LP in Conversation With FAULT Magazine.
We first met LP in 2017 and while the world is certainly in a different place – LP’s dedication to craft and songwriting abilities have remained a mainstay. With the release of LP’s epic music video One Last Time continuing to rack up the views, we caught up with the musician to find out more.
As an artist who also works on projects and collaborates with different people, have you been making music during this period of isolation and lockdown, and how has that process been?
Of course I’ve been making music in this period – I mean that’s all there is to do really, in a way! More songs or different songs have gotten on this record as a result of being in lockdown. Everybody gets tested. We’re all consistently tested and so see each other to work. That’s what we do, that’s what we’ve gotta do!
You’ve adapted to the global pandemic well with virtual world tours and other performances, was the transition a fluid one for you?
No! It was not. I was very difficult. It’s so much more fun, obviously, to play to people and feel that energy. Everybody knows and I think fans feel the same. So performing to nobody is difficult, especially when you’re releasing new songs. I think singing new songs and not seeing a reaction kind of fucks with your head a little bit. You feel like “…is this good?”. You don’t know. But I can always tell when we’re playing live.
‘How Low Can You Go’ takes us on a journey through wild memories, do you ever feel like you take the time to reflect on your musical journey or has it passed in a blur due to your heavy schedule?
That’s a good question. I do think of that sometimes, like I can’t remember different shows, but then I can. But that’s what I think is one of the many beautiful this about fans. They remind you what a great show was and even social media brings these things back to you and you’re like “oh wow, I would have forgotten”. If I posted a picture of me – I would have remembered it, I guess, but I wouldn’t have thought of it – there’s so many memories chopped into your life, especially when you’re on tour. Once they had a little girl who was dressed up as me, I held her on stage and it was really cute, so yeah, little beautiful things like that. Meet and greet memories and certain venues that I play that are beautiful and I never forget them. I can see all these different faces and that’s cool.
What’s been the hardest lesson you’ve had to learn in order to take your art to the next level?
I think mostly to just let go of songs and to not put expectations on songs. When I wrote ‘Lost On You’, By the time it was blowing up and doing all these beautiful things I was 30/40 songs away from it in terms of songs that I’d wrote, because I don’t do that anymore. First of all I don’t know when I’ve written a great song. To me, not to sound weird, but they’re all great ‘quote-on-quote’. If I decide to keep writing it and take it all the way to the end I try to make it as good or as great as I can, and then I just forget about it and move onto the next one, because it doesn’t matter anymore. What I’ve done with that song, it’s its own thing and it’s gonna to what it’s gonna do!
When you look back on your career, what do you want your music to say about you, the person?
I think it will say that I am an emotional person and that I care about feelings. I want it to say like ‘this person had a lot of feelings, this person was a feeler’, you know?
Can you tell us about your new single ‘One Last Time’ and what else you have coming up?
Speaking of feelings, there’s something about it [‘One Last Time’] that’s timeless and old at the same time. I don’t know where this song came from, it just feels like there’s a power to it in someway that I’m not sure I even understand. It just feels like it was waiting in a stone to be sculped out! It just feels good, there’s something very romantic about it, as is seen in the video too. There’s more emotional bombs coming your way!
What is your FAULT?
I try to people please. To the point where I’ll tell you what you want to hear if I’m uncomfortable enough to want to wiggle away!