Arlo Parks discusses songwriting perfectionism with Zane Lowe
Mercury Award winner Arlo Parks has opened up on how she has to deal with the hunt for perfectionism when she approaches songwriting. Parks has been discussing her methods on Apple Music with Zane Lowe ahead of her second studio album, My Soft Machine.
Parks said, “I think it took me a while to learn patience. I think especially when it comes to writing, I want it to be perfect now, and I think I had that real sense of frantically searching for the perfect way to say something, the perfect phrasing, the perfect chord.” She added, “But then I actually in this writing process found proof that when you actually leave things alone and allow for them to take the time that they’re going to take, then that’s when the best things come.”
The widely-celebrated artist then noted that her process often comes from within rather than finding external things to write about. “I try and cultivate that almost,” she said. “I like the idea of feeling like a teenager in my bedroom all the time.”
“I like feeling like I’m away from the world, and then I can craft this little thing that is just for me, at least for now,” Parks added. “‘I can be brave. I can be myself.’ And that I guess encouraged me to go inwards a lot more radically on this record rather than speaking about characters and people outside of me. It was a lot more I and the self.”
That process is going to be found on The Soft Machine, and Parks also opened up on what it will be like. “A lot of the record is about feeling deeply and surrendering to that feeling, or closing up and hiding behind walls,” she said. “I think even in terms of the instrumentation, there are moments that are a little bit more abrasive and energized and there are moments that are more soft and hypnotic, and I just wanted something that had that sense of context.”
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