GAYLE Breaks Down Every Song on Her a study of the human experience volume one EP
Is there any song that's blown up bigger than GAYLE's "abcdefu" in the last six months?
The infectious and irresistible track made GAYLE a household name practically overnight, with subsequent releases showing us she was anything but a one-hit-wonder. Her debut EP, a study of the human experience volume one, was also released earlier this month, featuring six raw and unfiltered tracks that simply don't hold back—and we just had to learn more. GAYLE was gracious enough to break down each of the six tracks on the EP for us, sharing her favorite lyrics and what each one truly means to her.
1. 'luv starved'
GAYLE: I originally wrote the chorus of "luv starved" on a piano in an apartment I was staying at in L.A., and then brought it into my session that night.
The song represents a moment of time in my life where I didn't know how to be treated properly, and I have really low standards so I couldn't tell when people were being genuinely nice to me or they were just giving me attention because they wanted something from me. I avoided people and anything romantic so I wouldn't keep making the same mistake of being with people who treated me improperly, and I didn't want to do that anymore… but I didn't know how to not do that anymore.
GAYLE's Favorite Lyric:
"I swear to god Imma change but I'm agnostic": I always say the phrase "I swear to god" but I'm not religious, so I can't tell if that means that I mean it or not.
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2. 'abcdefu'
GAYLE: I think the pre-chorus was the first melody that got established in the song. We knew we were writing the song "abcde f*** off" pretty soon into the session, and the melodies took a little longer to get to.
The song means that I was angry, and I was hurt, and I was finally letting myself hold somebody accountable for their actions. I never let myself get angry towards this person, and then I finally did and that was very empowering for me.
GAYLE's Favorite Lyric:
"F*** you," because f*** you.
3. 'sleeping with my friends'
GAYLE: One day I wrote down, "I really need to stop sleeping with my friends," in my notes because I thought that could be a cool concept or title for a song, especially because that's what I was experiencing in my life at the time. And then I went on a Zoom write, went through my notes, and I brought that song up as a concept and we decided to go with that.
This song means that I'm not perfect and I don't always know the reason why behind doing the things I do. I make mistakes, and that's okay.
GAYLE's Favorite Lyric:
"Gotta separate my sexual attraction from my loneliness, yeah, it's a chain reaction," because it's true. I found that when I was really lonely, I was attracted to certain people. And then I stopped being so lonely and bored, and I was no longer attracted to those people. I learned that loneliness can control who I am attracted to in a moment of time.
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4. 'ur just h***y'
GAYLE: I wrote down in my notes, "You only want to be friends when you're h***y," and then I brought that into my session. The words got switched around to, "You don't want to be friends, ur just h***y." For a really long time, I blamed myself for what I thought was ruining friendships when in reality, I realized that people were just using me for sex because that's what they wanted the whole time. I didn't know and once they got it, they started treating me differently.
It means that I got angry and talked about it because for so long, I didn't and it was so hard for me to acknowledge my negative emotions especially when they're towards people I love/like. I learned that they didn't have to make me feel that way. It's not all on me, it's on them too.
GAYLE's Favorite Lyric:
"Say everything's different but I think I'd rather sleep in," because I think it's funny.
5. 'e-z'
GAYLE: I was in a room with two writers who are from different generations than me, and we started talking about and making fun of the differences between our generations. It slowly started turning into us writing this song.
This song plays more into the sarcastic side of my personality, and trying to be more light-hearted and willing to make fun of myself and my generation—while making fun of people who make fun of us at the same time.
GAYLE's Favorite Lyric:
"Losing touch and losing sleep, we make it look e-z," because I feel like everybody thinks our generation is super out of touch with reality because we grew up on the internet and always have phones in our hands, and we're always tired from staying up on our phones all night.
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6. 'kiddie pool'
GAYLE: I originally wrote this song with Post Malone in mind, so we had this super heavy 808 and electronic drum vibe to it. We wrote the chorus and then we went back to the song and ended up switching it from a pith idea and more for my project, took it to guitar and made it more of a sweet love song.
It means that I was in love at one point in time and I loved being in love, and I wanted that person to be in love, too.
GAYLE's Favorite Lyric:
"Don't want kiddie pools, I'm a fool, I want oceans," because I think it's cute and it says what I was feeling at the time.
Want to know who else we're loving at the moment? Click HERE to read our interview with Lauren Weintraub on her viral single, "Missing You."