Sad girl songstress of the moment, Gracie Abrams checked in with Audacy’s Mike Adam at the Hard Rock Hotel New York to talk all about her highly anticipated sophomore album, The Secret of Us (out June 21), her latest single “Risk” (out now), her writing process, and more.

Gracie started off by spilling some deets about walking the Met Gala red carpet with Chanel, hanging with Troye Sivan and Charli XCX inside the event, and sharing how “rad” it was getting to witness Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo perform.

Abrams then delved into her own “rad music,” discussing her new single “Risk,” which Mike described as “the perfect Pop song,” and also talked about it’s “terrifying” music video.

Going on to discuss what it is about songwriting that allows her to open up about things she wouldn’t even divulge to a best friend in a private conversation, Gracie shared, “writing has always been my outlet and it’s always been my instinct when I’ve had feelings that I don’t wanna talk to people about, to just put it down on paper.”

“I think the more experience I have, and the more my personal relationships have deepened and developed… I’ve gotten better at intimacy with people and vulnerability.” Noting that she believes “this album was a pretty significant turning point, just of tangible proof of my, just like, personal evolution, which I’m relieved about. I’m actually happy to talk about tricky experiences or tougher feelings with people. It’s at least for right now, the most effective way to work through things, cause I’m lucky to know some really wise people who I have a lot to learn from. So this album kind of came from real friendship and safe environments to really talk about everything.”

Answering whether she’s a lyrics first, or beat first type of artist, Gracie revealed, “Typically lyrics first,” however recently, “they kind of happen at the same time for me. I feel like melody, I’ve had a lot of fun writing more whatever would be considered Pop, with more tempo. I’ve been looking for ear-worms and I feel like that’s been a really sweet thing to start with, and that’s newer for me, because I used to always start with lyrics. And now, I think the more that I’ve gotten into producing, the more I know how to use what I’m lucky enough to be surrounded by in the studio and that really helps inform melody.”

As for if there were any lyrics she hesitated about including, Gracie admitted, there “totally” was, “but actually I felt like because I was writing with my best friend,” she felt the freedom to include any lines she might have not if otherwise. “The whole process with this album is really about being able to, not laugh at situations, but through them, and being able to really laugh at ourselves in the process,” Abrams continued.

“Both Audrey and I love dramatic writing, and we do it outside the context of music as well, so there’s lots of characters in this album, there’s some exaggeration sometimes but, starting from seeds of truth. We know each other the best, and I wasn’t telling her and she wasn’t telling me, we can’t say that that’s nuts. It was more like we’re laughing… maybe someone else will think it’s funny, let’s include it.”

For all that and more, check out  Gracie’s entire interview above.

Words by Maia Kedem Interview by Mike Adam