Lavender Haze

“Lavender Haze” is track one on Midnights, and I happened upon the phrase “lavender haze” when I was watching Mad Men, and I looked it up, because I thought it sounded cool, and it turns out that it’s a common phrase used in the 50s where they would just describe being in love. Like, if you were in a lavender haze, that meant that you were in that all-encompassing love glow, and I thought that was really beautiful. And I guess theoretically when you’re in the lavender haze, you’ll do anything to stay there, and not let people bring you down off of that cloud. And I think a lot of people have to deal with this now, not just quote-unquote “public figures,” because we live in the era of social media and if the world finds out that you’re in love with somebody, they’re going to weigh in on it. Like my relationship, for six years we’ve had to dodge weird rumors, tabloid stuff, and we just ignore it, and so this song is about the act of ignoring that stuff to protect the real stuff. I hope you guys like it.

Anti-Hero

“Anti-Hero” is one of my favorite songs I’ve ever written. I really don’t think I’ve delved this far into my insecurities in this detail before. I struggle with the idea that my life has become unmanageably sized and I, not to sound too dark, but I just struggle with the idea of not feeling like a person. This song is a real guided tour throughout all the things I tend to hate about myself, and it’s all those aspects of the things we dislike and like about ourselves that we have to come to terms with if we are gonna be this person, so I like “Anti-Hero” a lot, because I think is really honest.

Snow on the Beach

“Snow On The Beach,” featuring Lana Del Rey, is track 4 on Midnights, and I can not get through that sentence without grinning because I am such a massive fan of Lana Del Rey, more on that later. The song is about falling in love with someone at the same time as they’re falling in love with you, in this sort of in this cataclysmic, faded moment where you realize someone feels exactly the same way that you feel, at the same moment, and you’re kind of looking around going, “Wait, is this real? Is this a dream? Is this for real? Is it really happening? Kinda like it would be if you were to see snow falling on a beach. And Lana Del Rey is, in my opinion, one of the best musical artists ever, the fact that I get to exist at the same time as her is an honor and a privilege, and the fact that she would be so generous as to collaborate with us on this song is something I’m gonna be grateful for life. Absolutely love her and I really hope you love this song as much as I do.

Bejeweled

The song “Bejeweled” is a song that I think it’s really about finding confidence when you feel that it’s been taken away, for whatever reason. You know, you’re feeling insecure, you’re feeling taken for granted… One of the things we love to do at night, ‘cause we love to go dancing, we love to put on an outfit that makes us feel good, and we love to feel like we’re still bejeweled. I think that there are tiny inflections of me pumping myself up to return to pop music after spending these glorious years writing folk songs and being in this metaphorical forest that I’ve created, which I loved so much, but there was a bit of pumping myself back up to be like, “You can do it, you’re still bejeweled!” I’m still bejeweled? We’ll see, but that’s what the song’s about.

Karma

One of the themes about Midnights is how you’re feeling in the middle of the night, and that can be intense self-hatred, intense self-love; you go through these very polarizing emotions when you’re up late at night and your brain just spirals. It can spiral downward and it can spiral way up, and you can be really feeling yourself, and “Karma” is written from a perspective of feeling really happy, really proud of the way your life is, feeling like this must be a reward for doing stuff right. It’s a song that I really love because I think we all need some of those moments, we can’t just be beating ourselves up all the time. You have to have these moments where you’re like, “You know what? Karma is my boyfriend,” and that’s it.

Mastermind

“Mastermind” is a song that I put last on the album because I’m really proud of it, and I love that, when we were making this song, we wanted the verse to sound like romance and this sort of heroes type of soundtrack, and then we wanted the chorus to sound like a villain has just entered the room and the idea that you’re flipping this narrative, and you have been planning and plotting things and making them look like an accident — and I think that’s sort of an inside joke between me and my fans, that I tend to do that. And so, this song is the romantic version of that.