FILTER ALBUMS
“I went back and forth with the visions.”
Aldous Harding speaks to Tom Doyle.
All wrapped up: Aldous Harding focused on “pure phonics” for her fourth LP.
What was your general approach to writing these new songs? Were they written in an intensive burst in one place or in fits and starts in different places?
“I think of my songs as deep secrets the muse has been keeping from me. Writing feels more like reading. A lot of it is done in silence. Winning a ‘good song’ comes secondary to spending time with the person doing me [the] favour of making it. I focused on pure phonics more than any other record. I needed the sound, not the meaning of the word to stand alone as a poem against its backgrounds. Sound alone as poems. So, instead of trying to show the universe in a lyric, letting the sound of the instruments decide them for me.”