behind “Last Bonus Track”

I've loved writing since forever. telling stories, making up stories, is my favorite sport. that explanins why I love songwriting: writing songs is one of the most interesting and pleasurable ways to tell and hear stories, in my opinion.

however, when we start to compose, it can be easy to fall into the maxim that “everything has to be authentic”, in the sense that it must have come from me, it must have been lived by me. for a long time I was uncomfortable with the idea of ​​writing music from a lyrical self other than myself.

even so, sometimes I did. I just didn't invest as much of myself in these compositions that I felt were “further away” from my truth. that is, until I watched Taylor's NPR Tiny Desk Concert. at one point, near the 13-minute mark, she comments about how she was afraid of “not being able to write heartbroken songs, when she wasn't heartbroken”, and that, also encouraged by this incredible talk by Elizabeth Gilbert, she managed to overcome this affliction. that's where “Death By A Thousand Cuts” came from, one of my favorite songs of hers.

knowing all this encouraged me too.

that's when I decided to try writing about the idea that my friend Marco had given me a few days before - writing about a couple's last night, when one of them doesn't want the other to leave.

I took that idea, a little bit of the feeling and experiences that I myself went through when I broke up, and started writing “Last Bonus Track”. while the composition was taking shape, I started to produce the track, and to choose the timbres that would be part of the arrangement.

I felt a cold, nocturnal nostalgia vibe from this song. so, in this track, the influence of the 80s is carried by FM synthesizer timbres, such as the Roland DX7, the same one that was used in a multitude of productions of that era, and which was super revered by The Weeknd on the album Dawn FM. I chose these sounds meticulously, and almost all of them remained until the final version, which Nick was responsible for.

this song was made with great appreciation, care and detail. the feeling that exists in it is so real to me, it's as if I really lived each scene and felt each emotion present in it. and I'm very happy that at the beginning of my career, I managed to free myself to this way of creating and writing from a place outside of myself.