First Take by Roberta Flack

"Someone made me a mixtape once of a lot of amazing folk and soul and jazz, kind of legendary songs, quite rare, and it had a lot of Pentangle and Fairport Convention and it had 'Compared To What' on it. And I went seeking 'Compared To What' because I thought ""what is that song?"", and that's what inspired the song 'Central Reservation'. It's just an amazing record. Come the last six years, I was just like, ""you know what, the sound of the next record is this record"". One of the reasons is that I love the fact that the drums and bass are ever-present and yet, at the same time, they're almost not there. I can't explain it; it's like all of the elements of the record are perfectly heard but each sound has so much space around it. It's got the most extraordinary rhythm, emotion and beautiful songs. When I started speaking to Tucker Martine [Sugaring Season producer], who produced the album, I said ""okay, here's a blueprint for a sound I love and a record that I love"", and that was it. We weren't being analytical; it gave us a starting place, and from there it grew out. It's just filtered through in different ways."

"Roberta Flack speaks to me in that same way that Melanie speaks to me. She's such a beautiful songwriter and composer and pianist and I don't think she gets enough credit either. She's such a beautiful songwriter and she's, to me, up there with Joni Mitchell. She covers 'Hey, That's No Way To Say Goodbye' by Leonard Cohen so beautifully. And that piano part, I think it's a minor key, it's a small part that's been sampled by Lil' Kim and I think Notorious BIG. It's so subtle and I don't think you would notice it unless you loved that record. It's so good. It's also so curated perfectly from start to end. I am no spring chicken and making the new album, it was my first record where the Spotify playlist was what mattered the most, and it's really difficult because that beauty in curating the song-list and what comes where, really thinking about it, and the titles of the tracks, that mood, is gone. It's all gone. No one cares about albums anymore. The labels want you to put the songs that they've chosen to be singles first and before you would never put the single first. Ever. First Take is very visual. I can see it in my head."