Gracie Abrams

I love slip skirts, slip dresses.

Every artist I love is a hill that I'm willing to die on for the rest of my life.

That's what I love about songwriting. It's why I've been obsessed with Joni Mitchell forever. You can place yourself right in the moment that she's in, and it makes you feel very close to her as an artist. Feeling like you know someone through their writing strengthens your relationship to all their future music, in my experience.

I love when a song is so specific that there's not much room for interpretation.

The thing that has been the coolest part about social media is that I get to connect with complete strangers from different parts of the universes... It's just been nice to talk to real people. Even if it's not in person.

I started music when I was 8.

Being outspoken has always been one of the more important aspects of growing up with my parents. Whether it's art or politics you feel passionate about, it's about not oppressing that - be vocal about it. Even if it's not popular.

I love Muji pens. They feel good to hold, and they're my favorite pens to journal with.

I really don't do makeup often; it feels more like my skin-care routine, really. I use just a tinted sunscreen and brow gel, but I'm very passionate about brows.

I don't read my DMs often because it breaks my brain.

I think that voting is the number one way that we can actively show up and make a difference, along with basic human kindness and compassion that we should be showing each other on a daily basis - as well as curiosity about what it's like to be in anybody else's shoes.

I'm especially devastated by Roe vs Wade being overturned, but it's just one of the trillion things on the list of the ways we've been betrayed.

I really love natural colours.

When I was in high school, I was writing all the time, it was such good practice. But I wasn't writing my best songs.

I feel very intense stage fright, and the concept of performing in front of people freaks me out, and I just need to get around it. When I thought about posting videos initially, the degree of separation between myself and the people on the other side of the phone, that didn't freak me out.

I started writing when I was so little so it just feels like a natural response to any situation emotionally for me - it's just my outlet.

I'm never really thinking about other people when I'm writing.

I have learned how to crack an egg with one hand.

I was lucky enough to know that even a handful of people responded well to me being honest about the way that I felt when I wrote 'Minor.'

Pulling like little pieces from things that we love is how we are formed as people, whether it's music or anything else.

Like as a fan of music, I feel like everything that I listen to influences my writing, whether it's a song where I know it hits a certain emotion, where I'm like, 'Oh, I haven't written something from that perspective yet. Wouldn't it be cool to try and go do that?'

I didn't want to make 'Minor' twice. And I don't think that I did.

My priority is being able to move and breathe the most freely on stage.

Being involved really mattered to me, but also when I think about songwriting, for example, and where I pull inspiration from, it's not just other music or relationships in my life. It's seeing people that are passionate about whatever it is they're passionate about.

Unfortunately, for a really long time younger people had assumed we would be OK in the hand of the older generation, but clearly we can't rely on them to shape the future that we want to see.

I have been writing about my feelings forever.

Well, growing up, my favorite ever was apple slices with peanut butter and cinnamon. That's one of my favorite snacks.

I don't think my songwriting process has been influenced directly by either of my parents, because that is definitely something that you have to figure it out for yourself.

I think my dad's influence on me as a writer, or just a creative thinker, is, more than anything, that I grew up with an adult in my life who was obsessed with storytelling.

I love jumpsuits.

Whenever it feels good to write, I just am so relieved, and that is the one revelation every time. I thank God that I know it works for me emotionally and mentally. It's a really grounding practice, and I don't know what I would do if I didn't have it.

Every time that I write, whether it's journaling or songwriting, I feel better after. There's a wave of relief and gratitude.

I've been a fan of The National since I was 12 years old.

This Is What It Feels Like' came together in lots of fragments and pieces over different periods of time. It was scattered in a way I think I really needed at the time.

I love performing now, and that's due to how truly kind my audience is. They're all sensitive people too, and that has changed my life even on a songwriting front.

I was not like a little kid that would listen to music on the radio and pretend to be onstage. I never wanted to be onstage.

Writing 'Good Riddance,' there was a lot of working through feelings in real time, in a way where there were lots of questions being asked.

I know the importance of a live show. There have been a handful of shows that I think about frequently that were real touchstones in my life.

When I wrote 'Minor' it was definitely in the middle of a break-up and feeling like it was what I needed to write about.

I think a lot of my songwriting in the past almost placed blame on others before reflecting on my own role in a situation. With 'Good Riddance,' I wanted to grow out of that really desperately... I wanted to be more thoughtful and more accountable.

I found when I was really little that my instinct was to write before talking to other people about the way that I felt.

The Internet is a funny and scary place to talk about your feelings.

My mom would suggest putting ice behind my ears and on my wrists when I was little because I would get anxious and nauseous. So ice has been my friend for a very long time.

My skin-care journey has been a very interesting one.

I love a crush; I love being in love. But in the absence of that, I feel most moved by the women that I'm lucky enough to know.

Aaron Dessner is an expert at letting the narrative carry the story. He's reminding me constantly of the importance of space and room in my life and in music.

That's the thing about Taylor's music. When one of her songs lands in a specific place in your life, it feels like you're the only person in the world who has that extreme of a connection to the song.

I don't feel like it serves me, always, to know what a stranger feels about me, on any given day.

I definitely feel like I have a thicker skin now than I used to, but I also am a perpetually sensitive person.

I think it's obviously an abnormal, pretty unnatural thing to be available to so many strangers, in the way that you are, when you choose to share your feelings through music, or any medium. Everyone's allowed to have their own opinions, which I totally respect, but I think it's also why I don't tend to go seek those out.