Q: The phrase "Nothing I Can't Undo" almost sounds like a mantra, something you tell yourself when you're trying to move forward after making a mistake. At what point in the creative process did you realize it perfectly captured the heart of this album?
A: It took me a while to settle on a title for the project, but there was something about the phrase “Nothing I Can’t Undo” that kept pulling at me. When writing what eventually became the title track, I came to the realization that I live my life in a very open-ended way. I run from security and attachment but crave it at the same time, and that conflict lies at the center of a lot of the songs on the project. My battle with perfectionism, my anxiety in relationships, maybe it all comes back to a fear of one thing: permanence. I think, without knowing it, that’s what I was coming to terms with while writing this album.
Q: Compared to your earlier EPs, this feels like your most cohesive body of work yet. Did you approach this as a collection of songs, or were you consciously building one larger story?
A: A little bit of both. When I first started writing these songs, I didn’t know what they would become, but I had been looking forward to creating an album for a long time. Once I decided that’s what I was doing, I already had written some of the songs on the project. The exciting part came after, when I got to write with the project in mind. While I still approached each song individually, I did pay consideration to the role that each one would play in the larger story.
Q: Was there one song that became the emotional anchor for the entire album?
A: I think that “Nothing I Can’t Undo” ended up becoming the emotional anchor, which is why I ended up choosing it as the title. It felt like everything I wrote, even without meaning to, kept coming back to that idea. Ironically, in the early stages, I almost cut that song from the album. I’m so glad I didn’t.
Q: Every debut album feels like a snapshot of a particular season in an artist's life. When you listen back to "Nothing I Can't Undo" what version of Taylor Bickett do you hear?
A: I wrote this album across four cities, in two countries. It was a nomadic period of my life; I packed one suitcase and stored what belongings I didn’t sell at my parents’ house (much to their chagrin, but hey, I was on a journey of self-discovery!), bouncing between New York, Nashville, Los Angeles, and London. This album feels like burning down and building up, running away and coming home all in one. I think it’s evident, when you listen to the record, that I was in a transitional period of my life, tugging and being tugged. Doing and undoing.
Q: Perfectionism seems to be one of the emotional threads running through this project. Do you think perfectionism has ever protected you, or has it mostly held you back?
A: I think that my perfectionism has pushed me to make great work, but it’s also been a great hindrance to my life. Sometimes, my insatiable desire for perfection spins me around in circles until I’m too dizzy to accomplish anything. I procrastinate in fear of getting it wrong. My mom used to tell me, “action is the enemy of anxiety,” and I think about that sentence every day. When your perfectionism leads to inaction, that’s when you know it’s reached an unhealthy level.
Q: Looking back, was there a moment during the writing process where you realized you'd outgrown the person who inspired some of these songs?
A: “Driving In The Dark” immediately comes to mind. The song itself is a reflection on a past version of myself, a version that lived with wool over her eyes, refusing to see the destruction that her relationship was causing. Driving in the dark, refusing to turn on the headlights. In the verses, I put myself in her shoes: “my lungs are on your fist, my foot is on your throat.” But in the chorus, I pull myself out of them: “taking faith too far, making things too hard.” I recognize my own foolishness, but the emotion is still visceral and present. This song, which I wrote with the incredibly talented Jensen McRae, was actually the first song I finished for the project, over two years ago. When I listen to it now, I still feel the tenderness, but I almost want to laugh at how far away I am from the person who inspired it.
Q: Is there a lyric on this album that took dozens of drafts before it finally felt right?
A: I kept coming back to “Venice,” the final song on the album. It was less about drafting and re-drafting, it just felt impossible to finish because what I wanted to say was so vast. I wrote the first stanza about a year before I finished the song. I honestly thought it might never see the light of day until I happened to go to a museum which was holding a temporary Venice exhibit (a temporary exhibit about a sinking city… the irony was not lost on me). I thought to myself, “I want to visit Venice before it sinks.” It reminded me of that stanza I had written months prior, for whatever reason. I brought these bits and pieces to my friend (and remarkable songwriter) Lauren Weintraub, who helped me finish it. We actually wrote it to be a much longer song, but as I listened, I decided that less was more and settled on the final version.
Q: This album seems to ask whether it's possible to let go of people, expectations, or old versions of yourself without losing pieces of who you are. Did you discover an answer while making it?
A: I think that your experiences will always be a part of you. There’s a difference between letting go and erasing entirely. Making this album did allow me in some part to sort through the mess of my mind, untangling hopes and fears, expectations and disappointments. There's a catharsis and peace that comes with writing a song. It can feel like a purging of emotion. What I love about songwriting is that it allows you to keep that experience or that version of yourself with you, but as a separate, new thing.
Q: If you could sit down with the Taylor who wrote her very first song, what's one piece of advice you'd give her and what's one thing you'd deliberately leave unsaid because she needs to discover it on her own?
A: I would tell her that action is better than inaction, writing is better than not writing (even if what you’re writing isn’t good). Sometimes you have to just get it out before the truly spectacular art can appear. Sometimes you look back on what you thought wasn’t good enough and realize that it was. What I’d keep to myself is that there would be so many disappointments (and successes) ahead. There’s something beautiful about the naïveté of someone just starting out. I wouldn’t try to guard myself from experiencing those ups and downs. They made me the person I am.
Q: Your fans often say your songs make them feel "seen". Has there ever been another artist whose music made you feel that same way?
A: I distinctly remember hearing the song “Funeral” by Phoebe Bridgers when I was in college, and I was so struck that I immediately started to cry. It was one of the first times I felt truly and fully seen by a song. Her music continues to do that for me.
Keep up with Taylor Bickett!
Website