You finally meet someone.

———

So, you meet someone. You're young. They're a few years older. They seem to have their life figured out, you don't even know what you want to have for dinner that night. You're infatuated instantly, and you think it's love at first sight, because, let's face it. You've never truly been in love before. They seem perfect to you and you cannot for the life of you see faults in them, and you think, well that's it, isn't it? You've found them, the one.

But in the end, when you're in that moment, in the beginning, when you think you're falling in love... everything seems beautiful. And it's picture perfect, and a minute feels like forever and forever feels like a minute, and... yeah.

———

My brother and I... we never had the best of relationships. For starters, he was a lot older than I was. We would never really hang out together. But I loved him a lot growing up. I looked up to him, maybe even more than anyone else in my life. He was the one who had inspired me to pursue music. He started teaching me the piano. He'd play something and I'd repeat it and... that was how we bonded. Over music.

He... he didn't have the easiest life. He struggled a lot in high school and college, with uh, addiction. And that was when our relationship started just, you know, getting more and more strained. I was pretty young, but I understood what was happening for the most part. I'd be in my room and I'd listen in to my dad and my brother fighting and...

Uhm, see, the thing about Ryne was that he was actually the light in every situation. He was always the optimist. He never failed to make anyone laugh. At family parties, he'd be making everyone dance and play these ridiculous games. Everyone who ever met him truly loved him. But he had this one fault he couldn't shake off, until his daughter was born. Somehow, he started getting better. He was clean for four whole years. And the old Ryne came back, he was different of course, but you could see him shining brightly again. And we were good. We were on track to fixing things. He was starting to become my best friend again. We'd go to concerts together with my sister and it was... it was good.

Until, he slipped up. Just once. But it was all he needed to overdose. The last thing I ever heard from him was a message he had left for me and... maybe, if I'd called him back sooner. But anyway.

This song wasn't planned. The album was going to be twelve chapters long. But even after we had wrapped everything up, it didn't feel complete. My story felt empty and so I wrote this song at three in the morning, inspired by the first thing Ryne ever taught me to play on the piano.

And when I finally added it, it felt right. It was exactly what the record needed. I was already vulnerable, but I needed to be as naked as possible, I needed to say everything I had in my heart to be able to move on. To... be able to look back at the good memories and remember why I loved my brother. Forgive his mistakes. To remind his children of the real person he was. And as a tribute to him. Because he really was such good person. He just got stuck.

I think, so many other people have gone through this as well and I guess this song is also theirs.

Uhm... I'm sorry.

So, Moral of the Story...

That one's a long story.

So, I got a divorce.

I met a guy when I was still pretty young and impressionable. I was twenty-years-old, he was twenty-five. Just as I explained previously, he was perfect, and I was infatuated. We got married and I thought I really was in love.

I thought that fighting over the smallest of things was just love. I thought being jealous over your partner was just that you loved them too much. I thought, you know, that the pain was only because you loved them. I realised too late that, wait, no, that's toxic!

And months after I should have, I left and... well, it wasn't easy. I was at my lowest right then. And the divorce was just, you know, my breaking point. It couldn't get worse after that and, well, thankfully, it didn't really.

———

Alright... this song I think is the most personal one, in terms of, well, it's just me coming into terms with myself as a person. It's about personal growth and accepting this new chapter in my life.

The August before this chapter is not the same as the August moving forward.

This August is going to be singing to crowds about the old August and they're going to eat the old August up... meanwhile, this August is worrying about you know, anxiety, battling all these fears, there's these fresh wounds that are bare to everyone but you know, eventually, no matter what, you'll be alright.

It's a new chapter in your life, and you just get onboard and embrace it. Make the most out of it. And eventually everything works out. And you'll be alright.

———

The last three songs on the record... One of them's in French. I speak a bit of it, so I thought, why the hell not, you know? And besides, it's a romantic language... and when I wrote it, I was... well, in the process of falling in love I think.

These three songs... they're gold. They've moved well past the red and everything is bright colours. It's Midas, turning everything to gold. That's love.

I'd met someone at a time in my life when I didn't think I'd ever be able to actually love again. But, the thing was, I'd never really been in love before. Not with my partners in high school, not with those people I dated casually in college. Not with my ex-husband.

But... then, I met this person and I learned a lot about myself. I learned a lot about love, even when it was pretty hard sometimes. Even when it doesn't end up working out. But that's life, you know? At least when it did happen, it was beautiful. And you'll cherish those times for the rest of your life.

And in the end, you realise you've found your home in these people around you. In this new life you've built for yourself, this cottage with a white picket-fence and trees all around, the leaves are golden and red and yellow and green, and you're sipping iced tea with all these people in your backyard with your dog in your lap and, a record scratching in the back and... it's beautiful, isn't it?