Jack Antonoff Talks Crafting the Summer Hit ‘Please Please Please’ and Falling in Love with Sabrina Carpenter’s Voice

Variety

Watch Jack Antonoff Talks Crafting the Summer Hit ‘Please Please Please’ and Falling in Love with Sabrina Carpenter’s Voice - Variety on Dailymotion

Transcript

00:00So the entire vocal stack of the chorus, which to me, in my head,

00:03sounds like the heavens opening up, is...

00:05Please, please, please, don't prove I'm right.

00:11It's literally eight vocals, and three of them barely count.

00:17Please, please, please, don't prove I'm right.

00:25I started hearing Sabrina's music a few years ago.

00:28I was always in love with her voice.

00:30There's something about certain voices, like all the greatest voices,

00:33you just kind of stop even thinking about what's happening.

00:36You just hear the voice, and you're like, oh, it's always existed.

00:38I feel that way about all the great singers of all time.

00:41It's almost like a thing that's been an old friend.

00:44You don't sit back and dissect and be like, oh, how...

00:47But it's just there and brilliant.

00:49So I was aware of that voice. I heard it.

00:51And there's not a lot of those voices,

00:53so when you hear one, you never forget it.

00:55And now it's become, in the context of my life,

00:58like an iconic day in my life,

01:00because we sat there and we made

01:02Please, Please, Please, Lie to Girls and Slim Pickings

01:04all in that one day.

01:06Not finished, but the general feeling of those songs

01:10and then all the writing and the general production done.

01:13And so we talked a lot about these references,

01:15like ABBA and Jeff Lynne and ELO and The Beatles and Dolly

01:19and how at any given moment, it's utterly euphoric.

01:23You're like fucking roller skating with a disco ball,

01:26and then 5 seconds later, you're weeping in bed,

01:29and then there's a joke, and it really is my favorite kind of music,

01:33which is music that is really embodying

01:37what the human mind is actually feeling.

01:39The songwriting process was so fun

01:42because her and Amy Allen have a thing

01:45that is so magic and locked in.

01:48I caught that really quickly, and from that day

01:51when we made Please, Please, Please

01:53to everything we've made since, it's been this 3 of us

01:56figuring something out, where are we going,

01:58and then as soon as we have that magic moment

02:00where we know what it is, then there's a split-off point

02:03where they just kind of go like this,

02:05working out what they're working out,

02:07and I'm over here working out what I'm working out.

02:10So on the song, like Please, Please, Please,

02:12I didn't touch a lyric.

02:14So there's this funny thing where they're working on lyrics

02:16and I'm running around the room

02:18just trying to find something special,

02:20and that was when I started doing the bubbly Juno things.

02:30Please, Please, Please starts with a concept,

02:33and I'm on an acoustic guitar,

02:35and we're getting that structure of the song,

02:38but it was written in many ways

02:40kind of like a country song, you know.

02:45This is how it happened in the room in terms of writing.

02:49The second thing I did is when I started to get this world of...

02:58That reference point of ELO or ABBA,

03:00one of the great hallmarks of that is you have incredibly organic,

03:03I hear a person playing guitar, I hear a person playing drums,

03:06I hear a vocalist, and you hear a human being

03:09like struggling with a machine.

03:11I love that sound.

03:13I always want to play things in some way

03:15like it's the first time I've played them,

03:17but one thing that gives Please, Please, Please great character

03:20is this grand push and pull

03:22between things that are great and on time

03:24and things that are like floating around.

03:26It makes you feel like a little bit drunk,

03:29a little bit dreamlike, that interplay

03:31between hearing a human being

03:33very humanly playing an acoustic guitar,

03:36a full take all the way through,

03:38and then hearing a human being express humanity

03:41through a synthesizer by not feeding MIDI,

03:44not feeding click, I'm playing an arp,

03:46and this is the hallmark of the whole song.

03:49So if I have a super, super tight lindrum,

03:52so if this is like dead locked,

03:54then I start playing around with something

03:57that is not locked to tempo.

04:09The rockness of the lindrum makes the song looser

04:13because now I know where the beat is perfectly,

04:16so now I'm like, who are these people doing this?

04:19What you start to feel is these exciting moments

04:22that to me are very reminiscent of ELO or ABBA

04:25where there wasn't the technology to make things too great,

04:28so people are expressing themselves

04:30on synthetic instruments,

04:32and it gave this song an incredible character.

04:34But that moment when I started doing those bubbly things,

04:37I remember Sabrina and Amy were just like,

04:41and I knew I was going to go back

04:43and get meticulous with certain things,

04:45but I had the emotional center of the production.

04:48We all know in the room that it's got to be this huge chorus,

04:52this huge, shimmering, massive vocal stack.

04:55What's interesting about recording and about this song

04:58is there's actually very little going on,

05:00so what you really have is...

05:02Please, please, please...

05:04You have one lead.

05:06You have 3...

05:08stacks beneath it.

05:10So it's a 4-stack, but it's not.

05:12So this is the main vocal.

05:16So essentially what I'm doing here

05:18is instead of using too much reverb or delay,

05:21I'd rather just have someone do a few more takes

05:23that I can spread out.

05:25You have 2 harmonies doubled each.

05:27So the entire vocal stack of the chorus,

05:29which to me, in my head,

05:31sounds like the heavens opening up, is...

05:33Please, please, don't prove I'm right.

05:38It's literally 8 vocals,

05:41and 3 of them barely count,

05:44and the only other thing I have going on

05:46is I have that stack running through a copycat

05:48and a space echo,

05:50which I'm manipulating in real time.

05:52Please, please, please...

05:54Don't bring me to tears...

05:56So the EQ of this, the tune, the pitch,

05:58it's all getting fucked with.

06:00If I got a super-locked lin drum,

06:02and then I'm doing acoustics and bass

06:05and synths floating all around it,

06:07then okay, I got Sabrina's pitch-perfect,

06:10one-of-a-kind amazing vocal.

06:12Let me also run that vocal through a copycat

06:15and mess with the pitch,

06:17so it's like playing with it,

06:19going in and out of perfect pitch on the effects.

06:22To my ear, it further proves

06:25how brilliant her vocal is.

06:275 vocals, and then one through a copycat,

06:30and one through a space echo,

06:32sounding like this.

06:34Please, please, please...

06:36Don't prove I'm right...

06:39It's, you know, what in my head

06:42I thought would be 20, 30, 40 tracks of vocals.

06:45You start to realize, no, that's it,

06:47because the impression of it being massive

06:50versus filling the sonic space

06:52to the absolute rim.

06:54If we're leaving all this space,

06:56then I like the idea that at one point

06:59we can completely go there.

07:01So it's only on the very last line

07:04do you get this 15 stacks of vocals.

07:06Please, please, please...

07:08Don't prove I'm right...

07:11At that point, it's like,

07:13I feel like we've earned the right to blow it out.

07:16For as massive as it feels and sounds,

07:18I think the reason why it sounds that big

07:20is because we left a lot of space for the listener.

07:23The heart and soul of the song

07:25to stick with her voice, to play bass,

07:27all these sort of drunk things going on.

07:30Please, please, please...

07:33Don't prove I'm right...

07:36You know, there's little moments,

07:39I added just a sub, just...

07:42sub and a high Juno.

07:46Sometimes you do something,

07:48and you spend a ton of time

07:50and an amazing amount of effort,

07:52and it really is not meant to be

07:55anything but a passing moment in the song.

07:58Perfect example of this,

08:00I recorded Evan Smith from Bleachers on flute,

08:03Bobby Hawk on violin doing...

08:11And as you can see, I'm barely using them.

08:17Here's the flutes for one second.

08:22Here's the whole flute stack.

08:24These are all the takes, and this is what's going on.

08:26And it's absolutely gorgeous.

08:33I didn't use any of that,

08:35which is a real...

08:37It's tough when you hear something that beautiful,

08:39but the song didn't need it.

08:40But the song needed,

08:41and you can see my automation here.

08:43The only time I use the flute is right here,

08:45going into chorus two.

08:49In the context of the song...

08:53It's a fucking passing moment

08:55that just was a moment right into the second chorus.

08:58I just wanted to introduce one new sonic

09:00that just that even if you didn't

09:02specifically hear it emotionally,

09:04you're like, what the fuck is that?

09:06Another welcome into a new place.

09:08I did the same thing at the end of chorus two,

09:10and then the only other time you hear the flute

09:12is at the very end, and once again,

09:14this is not something you really pick up in the recording.

09:16It just kind of rises up on the final outro.

09:19In context...

09:24And so that's a moment where it's like,

09:26I used this element, this character

09:28just flew across your head for one second,

09:30introducing you into another chorus.

09:32I just want at the end of the song,

09:34almost at the end of a play,

09:36everyone comes out and takes a bow.

09:38Does every character just say hi one more time?

09:40You don't think of Please Please Please

09:42as a big orchestrated string song.

09:44It's about her vocal. It is about her vocal, period.

09:46♪

09:50These are really ornate moments

09:52in verse two, which is not something

09:54obviously your mind goes to the key change,

09:56but the first entrance of the strings,

09:58these, I call them sergeant pepper chugs

10:00just because of the way they scratch.

10:02In context of the song...

10:04♪ I have a fun idea, babe

10:06♪ Maybe just stay inside

10:08What you really feel in the song

10:10is the sputtering 16th note

10:12of the beat pickup,

10:14most important is her voice,

10:16her lyric, and the key change.

10:18♪

10:22♪ I have a fun idea, babe

10:24♪ Maybe just stay inside

10:26But these little elements that just start to creep in,

10:28they do a thing to me that is really powerful,

10:30which is they create a space

10:32that honors how brilliant the listener is, right?

10:34You take them out, the song works,

10:36the song's great, but why not spend,

10:38you know, 15 hours

10:40recording, orchestrating

10:42the best string,

10:44you know, orchestration

10:46and flute parts

10:48only to have this like absolute magic

10:50just come and go for one second.

10:52It's almost like a vote of confidence

10:54in your listener and yourself.

10:56And that theory extends, you know, like so...

10:58♪

11:00These are things that are just moments

11:02that I liked when I was just...

11:04So there's a flute, you know.

11:06Here's a... whatever the fuck that is.

11:08There's this...

11:10Like waterfalls

11:12of tubular bells.

11:14There's an interestingly random

11:16percussion moment.

11:18It's not the theme

11:20of my song. I don't want to have a song that just like

11:22changes sounds every second, but if you have

11:24these tight parameters,

11:26I like to get on things and literally

11:28just search around, search around. And these takes are

11:30hilarious, you know what I mean? Like 15

11:32out of 16 things are like, you know,

11:34the fucking Seinfeld bass sound.

11:36They're just like so not right. But then you grab one

11:38of these moments, and it just

11:40rips people back into the song,

11:42reminds you that we can do

11:44anything, anything can happen, and that it is

11:46a journey. And then if you choose to peel back

11:48and dive into the production,

11:50it's like a whole incredible

11:52world. I really invest in those

11:54things emotionally and spend a lot of time

11:56on moments that someone

11:58else might say, ah, it's passing.

12:00♪

12:08♪

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