Photo by Moni HaworthDuring the album release party at Berlin’s Rough Trade earlier this month, I had the pleasure of speaking with Allie X about Happiness Is Going to Get You. Marked as one of this year’s most anticipated releases by The New York Times, this album represents a significant evolution from her previous work, Girl With No Face. With its introspective themes and innovative sound, including the intriguing use of the harpsichord alongside modern synth elements, Allie X shares her journey through self-acceptance and creativity in the face of adversity. As we dive into the interview, Allie X reveals insights about her artistic process, inspirations, and the importance of embracing her identity as she navigates her evolving musical landscape.
I would love to hear the story behind the new album, Happiness is Going to Get You
It’s quite different from the last album, Girl with No Face. Even sonically, it was a very referential record to a period of time in music. Tonally, it was quite angry and almost kind of—I wouldn’t say immature, but maybe a bit immature compared to this one. It was the first project that I had produced myself, and it was a challenging three years of doing that. I also got extremely ill while I was doing it. So I feel like the difficulty in getting that one done, and getting all these things that had been inside me out into song, cleared some of the space for this one to form very quickly in a way that I don’t fully understand… but I don’t think I’m meant to, you know? That’s the beauty of art. I think it’s just being kind of a vessel sometimes for something else, and that’s how I felt this time.
There’s something about the harpsichord that listening to it really tickles the brain. What made you decide to introduce this instrument into your new work?
There’s something about it, yeah. It’s very plucky. It’s a historical instrument, you know? It’s been funny trying to mic it because it doesn’t want to be amplified, actually. It just wants to be in a big space with reverb! Well, I wrote the record at the piano, which just got me sort of in my like singer-songwriter feels, and I was thinking a lot about Björk and Tori Amos, and then I was also just thinking a lot about sort of nostalgia and taking sounds from all sorts of points in time. So we started to play with baroque sounds such as the harpsichord, symphony zither, and strings. And it was sort of just an indulgent sound exploration.
Berlin has a rich musical history, especially within the post-punk and new wave spaces you often explore. How familiar are you with that legacy, and has it influenced your recent work?
With the last record, actually, yeah, I was mostly focused on the early eighties and the late seventies in the UK. A lot of New Order, Siouxsie Sioux, and Depeche Mode. But also, Germany was a major player in that sort of post-punk and new wave transition that happened, which is my favourite genre of music. So, yeah, I know about Bowie’s Berlin years. There’s a lot of really interesting stuff that came out of here. I haven’t done a deep dive, though, in the way that I have in the UK. I actually wasn’t thinking too much about that on this record. I was just really fueled by the punk spirit, even though it was post-punk music. It was still that spirit that inspired all that music.
I was constantly reading books and watching documentaries and YouTube videos, and stuff. This record is the first where I wasn’t really heavily referencing anything. I was just sort of falling through time and space and plucking things and melding them all together.
I felt like it was a sign of confidence as a writer that I wasn’t relying so heavily on outside references and inspiration. This is the first time that I had songs that were just me singing at a piano, not thinking of any other songs, and the writing just came to mind.
You mentioned that the last album was three years in the making, but this took only one
Yeah, there are a couple of songs in there that existed as ideas, but most of it was written in the span of a month in Canada, and the others were written in Central California, in two little vacations that I had. So, yeah, really quick.
Where do you typically focus on writing: do you have a dedicated creative space, or does inspiration often strike while you’re on the road?
I can’t write when I’m touring. It’s like two different brains. You’re just in survival mode on the road. As soon as I have time to take a break, I get creatively restless, though. I’m definitely a workaholic.
Does it feel weird to stop?
Yeah, it’s scary. I mean, the reason that we are addicted to work is, I think, to escape the actual feelings that we feel, you know. As soon as I started promoting this record, I got into my icky feelings again. But for most of this year, actually, I was super inspired and grounded in the work. Even though I was working all the time, it felt like I was in a flow and really healthy. So I started thinking maybe it’s not so bad being a workaholic. Like it’s fun, but I think there’s always a crash.
There’s a sense that your soul is out of alignment with what you’re doing. I’ve really gotten good at feeling that, and I have been feeling that as soon as I basically started promoting this campaign (I’m the manager as well). But before that, the creative work felt, even though I was working like crazy, I did feel very much in alignment. So, I’m taking this December off, and I’m actually scared. I think I’m probably gonna get depressed.
In the spirit of your Rough Trade album release party here in Berlin, what are some of your life-altering albums?
On this album cycle, to give me strength, I keep watching old videos of Björk, Tori Amos, and PJ Harvey. I listened to them as a kid, but as an adult woman, I just really get now how fucking, like, ferocious they were, you know? And still are. But how much that work meant at the time, and how it pushed the boundaries. And there’s this, especially with Tori, this femininity in it that was so unapologetic and bold.
But yeah, I’ve been listening lately to Tori’s From the Choirgirl Hotel and just watching so many videos of the stuff I mentioned. I’m like a classically trained theatre kid that didn’t really listen to music properly until way later, and as a result, my writing suffered. My boyfriend, who’s been my partner for 12 years, introduced me to so many bands, and it just sort of came like super late in life. It became a backbone for me. Which is also really important for me in this commercial pop writing world of Los Angeles that I got plopped into by accident. So, yeah, I’m still on that kick right now. I feel like a teenager in some ways now, that just discovered her thing, you know?
I love the idea of always learning something new! When you’re diving into music and history, are you the kind of person who reads books, or are you all about the documentaries and video deep-dives?
My attention span is like everyone else’s; it’s decreased massively. It depends where I’m at. I like to always have two audiobooks or maybe three on the go, and then one book that I hold at night. I’ll literally fall asleep on one page, though. I don’t know what it is, but my brain just can’t. When I got out of the hospital in 2022 and I was so weak and fragile, I could actually sit down and read a book. But as soon as I started interacting with devices and running a business again, I lost it. It’s really interesting, actually, how I was able to sort of watch my brain go back to how it would’ve been as a kid, and then watch it lose its focus again.
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Photos by @monibelle
Happiness Is Going To Get You is out now: https://alliex.os.fan/happinessisgoingtogetyou
