Andrew Watt

Zane Lowe (0:00)

Andrew Watt, it's great to see you, man. Andy, what a beautiful life in music you get to live. I'm so thrilled that we get another chance to talk about what you do and what you do so well. This playlist is absolutely fucking crazy. I mean, these are just handpicked songs from all the music, not even all the music, a selection of the music that you've created. There's like four hours and 30-odd minutes of songs here on this playlist. And that's just like the chosen ones.

I mean, what do you think when you think about that amount of music, when you think about the amount that you've done? Do you even think about it in totality?

Andrew Watt (0:38)

I don't. It actually makes me cringe. It's a lot of hours spent.

Zane Lowe (0:46)

So how do you work then? Is it literally on a day by day basis? Is focus the key here?

Andrew Watt (0:54)

Yeah. I mean, it's like the oldest statement in the world. You're doing what you love and you're not really working, right? So I've been in situations before where I was doing something that I wasn't that into, and then my focus is nowhere. Like the childhood ADD comes back bigger than ever. But if it's something that I love, like we were just listening to records by Pearl Jam, I'm in it until it's perfect for everyone. So the hours, they don't really add up for me until you realize you've been working for 18 hours straight and then you're exhausted.

Zane Lowe (1:31)

Yeah. Do you have a limit on how far you can go on a session or on a song or whatever before? Like, are you the last person to cave in and be like, man, I need to sleep right now?

Andrew Watt (1:42)

It's like an ongoing thing. It's really weird for me when I'm deep in the project, it's like, it's all the time. It's not that I'm there all the time working on it, but you're consumed by it.

Zane Lowe (1:54)

Yeah.

Andrew Watt (1:54)

I'll go to sleep. Going to sleep is the best thing ever for, if you can get it to stop looping in your head, you wake up the next day, within the first hour of being awake, I like to listen to it. Yeah. Just because you're fresh, but it's still right there and you want to see what it's like, and you have a great thought on it. So it's kind of all the different parts of the day give you a different perspective on what it's going to sound like.

Zane Lowe (2:19)

Have you now, is it safe to say you have worked with a good healthy amount of the artists that got you on this in the first place, the people that really raised you as a young music fan?

Andrew Watt (2:30)

Yes. Absolutely.

And it means so much. It's like going to college, working with these artists and learning from them and getting to use that with other artists after. It's like sharpening the tools every time.

Zane Lowe (2:46)

So what does that teach you about manifestation and the gravity of being a fan to appear?

Andrew Watt (2:51)

Yeah. I said to my mom, like, why don't we have a photo of me like in my childhood bedroom?

Those photos don't exist. My childhood bedroom was Stones posters and Pearl Jam posters and Chili Peppers posters and everything of the people that are in my life. And friends that I work with, it kind of would make me look a little bit like a stalker almost, I think. But only after a certain age.

Zane Lowe (3:19)

When you're young, it's called being a super fan. Totally fine.

Andrew Watt (3:22)

You're a great musician. Did you go to concerts and hold signs up and stuff like that?

Zane Lowe (3:26)

Never did the signs. I mean, definitely the T-shirts and the merch guy and all that sort of stuff. You know, never did the signs.

Andrew Watt (3:32)

Yeah.

Zane Lowe (3:32)

I mean, look, keep the stubs.

Of course, the big one for me is, I could tell you the first song played by almost every one of my favorite concerts I've ever been to from a young age. I'm a super set list obsessed person. Like I could tell you Nirvana started with school, I think, at the gig they played at in Auckland when they came and did the Nevermind Tour. You know, it's pretty, that should have been obsessed. I never understand when I say to people like, what did they start with? And they're like, I couldn't even tell you. I mean, how can you not tell me what the first song they played was? That's the best part of the show.