Lorde understandably took some time off after the whirlwind of a year she’s had — between newfound superstardom, the Pure Heroine tour, and putting together The Hunger Games soundtrack, she certainly deserved a little rest. But she’s back in the studio working on new music, and she took to her Tumblr to provide an update on what’s been going on. And she starts things off with a story of her with “some new friends” — who could conceivably be anyone famous?! — talking about which songs they’d want to live on in perpetuity. Her friends had some nice selections — Lou Reed’s “Perfect Day” and the Beach Boys’ “God Only Knows — but Lorde went for something different altogether: Robyn’s “Dancing On My Own,” which is basically a perfect pop song in my eyes. Good pick!

She then went into some pretty deep analysis of the track, inspired by her stumbling over the very great website One Week One Band, where a writer goes in-depth on a single artist for a week’s time. (Plug: I did one on Tegan And Sara last year!) Lorde had her own entry in the series a few months ago, and she had some very nice things to say about it. Read her note below.

hey, you guys. i know it’s been a minute since i came on here, and i feel terrible about that, but i hope your year has at least been manageable, and hopefully even fun. i’m thinking of you.

i took a few months off at the beginning of this year, which was so great – i did a bunch of swimming and driving around and being salty – and now i’m just getting into making the next body of work, which is very exciting and scary but SO VALIDATING (i also went to a wild beautiful fashawwn ball last night which maybe i’ll elaborate on in another post).

the other day i was in the studio with some new friends, and i asked them which one song they would send into space, to live on forever, if they had to. one said ‘perfect day’ by lou reed (a song which i heard when i was thirteen in passing somewhere, then went home and sat in front of my family’s desktop computer listening to, and cried my eyes out) and someone else said ‘god only knows’ by the beach boys, also in my top 5, so complex and kind of bittersweet and happy, also a good choice. and i thought about it for a while, thought about talking heads and fleetwood mac and nina simone, but the song that came out of my mouth was ‘dancing on my own’ by robyn. this song, to me, is perfect. it’s happy and sad, fiery and independent but vulnerable and small, joyous even when a heart is breaking. every line is perfect, how that second verse (“stilettos and broken bottles / i’m spinning around in circles”) stumbles perfectly into that bridge (”the lights go on, the music dies / …i just came to say goodbye”), and final chorus. it’s just perfect. we put it on right there in the studio, and i was up out of my seat dancing with my eyes screwed shut, and my hands up around my ears, and we looked into each other’s eyes and sang the words, and i could feel something hot and teary in the back of my throat just from FEELING so much at once. and i think it was then when i realized i’m going to be in love with music for the rest of my life. it’s going to be the most important friendship i’ll ever have. i’ll never, ever leave it alone, because you can’t leave alone something like that, something that makes you weep alone on aeroplanes or jolts you out of a chair and shatters your face with a big toothy smile. i think that’s a cool, intense revelation to have, going into your second record. first records are like meeting someone and feeling that need to do everything, just in case for whatever reason, you run out of time, or they stop feeling the same way as you. i feel much calmer, more comfortable in my love of doing this, and its apparent love of me, this time around. so there’s that.

the main reason i was inspired to write to you today came from googling a picture of britney taken by david lachapelle, and stumbling across this website called one week // one band. they had this incredibly thoughtful collection of quotes and ideas regarding this photo. out of morbid curiosity, i typed in my own name to have a look at what people were saying. and you guys, i have been sitting here for almost an hour fluttering my hand against my chest and making these tiny high-pitched sounds, because how i was written about, how pure heroine was written about, was remarkable in its attention to detail and flow in these songs. i make music for you guys, as you know, and to read these interpretations of the songs that were so nuanced and so much smarter than anything i’d read from an adult journalist (i believe the author of these wonderful pieces is a touch younger than me) was so inspiring for me. these pieces of writing are like a map to this record, and this (dare i say it bleugh) era. they should be packaged with my record, for goodness’ sake. they’re brilliant. you can find the author, sophia, at http://nyogu.tumblr.com/, and the pieces on my work at http://oneweekoneband.tumblr.com/tagged/lorde/chrono

and i guess that’s it for now. sending so much love to you all. thank you for loving and living inside my music. know that i’m taking my time to make the new stuff as good as i can. know that music is still making my heart skip every day. can’t wait to hang out soon. love you. xxx L