French-Korean-American artist spill tab is one of our absolute faves, here at Dork. It doesn’t matter what she’s writing about, or what new sounds she’s trying out, she always hits right bang in the middle of the ‘all the feels’ x ‘addictive pop goodness’ Venn diagram. AND sometimes you get to learn a bit of French too, which is nice, isn’t it?
With second EP ‘Bonnie’ – out today, hello – she’s rounded up some of the very best tracks of 2021, including the sugary sweet and proper lovely ‘Anybody Else’, as well as must-hear collabs with old and new pals, Gus Dapperton, JAWNY and Tommy Genesis.
Claire Chicha talks us through the EP, track by track.
PISTOLWHIP
‘PISTOLWHIP’ is the song on the EP that [frequent collaborator] marinelli and I first started writing over a year ago. I wanted to imagine what it was like to be cheated on and absolutely heart broken but simultaneously fuming with rage. I love this song because the lyrics really interweave with the instrumental, I love the highs and the lows in dynamic and how much energy those drops have.
en quatre
This is the first song released that I wrote in another country, haha. I wrote this one in Paris with [producer] Myd and marinelli. We had so much fun just hanging out and eating good food while making this, and then we brought it back to LA and my good friend Oscar Scheller added more elements and really brought it all together. This song probably has the most amount of people that’ve worked on it out of the whole EP, and I love that about it, that all these incredible people added their little flare and seasoning to it. It’s the only one that’s in French, idk why, I was feeling very un-European this year I guess.
Anybody Else
This song started as a joke, I sang the chorus like an 80s frontman and thought it was the funniest thing in the world. marinelli and I were just hanging out at the end of a session, I remember it was super late and I was losing it and so tired so I was lying down on the bed with the mic chilling on my chest while I was singing into it. It ultimately turned into an actual song and I’m so glad it did. The verses are very heartful and truthful for me, and it’s probably the corniest song I’ll ever write.
Indecisive feat. Tommy Genesis
The guitar part on the drops of this song are my favorite thing ever, they’re so wonky and weird and unsettling. marinelli and I started this one at his place with drums first, and then built everything out from there. I knew I wanted a fast rap type thing going one in the second verse but I also definitely didn’t want it to be me. Tommy Genesis took the whole ass wheel on it and truly slam dunked it. Her verse absolutely cranks. It’s the first song I have ever released with someone featuring on it, such a sick first feature, feeling very lucky.
Grade A feat. JAWNY
Spencer Stewart and I started this one over Zoom, classic quarantine during the pandemic move. He ripped that sick bass line over the drums and I wrote the first verse and chorus over it. I kinda didn’t really know what to do with it after that and I think my manager sent it over to JAWNY’s camp. He ended up really liking it which is still insane to me cause I’ve been a JAWNY fan for years. To have a song with him is quite frankly unreal, and hearing his verse on it for the first time was definitely one those moments of, holy fuck this is crazy, I love my job.
Velcro feat Gus Dapperton
Listen though, I just had to seal the deal of this EP with ‘Velcro’, because it’s so representative of how surreal this year has been for me. I feel like I’ve told everyone and their mother this story already but I met Gus two years ago on his last tour while I was running his merch. I think back then the whole crew and band ended up being like eight people and we all lived on his tour bus for two months straight touring the US. I am so eternally grateful for that experience. I made friends that I love dearly and am so thankful to have in my life including Gus, who has also supported this project from the start. Making this song with him felt so effortless and good from the get go, he is definitely an artist I look up to, so to also have him feature on the song is a big ol dream. And cherry on top is I got to open for him on this last tour, and we performed it live every night. Yeah that shit was sick.
