Yorke, Finding Her Feet And Her New Single 'Gravity'
{interview by Emily-Layne Kapetanovic}
Coming off the release of her debut EP, Yorke is hitting all the right notes with her new and infectious track ‘Gravity’. While her EP was a collection of coming of age tracks, ‘Gravity’ marks the moment where the Byron-based artist felt most authentic – a catharsis of sorts. Written with a cavalry of talented individuals, including the likes of Japanese Wallpaper (whom we have agreed is an Australian icon), ‘Gravity’ marks a new era for Yorke where she can shine through with her truest and most authentic sound to date.
Alright, awesome. Well, we’ll kick start, obviously you dropped your track ‘Gravity’ which may I say is amazing, I’ve listened to it so much it’s almost crazy.
Thank you.
So it’s sort of like your first track since you released you debut EP, so how does it feel to have this one out in the world now?
Yeah honestly, it’s very strange. I’m very excited. I still can’t believe it’s out. It’s just been my little baby that I’ve been sort of working on throughout Covid and now its finally in the world and its so nice seeing people react to it.
I’m guessing the reactions have been all positive because it’s seriously so much fun, its a good track. Talking about your EP, how does Gravity and sort of any of your future projects differ from your EP that you dropped earlier this year?
Yeah, I think my Ep was a lot about finding my feet and my sound and I think I’ve really figured it out, sort of in the space between writing the EP, which was mainly 2018 even though it came out in March, I sort of spent a year and a half really just focusing on my craft and learning as much as I can about who I am as a writer and an artist. I think Gravity is the best indication of that and sort of shows what’s to come.
That’s so nice, it’s nice to know you’ve found your feet which is a wholesome thing to hear. You previously said that writing this track was the first time you’ve felt completely authentic as an artist. So like, what does authenticity mean to you and why do you think this track sort of brought it all out?
Well my EP, the name Liberosis is like an ache to let things go and a desire to care less about things. I think that this next track and this next sort of phase of Yorke is the letting go, and it’s sort of embracing that sort of, I don’t know, it’s a lot more joyous and I think it’s just fun and sort of just living in the moment more and I think the authenticity comes because it’s music that I’ve always loved to listen to in terms of like sonically I think a lot of my influences are in there and it’s also exactly what I want Yorke to sound like, which make me really excited.
So what sort of things inspired it then?
Yeah, I think I was listening to a lot of Bleachers at the time. I did the track with Japanese Wallpaper and he’s a huge Carly Rae Jepsen fan and I hadn’t really listened to much Carly and he was playing it. He was just trying to convert me really and I am converted, I do admit. It was just a lot of really fun pop music, a lot of like Swedish influences but also really embracing what Yorke is to me, which is sort of New York obviously – it’s inspired by the name – and sort of the kind of music that makes all your senses heightened which is sort of what we wanted to aspire to.
So you talked about working with Japanese Wallpaper, you also worked with a heap of other super cool people on this track. How did it feel to be able to put the track together with those awesome people?
Yeah, it was a pretty fun process, especially working with Chris Walla, who is actually Japanese Wallpaper’s number one idol. So watching Japanese Wallpaper just freak out was very wholesome. Chris really embraced the track and he mixed it based on a story that he’d created in his own mind when he first heard the track. So he didn’t really have any pre-conceived ideas of who I was or anything, it was just purely based on how it made him feel and I think even just learning about his process was really cool and made me think about mixing songs differently. Hank Solo was amazing. I think he really brought out the punch in the chorus which was really fun. And yeah Gab (Japanese Wallpaper) is just incredible.
An Australian legend.
He can do no wrong. Like, I’m a huge Japanese Wallpaper fan.
Aren’t we all? I feel like as an Australian you have to be a huge Japanese Wallpaper fan.
It’s just part of who we are, I guess.
Ingrained in our culture. So obviously you were talking about Chris sort of having a different story in his mind that the song was going to follow and I know that your idea behind it was sort of that Intergalactic Romeo and Juliet. So how did those two stories differ? Was there a massive difference in the way you both perceived it or did they sort of come together?
I guess, obviously as you said about how it sort of was in my mind when I was writing it, it’s a bit of a metaphor for two people trying to come together and sort of figuring out how to cope in each others different spaces. Chris’, sort of the way that he viewed the track, was I think I was in like a cinema or something, it was very 90s romcom, and I was trying to tell someone that I loved them and they just weren’t listening to me and they weren’t taking me seriously but I was the real deal or something and I finally got the guy in the end… I think. He sent us a very comprehensive email on his story behind the track which was very sweet.
I feel like they’re both such nice stories, they both work. They’re like intertwined in a sort of way. So, what was the process like behind Gravity? Was there a lot of back and forth between Gab and Chris and Hank, did the track sort of come really quickly or was it a bit more of a process?
It came together really quickly when Gab and I were writing it. So we were doing a sort of three or four day session, I was in Melbourne. It was on the back of another song that we’d written and yeah it came together really quickly. I think I was really hyper that day and I don’t know if the song would have been written had I not had three coffees. It was very very quick. Gab was sort of just messing around and I already had a very clear concept of the song in my head just from the sonics that Gab was putting together. We came out of the session being like “Oh my gosh this song is so cool”. Then we sent it to Hank and there was a bit of back and forth there. Then with Chris he pretty much nailed it. Yeah, he’s incredible.
I feel like the end result is just so cohesive, even though it’s been through so many different people, it’s just come together so nicely. Alright, I’ll wrap it up though. Obviously the future is a bit unclear, but what can we expect from Yorke – the distant and immediate future? What’s the plan?
More music. Shows hopefully, when possible. Just lots more writing for me and thats about it I think. It’s a bit hard to plan but yeah more music and just expect lots of cool things.
You can stream ‘Gravity’ here.