Latest / Broken Record with Rick Rubin, Malcolm Gladwell, Bruce Headlam and Justin Richmond / Caroline Rose

Transcript

Caroline Rose · Broken Record with Rick Rubin, Malcolm Gladwell, Bruce Headlam and Justin Richmond

• 0:15
  Speaker 1: Pushkin. Singer songwriter Caroline Rose has always been a character.
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: Her music videos often feature Caroline as the screwball lead
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: navigating ambition, desire, and superstardom. Since her twenty twelve debut,
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: Caroline's music has evolved from an American of folk sound
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: to incorporating more elements of synth, heavy indie dance, and
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: straight up pop. Now, on the verge of releasing her
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: latest album, The Art of Forgetting, Caroline is shedding all
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: of the past pretense and offering up an unflinching look
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: into her inner life in the midst of personal turmoil.
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: The result is an album packed with clever lyricism and
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: soaring arrangements. Caroline produced the album and collaborated with Nick
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: Sanborn of Silvanesso, who helped stack and distort her vocal.
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: On today's episode, Broken Record producer Leah Rose talks to
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: Caroline Rose about why she wanted to set her living
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: room on fire for the sake of her album art.
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: Caroline also shares an early demo of a song she
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: wrote under a starry desert sky and explains how, aside
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: from herself, Caroline's parents are her harshest critics. This is
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: broken Record liner notes for the Digital Age. I'm justin Mitchman.
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: Here's Lea Rose with Caroline Rose.
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: So let's talk about the new album. Yeah, where are
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: you sitting with it?
• 1:46
  Speaker 3: Now?
• 1:46
  Speaker 4: You're done with it, You're ready to start talking about it.
• 1:49
  Speaker 4: Hopefully eventually you're going to start touring it. How do
• 1:52
  Speaker 4: you feel about it now as like a completed piece
• 1:55
  Speaker 4: of work.
• 1:57
  Speaker 5: Well, you know, you're catching me at an interesting time because, uh,
• 2:00
  Speaker 5: you know, I wrote these songs a while ago now,
• 2:04
  Speaker 5: and I wasn't sure what I was even going to
• 2:07
  Speaker 5: do with them. I thought that they were just songs
• 2:10
  Speaker 5: that I wrote to kind of help me through this
• 2:12
  Speaker 5: difficult time, and then it ended up being pretty clear
• 2:15
  Speaker 5: that it was an album and it's finally coming out,
• 2:19
  Speaker 5: which I'm I'm really proud of it as a body
• 2:23
  Speaker 5: of work. I think it's by far my strongest material
• 2:26
  Speaker 5: and I'm really proud of that, and I think it's
• 2:29
  Speaker 5: really beautiful. But there's something else that it's like, it's bittersweet,
• 2:35
  Speaker 5: I think because it's really difficult for me to have
• 2:38
  Speaker 5: to keep reliving this stuff, and I you know, now
• 2:41
  Speaker 5: that it's finally coming out, I'm like, wow, did I
• 2:43
  Speaker 5: just shoot myself on the foot putting out this really
• 2:47
  Speaker 5: painful material. Yeah, that's on me though, you know, I
• 2:50
  Speaker 5: did this to myself really, so it's a mixed bag.
• 2:55
  Speaker 4: The album is very much it feels very much like
• 2:57
  Speaker 4: it's connected to a situation, and a very painful situation.
• 3:02
  Speaker 4: I don't know if it's a if it qualifies as
• 3:04
  Speaker 4: a breakup album, but as far as just that situation goes,
• 3:07
  Speaker 4: do you have enough distance from it? Like do you
• 3:11
  Speaker 4: feel like you've healed and moved on from whatever spurred this?
• 3:15
  Speaker 6: Yeah?
• 3:15
  Speaker 5: Well, you know, it was a series of things that
• 3:18
  Speaker 5: all happened at the same time, so there was like,
• 3:21
  Speaker 5: you know, this like handful of one, two, three, four
• 3:25
  Speaker 5: punches all at the same time that I was just like, uh,
• 3:29
  Speaker 5: And I think the process of moving on it's not linear,
• 3:35
  Speaker 5: Like you don't ever reach a place where you're.
• 3:37
  Speaker 6: Like, oh, I'm completely moved.
• 3:39
  Speaker 5: On from this. You know, it'll all there will always
• 3:41
  Speaker 5: be tendrils of things that pull you back into something.
• 3:44
  Speaker 5: And I find myself going in these waves of I'm oh,
• 3:49
  Speaker 5: I am moved on. You know, I'm in a much better,
• 3:52
  Speaker 5: happier place now. And for a while I kind of
• 3:55
  Speaker 5: lost my sense of humor and that doesn't like, that
• 3:58
  Speaker 5: doesn't feel like the case anymore.
• 4:01
  Speaker 6: But there are moments.
• 4:02
  Speaker 5: I mean, I had one this morning where I was
• 4:04
  Speaker 5: like just riddled with anxiety and fear, and I'm like,
• 4:08
  Speaker 5: what if I done I've made a huge mistake, just
• 4:12
  Speaker 5: full of doubt, and then I get thrown back into
• 4:17
  Speaker 5: you know, the lore of the past of like what
• 4:19
  Speaker 5: I could have done differently, And I think it's always
• 4:22
  Speaker 5: going to be this way of fascinating back and forth
• 4:25
  Speaker 5: being like, oh, I'm in a good place, and then
• 4:27
  Speaker 5: it's like duh, Yeah.
• 4:29
  Speaker 4: I mean the fact that you're so honest with this
• 4:32
  Speaker 4: new album, because that's what it feels like. It feels
• 4:34
  Speaker 4: like it's like almost like a primal scream, like it's
• 4:38
  Speaker 4: obviously you processing some sort of trauma, whether it was
• 4:42
  Speaker 4: one or many traumas, and you like really like we're
• 4:45
  Speaker 4: going through it with you, and you know, I, as
• 4:48
  Speaker 4: a listener, I felt very connected to you and your pain.
• 4:52
  Speaker 4: But I also you know, when I think about Caroline Rose,
• 4:55
  Speaker 4: like I know you almost like a character. Is that
• 4:59
  Speaker 4: actually a decision or how did you deal with putting
• 5:03
  Speaker 4: forth a more honest and open version of yourself?
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: Yeah?
• 5:07
  Speaker 6: To be honest, it didn't really feel like good.
• 5:08
  Speaker 7: True.
• 5:09
  Speaker 5: It felt more more like when I was younger, uh,
• 5:14
  Speaker 5: you know, even a teenager, and I felt really isolated
• 5:18
  Speaker 5: in those times, you know, as like a young queer
• 5:20
  Speaker 5: kid kind of trying to figure out who I was
• 5:23
  Speaker 5: and where I belonged in the world. And these songs
• 5:29
  Speaker 5: like it was really similar to that process of just
• 5:33
  Speaker 5: you have to express yourself somehow or else it'll build up,
• 5:37
  Speaker 5: and you know, bad things happen when you don't express
• 5:39
  Speaker 5: yourself and you have all these feelings. It didn't feel
• 5:43
  Speaker 5: like a choice because I had to get it out somehow.
• 5:46
  Speaker 5: It was just you know, also, mind you, all of
• 5:49
  Speaker 5: these things were happening in the midst of the most
• 5:52
  Speaker 5: isolating time any of us will probably ever feel in
• 5:56
  Speaker 5: our whole lives, like during the pandemic, and you know,
• 5:59
  Speaker 5: being forced to kind of stay inside and be alone
• 6:03
  Speaker 5: as much as possible, so you're just sitting just marinating
• 6:07
  Speaker 5: in your own thoughts. So to be trying to heal
• 6:11
  Speaker 5: from things, which requires looking inward in a very isolating time,
• 6:17
  Speaker 5: you know, that's a lot of loneliness right there, and
• 6:19
  Speaker 5: that's a lot of ripping some big band aids of like, Okay, well,
• 6:23
  Speaker 5: if I'm going to improve my life and if I'm
• 6:26
  Speaker 5: going to try and become a better person, improve my
• 6:29
  Speaker 5: mental health and start to love myself, I have to
• 6:33
  Speaker 5: go deep. And sometimes that's so scary. It's still scary.
• 6:38
  Speaker 5: You know, the characters that you're talking about, they are
• 6:41
  Speaker 5: still me. Yeah, And that was something that was probably
• 6:44
  Speaker 5: my bad of not making that more clear that anytime
• 6:49
  Speaker 5: I was like kind of putting on an act, it
• 6:51
  Speaker 5: was like just a poking, fun a version of myself,
• 6:53
  Speaker 5: like right, but this time there were no crutches because
• 6:58
  Speaker 5: I wasn't really I didn't have any I didn't.
• 7:01
  Speaker 4: Yeah, would the melodies come to you first? Or would
• 7:05
  Speaker 4: the words come to you first? Like how was the
• 7:06
  Speaker 4: actual construction of the songs happening?
• 7:09
  Speaker 6: It's always different.
• 7:10
  Speaker 5: I don't understand it, but you know, some things at work,
• 7:14
  Speaker 5: some things at work in there, because sometimes you know
• 7:17
  Speaker 5: the melody, I'll just be noodling on an instrument, the
• 7:20
  Speaker 5: piano or guitar, which is so much fun because there's
• 7:24
  Speaker 5: no gadgets involved.
• 7:25
  Speaker 6: You just sit down, dress.
• 7:27
  Speaker 5: A note and it makes a sound and then you
• 7:29
  Speaker 5: can immediately there's no waiting, like you can just make
• 7:33
  Speaker 5: something that sounds interesting, and there it is, and then
• 7:38
  Speaker 5: the song is made. So sometimes it's as simple as that,
• 7:42
  Speaker 5: as you just sit down, you hear something and then
• 7:45
  Speaker 5: it's like pulling a thread and you're like, this makes
• 7:48
  Speaker 5: me feel this way, and this other chord makes me
• 7:51
  Speaker 5: feel this way, and you just pull the thread more
• 7:55
  Speaker 5: and more until it's like, oh.
• 7:57
  Speaker 6: This is what this is about and it's so cool. Yeah.
• 8:01
  Speaker 5: And other times, you know it, there'll be a line.
• 8:04
  Speaker 5: I'll be like, oh, this is such a great line.
• 8:08
  Speaker 2: You have some great line on this album.
• 8:10
  Speaker 6: Oh thank you.
• 8:11
  Speaker 4: The first one that stood out to me just because
• 8:13
  Speaker 4: the sequence of the album was in Miami, where you're
• 8:17
  Speaker 4: talking back and forth with your mom in the song
• 8:21
  Speaker 4: your father and I were in the last stage of
• 8:23
  Speaker 4: our lives. So for God's sake, no more talk about
• 8:26
  Speaker 4: you imagine dying.
• 8:27
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you know you're going through.
• 8:30
  Speaker 4: All these like woes and troubles, but then you hear
• 8:33
  Speaker 4: what your mom's going through, what she's facing, and she's like, look,
• 8:37
  Speaker 4: I'm facing death.
• 8:38
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, and that's real talk right there. That
• 8:41
  Speaker 5: I feel like if only we all did that when
• 8:44
  Speaker 5: we were having kind of getting sucked into our own
• 8:47
  Speaker 5: little worlds. And just thought about the fact that this
• 8:51
  Speaker 5: isn't This doesn't last forever. You know, yeah, everything is impermanent,
• 8:56
  Speaker 5: and we all have an expiration date, including the good
• 9:00
  Speaker 5: times and the bad times, like they all have an
• 9:03
  Speaker 5: expiration date. So I need that reminder. And at that time,
• 9:08
  Speaker 5: when I was writing that song, I didn't have a
• 9:11
  Speaker 5: lot of tools to remind.
• 9:13
  Speaker 6: Myself of that. I know, it's obvious.
• 9:15
  Speaker 5: And now I look back, I'm like, this stuff is
• 9:17
  Speaker 5: so obvious, but for people like me at least to
• 9:21
  Speaker 5: get sucked into the stream of busyness and things thrown
• 9:28
  Speaker 5: at you and expectations and you know, ambition, right.
• 9:34
  Speaker 2: Is that an actual conversation you've had with your mom.
• 9:36
  Speaker 6: It's almost, word for word, a real conversation.
• 9:39
  Speaker 5: And when I was making this and when the album
• 9:42
  Speaker 5: kind of started revealing itself as a complete thing, I
• 9:47
  Speaker 5: did have this moment where I was like, I haven't
• 9:49
  Speaker 5: held back with myself at all. I'm not there's no
• 9:53
  Speaker 5: facade here, and I'm like, if I'm going to put
• 9:55
  Speaker 5: this out, I might as well go for it, like
• 9:58
  Speaker 5: go deep and make it as real as possible. And
• 10:01
  Speaker 5: I mean, man, so much of this is real. If
• 10:04
  Speaker 5: there's any quotes in there, like I don't know if
• 10:06
  Speaker 5: you have the lyrics sheets and stuff, but sometimes I'll
• 10:08
  Speaker 5: have little conversation. You'll see quotes where I'm having a
• 10:12
  Speaker 5: conversation with myself and these will be like real things
• 10:15
  Speaker 5: that I'm talking the voice in my head is saying,
• 10:19
  Speaker 5: and you know, sometimes the voice in my head is
• 10:21
  Speaker 5: like the most cruel.
• 10:23
  Speaker 4: Yeah, once you started to figure out that this might
• 10:27
  Speaker 4: actually be an album, how did you figure out what
• 10:31
  Speaker 4: went where?
• 10:32
  Speaker 6: Man?
• 10:32
  Speaker 5: Sequencing is probably my favorite part of the album making process.
• 10:36
  Speaker 5: You can craft the journey that people are going on,
• 10:39
  Speaker 5: and you know, normally I will put the more upbeat
• 10:43
  Speaker 5: stuff up front and then and then make it like
• 10:46
  Speaker 5: kind of heavier as you go along, or more theorial
• 10:49
  Speaker 5: or something, and sort of the opposite on this one.
• 10:53
  Speaker 6: I well, first.
• 10:54
  Speaker 5: Off, I knew that Love Love Friend was gonna be
• 10:56
  Speaker 5: the first song. I wrote that really quickly. It just
• 10:59
  Speaker 5: really I don't know it again, the magic I don't
• 11:03
  Speaker 5: ask questions, but it just kind of wrote itself. It
• 11:08
  Speaker 5: was just and I was like, this is the beginning
• 11:11
  Speaker 5: of some sort of journey. It just felt like the
• 11:14
  Speaker 5: beginning and it kind of captured the mystery in the longing.
• 11:20
  Speaker 5: But to me, there's a sort of hope in it.
• 11:24
  Speaker 5: I'll be a mixed in with some pain.
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 11:29
  Speaker 4: What I thought was interesting about that song, Like, it's
• 11:32
  Speaker 4: definitely I mean, it is the perfect first song because
• 11:34
  Speaker 4: it makes such an emotional statement and sets the tone
• 11:38
  Speaker 4: for the album. And you start out it's kind of
• 11:41
  Speaker 4: like making a personal statement, and I feel like you're
• 11:44
  Speaker 4: advocating for yourself. I'm not your lover, I'm not your mother,
• 11:49
  Speaker 4: I'm not your son, And it feels like you're trying
• 11:52
  Speaker 4: to figure out how you want to be treated in
• 11:56
  Speaker 4: an intimate relationship. And you have this love on one
• 12:00
  Speaker 4: end in your life that is unconditional, that comes from
• 12:03
  Speaker 4: your family. And there's all these like really sweet, beautiful
• 12:07
  Speaker 4: voicemails sprinkled throughout from I think it's your grandma. Yeah,
• 12:11
  Speaker 4: Who's like I love you, How are you doing? Are
• 12:13
  Speaker 4: you eating? Like these really like beautiful basic questions. She
• 12:17
  Speaker 4: just wants to know you're okay. And then you, you know,
• 12:20
  Speaker 4: have the conversation with your mom and you know, mention
• 12:22
  Speaker 4: of your family, which is just like this strong, unconditional love.
• 12:27
  Speaker 5: Yeah, oh man, that makes me, it makes me like
• 12:30
  Speaker 5: kind of weepy. Well, I should also mention my my
• 12:35
  Speaker 5: grandma like pass away the other day. Oh my gosh,
• 12:40
  Speaker 5: her voicemails are like all over it.
• 12:42
  Speaker 2: I'm so sorry. She sounded just like the sweetest.
• 12:47
  Speaker 5: Yeah, she she really was. She's like kind of a
• 12:49
  Speaker 5: rock in her family. But even just thinking about my family,
• 12:53
  Speaker 5: we're all so close and going through a hard time
• 12:56
  Speaker 5: and having a family that really cares for one another.
• 13:00
  Speaker 5: It's such a beautiful privilege. I just feel so grateful
• 13:05
  Speaker 5: for my family.
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: Mm hmm.
• 13:08
  Speaker 5: And I don't know this album, You're right, it captures
• 13:12
  Speaker 5: a certain moment in time, And I don't really consider
• 13:15
  Speaker 5: it a breakup album because that was just like one
• 13:18
  Speaker 5: of the things, one of the things during that time.
• 13:21
  Speaker 5: But to me, it's like it just will always remind
• 13:24
  Speaker 5: me of a time when I was in pieces and myself,
• 13:29
  Speaker 5: along with my family and my close friends like helped
• 13:33
  Speaker 5: put me back together.
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 13:36
  Speaker 4: The other line that really stood out to me is
• 13:40
  Speaker 4: on the last song on the album, on where Do
• 13:43
  Speaker 4: I Go From Here, which is a great last song title,
• 13:47
  Speaker 4: everybody wants a seat at the table. I just want
• 13:49
  Speaker 4: to be swaddled and rocked in a cradle. Where did
• 13:52
  Speaker 4: that come from?
• 13:54
  Speaker 5: I think I vacillate between being really ambitious about something
• 13:58
  Speaker 5: where I was like, oh, I could make you know,
• 14:00
  Speaker 5: why do this when you can make something even bigger
• 14:03
  Speaker 5: and greater and like it could be like legendary. And
• 14:07
  Speaker 5: then the other side of the spectrum is like I
• 14:10
  Speaker 5: just want to grow a garden, have my quiet little
• 14:14
  Speaker 5: life and.
• 14:15
  Speaker 6: Never see another soul again.
• 14:17
  Speaker 5: You know, Like I kind of flip lot between the
• 14:19
  Speaker 5: two extremes, and I'm trying to, like, you know, find
• 14:22
  Speaker 5: a balance between the two. But so often, you know,
• 14:26
  Speaker 5: I feel hold in this direction of it's like intense
• 14:32
  Speaker 5: ambitious kind of like success, you know, and sometimes I'm
• 14:37
  Speaker 5: just like I want to crawl back into the womb.
• 14:41
  Speaker 4: Man just thinking about your career and ambition and what
• 14:45
  Speaker 4: you want, like if you if there was like no
• 14:47
  Speaker 4: barrier to entry, no money issues, anything like how famous
• 14:52
  Speaker 4: do you want to be?
• 14:54
  Speaker 5: I can tell you right now that I care more
• 14:56
  Speaker 5: about and this is something I like work on with
• 14:58
  Speaker 5: my therapist. But ever since I was a little kid,
• 15:01
  Speaker 5: I've always had this like I don't know, like complex
• 15:04
  Speaker 5: maybe about being respected. I really just want, like I
• 15:10
  Speaker 5: want to die knowing I've been I've made decent enough
• 15:15
  Speaker 5: art to be considered a true artist.
• 15:17
  Speaker 6: That is what I want and I.
• 15:19
  Speaker 5: Still want it, and I you know, part of me
• 15:21
  Speaker 5: is just like who cares? Just quit, like just put
• 15:25
  Speaker 5: out this album. It's so stressful promoting an album and
• 15:29
  Speaker 5: like pouring in and especially this material is just gonna
• 15:32
  Speaker 5: You're gonna hear me.
• 15:33
  Speaker 6: Cry a lot.
• 15:34
  Speaker 5: This isn't the first time, Like you know, I'm gonna
• 15:36
  Speaker 5: be crying for the next two years talking about this album.
• 15:39
  Speaker 5: But it's really a lot, and you know, like this morning,
• 15:42
  Speaker 5: I was just like, I think I'm gonna do something
• 15:44
  Speaker 5: else after this, like I'm done with music.
• 15:46
  Speaker 6: It really depends on what day you catch me on.
• 15:48
  Speaker 5: I mean, if things are going well, people really appreciate
• 15:52
  Speaker 5: it and are moved by it, then maybe it'll carry
• 15:55
  Speaker 5: me on to do another one.
• 15:58
  Speaker 4: Is there like a marker of recognition, like something that
• 16:03
  Speaker 4: you could finally reach, Like whether it's like getting like
• 16:06
  Speaker 4: the Kennedy Center on ors, Like what's what would be
• 16:08
  Speaker 4: the ultimate marker that lets you know that like I
• 16:11
  Speaker 4: am a respected artist.
• 16:13
  Speaker 5: That's a really good question because I don't really care
• 16:17
  Speaker 5: about the awards. It's not that I think it would
• 16:21
  Speaker 5: be if if some of my favorite artists heard my
• 16:24
  Speaker 5: music or watch my videos or something, and we're like
• 16:28
  Speaker 5: this is good. If Tom Waits was like I really
• 16:31
  Speaker 5: like this stuff, I'd be like, I'm done. I checked out.
• 16:35
  Speaker 5: I've checked out. My career is over now because I've succeeded.
• 16:39
  Speaker 5: But yeah, I guess that. And sometimes that does happen,
• 16:42
  Speaker 5: you know, like mean directors or other musicians that I
• 16:47
  Speaker 5: really admire will write me, and.
• 16:50
  Speaker 6: That means so much.
• 16:51
  Speaker 5: That that means so much coming from people who whose
• 16:53
  Speaker 5: art that I also really admire.
• 16:56
  Speaker 2: So that gives you like a little like gas in
• 16:58
  Speaker 2: your tank.
• 16:59
  Speaker 6: Yeah, And but I think it's like that.
• 17:02
  Speaker 5: But at the end of the day, it's really what
• 17:04
  Speaker 5: people the fans send me that makes it feel like
• 17:07
  Speaker 5: I actually have some sort of value.
• 17:09
  Speaker 6: Like what I'm doing isn't just for me.
• 17:11
  Speaker 5: It's really to move people and like bring some beauty
• 17:15
  Speaker 5: into the world where there wasn't some before.
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: People actually like send you things, Oh.
• 17:21
  Speaker 5: Yeah, my friend just sent me this message. They're a
• 17:24
  Speaker 5: writer and they're talking about how the writing on the album.
• 17:29
  Speaker 5: It felt a lot like there's some writing process where
• 17:34
  Speaker 5: you'll write a draft and then you're kind of taking
• 17:37
  Speaker 5: the razor out and you're sharpening it down so that
• 17:39
  Speaker 5: each line is like razor sharp, gets to the point
• 17:43
  Speaker 5: and kind of hits.
• 17:44
  Speaker 6: You where it needs to hit you.
• 17:46
  Speaker 5: And they were saying that this album really feels like that,
• 17:52
  Speaker 5: you know, there's no extra fluff, and yeah, that really
• 17:55
  Speaker 5: got to me, and I was like, maybe I'm finally
• 17:58
  Speaker 5: getting closer to becoming a real artist.
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: And your parents are artists, right, That's.
• 18:07
  Speaker 6: Why I have such a complex.
• 18:09
  Speaker 5: I have such fierce critics aside from myself, they're my
• 18:13
  Speaker 5: biggest critics, especially my dad.
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: Do you send him your work and then he gives
• 18:17
  Speaker 2: you feedback?
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: Oh?
• 18:18
  Speaker 6: Yeah, and my dad will tell me how he feels.
• 18:21
  Speaker 5: He sent me a legendary email once that I had
• 18:25
  Speaker 5: made a draft in a song because I wasn't I
• 18:27
  Speaker 5: was like, you know, I'm not totally sure I nailed
• 18:29
  Speaker 5: this one. I just wanted to try, like a different technique,
• 18:33
  Speaker 5: and so I tried this different style and I sent
• 18:38
  Speaker 5: it to him and he wrote back, Oh great, let
• 18:42
  Speaker 5: me just douse myself in gasoline and let himself on fire.
• 18:46
  Speaker 5: And I'm like, wow, ouch. My dad is very dramatic
• 18:52
  Speaker 5: and also hilarious. But he wasn't a fan, and so
• 18:56
  Speaker 5: I was like, well, Okay.
• 18:58
  Speaker 4: So do you change it at that point? Like, how
• 19:00
  Speaker 4: do you know like when to go against what your dad?
• 19:02
  Speaker 4: Because you know a lot of times like dads can
• 19:04
  Speaker 4: be like God in our minds, Like do you go
• 19:07
  Speaker 4: against God or do you just like do you?
• 19:10
  Speaker 5: Well, the thing is, my dad's still a dad, and
• 19:13
  Speaker 5: he's still you know, an old white man, but he
• 19:16
  Speaker 5: is a genius artist.
• 19:17
  Speaker 6: He's a genius. Like my dad is one of my
• 19:21
  Speaker 6: favorite living.
• 19:22
  Speaker 2: Artists with medium does He work in mostly.
• 19:25
  Speaker 5: Draws, but he's one of those freaks that he could
• 19:28
  Speaker 5: do anything. He decided all of a sudden to become
• 19:32
  Speaker 5: a carpenter and made the most beautiful pieces.
• 19:36
  Speaker 6: I mean he could do anything. Wow, very brilliant mind.
• 19:40
  Speaker 5: Has no idea of the depths of his talent and
• 19:44
  Speaker 5: needs to be constantly reassured.
• 19:46
  Speaker 6: But he's a true genius.
• 19:47
  Speaker 5: And so when he does tell me something, he'll say
• 19:50
  Speaker 5: like this is low hanging fruit, or like this isn't
• 19:52
  Speaker 5: your best material.
• 19:53
  Speaker 6: It doesn't hold a candle to the other stuff. He's
• 19:56
  Speaker 6: usually right, wow, So I'll rework it and rework it.
• 20:00
  Speaker 5: And it's not like my dad is my main demographic.
• 20:04
  Speaker 5: But I do think that if it's a good song,
• 20:07
  Speaker 5: it kind of permeates demographics.
• 20:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's true.
• 20:12
  Speaker 6: So if my.
• 20:13
  Speaker 5: Parents are like, I really wish you wouldn't curse so much,
• 20:17
  Speaker 5: I'm like, okay, disregard.
• 20:18
  Speaker 6: But if they say something about like the.
• 20:21
  Speaker 5: Emotional level of the song or something that really it's
• 20:25
  Speaker 5: a real thought that they're moved by in some way,
• 20:28
  Speaker 5: like it's it doesn't move me enough, or there's too
• 20:32
  Speaker 5: many bells and whistles that sometimes that is a critique
• 20:35
  Speaker 5: of my dad, and almost all the time he's right.
• 20:38
  Speaker 2: That's incredible. What about your mom? What does she do?
• 20:41
  Speaker 5: My mom is also an artist. She's worked for NBC
• 20:44
  Speaker 5: doing mechanicals for a really long time and so she
• 20:47
  Speaker 5: got really good at like layouts and stuff like that.
• 20:50
  Speaker 5: So she does all the layouts for my albums and
• 20:53
  Speaker 5: all my friend's albums.
• 20:55
  Speaker 4: So getting back to the album, tell me about the
• 20:58
  Speaker 4: thought behind the album cover.
• 21:00
  Speaker 5: My friend Monica, Monica Murray, she came to my house
• 21:03
  Speaker 5: and had this special film and it took nine shots
• 21:10
  Speaker 5: to get this really beautiful photo of me. In my
• 21:15
  Speaker 5: I have this red chair in my living room and
• 21:18
  Speaker 5: that's where I meditate every day and I read and
• 21:21
  Speaker 5: I have.
• 21:21
  Speaker 6: My coffee it's like my favorite chair.
• 21:23
  Speaker 5: When I moved into this house, I was in the
• 21:26
  Speaker 5: depths of despair and my molm was like, just make
• 21:29
  Speaker 5: yourself a corner. And so I made this corner with
• 21:33
  Speaker 5: my chair and my plants and the rest of the
• 21:36
  Speaker 5: house was pretty much empty, and I just sat in
• 21:39
  Speaker 5: this chair for so long, so it was very special
• 21:42
  Speaker 5: to me. And she took this brilliant photo of me
• 21:45
  Speaker 5: in this chair and I had this fur coat on
• 21:48
  Speaker 5: and I like no shirt underneath, like in my underwear,
• 21:52
  Speaker 5: and it just was so beautiful. And I was obsessed
• 21:55
  Speaker 5: with this photo and we were both like, this is
• 21:56
  Speaker 5: so great. We got to do something with this. And
• 21:58
  Speaker 5: the more I sat on it and the album was
• 22:01
  Speaker 5: kind of coming together, I had this idea. I knew
• 22:04
  Speaker 5: the album was going to be called The Art Forgetting,
• 22:06
  Speaker 5: which is sort of a a poetic maybe a more
• 22:11
  Speaker 5: poetic way of saying learning how to let go of things.
• 22:15
  Speaker 5: At first, it was more of like the art of
• 22:17
  Speaker 5: forgetting to protect yourself.
• 22:19
  Speaker 6: Like I'm forgetting.
• 22:20
  Speaker 2: That's good.
• 22:22
  Speaker 5: But I knew it was called the Art Forgetting. And
• 22:25
  Speaker 5: I sent you to Monica. I was like, we need
• 22:27
  Speaker 5: to we need to make this album cover, like with
• 22:30
  Speaker 5: this same photo but with the room on fire.
• 22:33
  Speaker 6: And then it.
• 22:34
  Speaker 5: Became like, okay, how were we going to do it?
• 22:35
  Speaker 5: It Like, here's our budget, how can we light my
• 22:39
  Speaker 5: living room ondifire?
• 22:43
  Speaker 6: And it was such a labor of love.
• 22:45
  Speaker 5: Like my neighbor Andy Flores is a brilliant artist herself,
• 22:51
  Speaker 5: and Andy and Monica and our builder front Tory came
• 22:56
  Speaker 5: came over and we made a plan to rebuild my
• 22:59
  Speaker 5: living room.
• 23:00
  Speaker 2: Wow.
• 23:02
  Speaker 5: So we rebuilt the living room and I happen to
• 23:04
  Speaker 5: have a warehouse in the back of my yard that
• 23:06
  Speaker 5: my friends use and sweet the warehouse built the set.
• 23:11
  Speaker 5: It was like identical to my actual living room. I
• 23:14
  Speaker 5: was really going to light it on fire, and turns
• 23:16
  Speaker 5: out like that's very difficult to do in a city.
• 23:21
  Speaker 2: But why not just photoshop it?
• 23:22
  Speaker 5: Well, okay, So the thing is I wanted it to
• 23:25
  Speaker 5: be real. I was like, okay, I've gone this far
• 23:26
  Speaker 5: in this album. I'm getting deep, like this is real
• 23:30
  Speaker 5: for me. I wanted to all feel real everything, and
• 23:35
  Speaker 5: so I was like, let's really light it on fire.
• 23:38
  Speaker 5: And ultimately the reason why I didn't was it had
• 23:41
  Speaker 5: nothing to do with the cost or how difficult it
• 23:44
  Speaker 5: would be. But it had more to do with you
• 23:47
  Speaker 5: can't control the lighting. What you see is what you get, like,
• 23:50
  Speaker 5: you can only do it once.
• 23:51
  Speaker 2: True.
• 23:52
  Speaker 5: If the lighting isn't right, then you've just lit your
• 23:55
  Speaker 5: entire set on fire and that's your album cover.
• 24:00
  Speaker 6: And so I asked a bunch of people about this.
• 24:01
  Speaker 5: So I asked, like the set designer what he does,
• 24:04
  Speaker 5: and all of these people kind of said the same thing.
• 24:07
  Speaker 5: They were like, you have to recreate the effects of
• 24:09
  Speaker 5: the fire, and then you can add the flames on
• 24:13
  Speaker 5: top and then it looks very real, and then you've
• 24:15
  Speaker 5: got to you've got to use actual smoke. So it
• 24:18
  Speaker 5: actually worked really well because we had control over the
• 24:21
  Speaker 5: whole set.
• 24:21
  Speaker 2: So why are you blindfolded?
• 24:24
  Speaker 5: I find it so funny, like smoking a cigarette in
• 24:27
  Speaker 5: a burning room. Your outcome is not good, but you
• 24:30
  Speaker 5: don't want to see it, like you don't want to
• 24:32
  Speaker 5: see it. And I like the idea that people can
• 24:35
  Speaker 5: interpret it in their own way. You know, it can
• 24:37
  Speaker 5: be funny, it could be despairing, it could be like suicidal.
• 24:40
  Speaker 5: To me, it's funny because I also tend to laugh
• 24:44
  Speaker 5: when I'm so despairingly sad. It's like, you come on,
• 24:50
  Speaker 5: you've got to laugh. A little bit like this is pathetic,
• 24:53
  Speaker 5: and I felt that way. I was like, this is
• 24:56
  Speaker 5: hilariously pathetic to me, fur coat, and it's like blazingly.
• 25:02
  Speaker 6: Hot in there, right. I don't know, I just.
• 25:05
  Speaker 5: I'm always looking for, you know, ways to shake things
• 25:09
  Speaker 5: up a little bit, like the athlete was all the cigarettes.
• 25:13
  Speaker 4: I know you're such a great sense of humor. I
• 25:15
  Speaker 4: love that, and I love that that's still intact.
• 25:18
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I think I like anything that kind of makes
• 25:21
  Speaker 5: people laugh and think at the same time.
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: We're going to take a quick break here and then
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: come back with more from Caroline Rose. We're back with
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: the rest of Leo Rose's conversation with Caroline Rose. Before
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: we jump back in, let's hear a demo from Caroline's
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: new album, The Art of Forgetting. Here's the demo for
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: her song love Song for Myself.
• 25:52
  Speaker 8: If I a doorman, then im.
• 26:05
  Speaker 3: Hanover, I'm exceptional.
• 26:13
  Speaker 7: I am at times treasure on a hor with fall.
• 26:22
  Speaker 3: If I'm a punching bird, then to get your face
• 26:38
  Speaker 3: you are we wait fighter.
• 26:43
  Speaker 7: Genuine coloring. If I'm lonelys, then I'm not lonely. If
• 27:02
  Speaker 7: I'm suffering, deny am the moet.
• 27:10
  Speaker 3: If I'm a deacent.
• 27:15
  Speaker 9: The la two they from all the place, my final
• 27:50
  Speaker 9: a hurricane.
• 27:55
  Speaker 3: Coming to destroying. There are two the ritter of both things.
• 28:16
  Speaker 8: Beautiful my bed, you see a little beauty within me.
• 28:46
  Speaker 3: But until that, let's keep in time. I'll just be
• 28:56
  Speaker 3: here for then that.
• 29:24
  Speaker 2: When you sing this song by yourself live, how is
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: it different than what appears on the album.
• 29:31
  Speaker 5: Honestly, it doesn't. It doesn't feel that much different to me.
• 29:34
  Speaker 5: I think there's a little more production value on the
• 29:37
  Speaker 5: on the album. But I remember when I wrote it.
• 29:41
  Speaker 5: I was I was out in the desert and it
• 29:44
  Speaker 5: was just like a I brought this little nylon string
• 29:47
  Speaker 5: and I was just laying on the ground, like looking
• 29:50
  Speaker 5: up at the stars. It was very idyllic and dramatic
• 29:53
  Speaker 5: and beautiful, and it was sort of like the clouds
• 29:57
  Speaker 5: that part parted, and there's some golden hope for me
• 30:00
  Speaker 5: that I was learning how to love myself again, like
• 30:03
  Speaker 5: do nice things for myself. And I'm like, you know what,
• 30:06
  Speaker 5: even though I feel like I have the training wheels
• 30:09
  Speaker 5: and I don't remember how to totally love myself again,
• 30:13
  Speaker 5: I'm gonna just pretend you kind of hear that.
• 30:17
  Speaker 6: It's like if I'm a doormat.
• 30:19
  Speaker 5: Then I'm hand woven, I'm an heirloom, I'm a treasure
• 30:23
  Speaker 5: on the floor.
• 30:25
  Speaker 2: You know, Oh that's so nice.
• 30:28
  Speaker 5: If you can't be nice yourself, you can at least
• 30:30
  Speaker 5: just fake it till you make it.
• 30:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah, well, hopefully it worked.
• 30:33
  Speaker 6: Yeah, it did work. It did work.
• 30:35
  Speaker 4: Talk about your decision to distort your vocals. A lot
• 30:39
  Speaker 4: of the songs your vocals are are distorted a little bit.
• 30:43
  Speaker 4: I was curious does that change, does that change your performance,
• 30:47
  Speaker 4: like how you actually perform the song, and does that
• 30:50
  Speaker 4: ever allow you to say things that you wouldn't say
• 30:53
  Speaker 4: without the distortion.
• 30:56
  Speaker 5: I think a big part of a performance is the
• 31:00
  Speaker 5: vibe of it, you know, the sonics and the characteristics
• 31:03
  Speaker 5: that make you feel a certain way. And pretty early
• 31:07
  Speaker 5: on I made a point that it it was important
• 31:10
  Speaker 5: that I can play all of the songs by myself solo,
• 31:14
  Speaker 5: even the ones that ended up sounding pretty produced, they
• 31:17
  Speaker 5: can all be pledged, stripped down solo and be a
• 31:20
  Speaker 5: complete song. And I really liked this idea of if
• 31:25
  Speaker 5: you imagine the solo performance as this little small ball,
• 31:31
  Speaker 5: and this little small ball that is fragile and vulnerable
• 31:37
  Speaker 5: and at any moment could break and then these big
• 31:43
  Speaker 5: moments of magnitude and Hi Phi Sonics, kind of like
• 31:48
  Speaker 5: in Gulf does little little vulnerable nucleus. I kept seeing
• 31:53
  Speaker 5: that come up over and over again, because you know,
• 31:56
  Speaker 5: when you're feeling so bad, you do feel like you
• 32:00
  Speaker 5: could you could combust at any moment. Like humans also,
• 32:04
  Speaker 5: we have the ability to create measurably beautiful world even
• 32:10
  Speaker 5: from the depths of our sadness. And I felt that
• 32:14
  Speaker 5: even at the worst moment, I was like, Okay, I
• 32:17
  Speaker 5: know I'm definitely toward the bottom of the well right now,
• 32:22
  Speaker 5: but I know that's where I am, but just the
• 32:26
  Speaker 5: view from the bottom is enough to kind of give
• 32:29
  Speaker 5: me some hope. And that really fueled kind of the
• 32:33
  Speaker 5: textures of the album. And I wanted to maintain that
• 32:37
  Speaker 5: vulnerability but also have it feel triumphant and magnificent and
• 32:41
  Speaker 5: at times really dreamy, to kind of emulate that feeling
• 32:45
  Speaker 5: of being able to pull yourself out of despair and
• 32:49
  Speaker 5: recognize your own power even when you're feeling weak.
• 32:53
  Speaker 2: Totally, did you come up with all of the arrangements.
• 32:57
  Speaker 5: The only things that I didn't come up with were
• 33:00
  Speaker 5: the string arrangements, and those were done by my friend
• 33:03
  Speaker 5: Talcats and Sammy Weisberg.
• 33:05
  Speaker 2: The strings on, Jill Saysar's gorgeous.
• 33:08
  Speaker 6: They're beautiful.
• 33:09
  Speaker 5: They did such a great job, and they sent me
• 33:12
  Speaker 5: like the rough of it, and then I was like, oh,
• 33:14
  Speaker 5: what if it you know, what if it swells here
• 33:16
  Speaker 5: and does this and you move this section here, and
• 33:19
  Speaker 5: then it was like the next draft was done pretty
• 33:23
  Speaker 5: much as simple as that.
• 33:24
  Speaker 6: They really nailed it.
• 33:26
  Speaker 4: How did that song come together? And how did you
• 33:28
  Speaker 4: come up with the idea for the arrangement.
• 33:31
  Speaker 6: On, Jill says. Jill says, yeah, well, Jill's my therapist.
• 33:36
  Speaker 2: I love that.
• 33:37
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 33:38
  Speaker 5: And I had been noodling on the on the piano
• 33:42
  Speaker 5: at my parents' house when I visited, and I think
• 33:46
  Speaker 5: I had been listening to a lot of classical music,
• 33:50
  Speaker 5: a lot of w C and Satis. I really love
• 33:54
  Speaker 5: all the French minimalists kind of composers. And I think
• 33:59
  Speaker 5: I was just practicing and that the arpeggio that kind
• 34:04
  Speaker 5: of is like three or four octave arpeggio.
• 34:07
  Speaker 6: It sounded so beautiful.
• 34:09
  Speaker 5: I was just like, Wow, I can't believe I can
• 34:12
  Speaker 5: play this, because I've never really thought of myself as
• 34:15
  Speaker 5: a piano player. But I think those early early years
• 34:19
  Speaker 5: of piano lessons of somehow they've never left my hands.
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: Very cool.
• 34:23
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I was like impressed with myself. I'm like Dan,
• 34:26
  Speaker 5: I didn't know I could play as well. But I
• 34:29
  Speaker 5: really liked this sort of floral feel to it. It
• 34:32
  Speaker 5: was floral and it reminded me of the beautiful times
• 34:36
  Speaker 5: in this relationship that had ended. And it was like,
• 34:40
  Speaker 5: you know, a relationship can end and it doesn't all
• 34:44
  Speaker 5: have to be bad, like you can honor it. Even
• 34:47
  Speaker 5: if you don't have a relationship with that person, you
• 34:49
  Speaker 5: can still honor your time together.
• 34:51
  Speaker 6: And that's what it felt like to me.
• 34:52
  Speaker 5: It was like, you know, complicated time, but it was
• 34:56
  Speaker 5: a beautiful time. And so I liked this idea that
• 35:00
  Speaker 5: it was almost like a little movie soundtrack.
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: It feels very cinematic.
• 35:04
  Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, it is cinematic. I do think when you
• 35:06
  Speaker 5: put strings on something, it automatically sounds cinematic. But even
• 35:10
  Speaker 5: if the strings were in there, I think this would
• 35:11
  Speaker 5: be a cinematic sounding.
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: How do you feel about in a way when you
• 35:15
  Speaker 2: write a song, it's almost like, as an artist, if
• 35:18
  Speaker 2: this is your job, you're in a way you're commodifying
• 35:20
  Speaker 2: your feelings. How does that feel for you?
• 35:25
  Speaker 5: This is a tough question for me because I am
• 35:29
  Speaker 5: realizing more and more that if I want to make
• 35:33
  Speaker 5: my best work, I have to put that out of
• 35:37
  Speaker 5: my mind completely, and that includes not even involving anyone
• 35:43
  Speaker 5: to do with business or thinking in a business manner.
• 35:47
  Speaker 6: It cannot be involved.
• 35:48
  Speaker 5: And that's something I actually learned on Superstar, which I
• 35:52
  Speaker 5: made some choices that looking back on it, I'm like,
• 35:55
  Speaker 5: would I have done that again?
• 35:57
  Speaker 6: Knowing what I know now.
• 36:00
  Speaker 5: The only regrets I've ever had in my career have
• 36:02
  Speaker 5: been one I've made a business choice over a creative one,
• 36:05
  Speaker 5: Hans Now, every single time that's been the the issue,
• 36:10
  Speaker 5: and I did I made a point of not doing
• 36:12
  Speaker 5: that this time, and I really think that the music
• 36:15
  Speaker 5: benefits from that. So when it's made, I am selling
• 36:18
  Speaker 5: a product and my whole team, I have a whole
• 36:21
  Speaker 5: team that helps me sell a product and you know,
• 36:25
  Speaker 5: essentially selling myself too.
• 36:27
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yourself and like your most vulnerable self.
• 36:30
  Speaker 6: Yeah, we'll see how this goes.
• 36:31
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 36:32
  Speaker 4: Well, look, I wish you so much luck with the
• 36:34
  Speaker 4: whole promo cycle of the album, And thank you so
• 36:38
  Speaker 4: much for talking with me.
• 36:39
  Speaker 6: Oh, thank you. It's been a real pleasure.
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: Thanks again to Caroline Rose. You can hear her latest album,
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: The Artist Forgetting, along with our other favorite songs of hers,
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: at broken Record podcast dot com. You can subscribe to
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: our YouTube channel at YouTube dot com slash broken Record Podcast,
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: where you can find all of our new episodes. Broken
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: Record is produced with help from Leah Rose, Jason Gambrel,
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: Ben Taliday, Nisha Venkat, Jordan McMillan, and Eric Sandler. Our
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: editor is Sophie Credible. Broken Record is a production of
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: Pushkin Industries. If you love this show and others from Pushkin,
• 37:18
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• 37:23
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• 37:27
  Speaker 1: listening for only four ninety nine a month. Look for
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: Pushkin Plus on Apple podcast subscriptions, and if you like
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: the show, remember to share, rate, and review us on
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: your podcast staff. Our theme music expec. Kenny Beats. I'm
• 37:41
  Speaker 1: justin Richmond.