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Peel back Charlie Puth‘s perfect pitch, nine multi-platinum singles and 35 billion+ career streams, and you’ve got a guy who wholeheartedly lives and breathes music.
The singer, songwriter and producer catches up with The Hollywood Reporter about what he’s been working on, life on the go (he travels back and forth between Los Angeles and New York) and his very fitting partnership with Bic pens (he handwrites all his lyrics). He also breaks down his creative process, backstage must-haves and what he’s most looking forward to in the coming months (hint: it involves new music).
Let’s jump right in. Tell me about your songwriting process. Is it always the same or different based on where you are in life or what you’re writing?
I mean, it’s different everywhere because life is different every day. I’ll write different sounding music based on the location. I remember writing “We Don’t Talk Anymore” in the Philippines, and it was a very hot day. It was probably 100 degrees… Fahrenheit, not Celsius (Laughs). I saw palm trees, and I thought to myself very simply, “I’m going to make a song that feels like vacation, sounds like vacation.” This is before the lyrics were written, of course.
And then, “Light Switch,” the song I put out in 2022, was a result of me just being locked in the studio because of post-COVID times, and I wanted something upbeat and fast to kind of get me going because nothing at that point in time was. I wanted to make something that excited me.
Can you elaborate on your physical writing process?
I handwrite lyrics. I never type lyrics on my phone or a computer. It just feels like the song isn’t a song if I type it in — it needs my personality. It’s just something mental. Bic produces a product that I literally use every day of my life to make music: the 4-Color Pen. The different colors will trigger different parts of my musical mind. So I take it on tour. I take it on airplanes. I take it everywhere I go. If I don’t like a lyric, I’m going to use the color red to scratch it out. Red’s bad. Green’s my favorite color. Green means go. That’s usually a good lyric.
Other than your pen, what are your must-have travel items?
I’m a really basic traveler. Bose headphones. I have my iPad. I have my neck pillow. And there’s this little pocket synthesizer by Teenage Engineering that I use. I’ve never recorded with it, but it’s just like little blips and bleeps… I draft what could be ideas on it.
Side note: I just noticed that your Zoom name is “MusicRocks1991.”
Yeah, you can write that in the article too because music does rock.
I’m fully writing that in the article. OK, so we did travel, but do you have any backstage essentials?
Several notebooks and pens. I have to have a little keyboard backstage as well because I feel like sometimes I can’t talk. And if I have to meet a couple of people before I go on stage, I’ll just sit behind the little keyboard and play stuff as I’m talking and I feel like the words will come out easier. It actually helps me converse better. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.
That’s such a creative person thing to say.
Yes. I’ve heard people describe me as creative. (Laughs.)
What would you say is the best piece of advice you’ve ever received that you would give to an aspiring artist?
Best piece of advice I ever received was to not overthink things. Don’t re-sing the vocal a bunch of times. Don’t rewrite the script. Just whatever your gut is, do it. Multiple people that I’ve looked up to have told me that, and that’s what I would continue to spread.
How do you know when you’re done with a song?
That’s a good question. When there’s nothing left to add to the song, or when you try to add things and it doesn’t change it at all. There’s a song I wrote called “That’s Hilarious” in 2022, and it’s a very simple production, and I was listening back to it thinking to myself, “this is too simple; it needs a guitar.” I add it. It feels out of place. “Okay, well, it doesn’t need a guitar. Maybe it needs another hi-hat.” I add it. It feels weird. It feels awkward now. When I take it out, it felt much better. I guess, when you start to add things in and it feels like the cup’s been filled, that’s how you know when you’re done with the song.
What else are you working on right now? What are you excited about in the coming months?
I’m excited about music in general. I can’t share when, but I do plan on putting music out soon. And when it does come out, I feel like a lot of question marks are going to be answered. [There will be] a lot of things that I haven’t sung about. Life for me is much different than it was 10 years ago when “One Call Away” or “See You Again” came out, so there’s some things to say.
And I am constantly inspired by my surroundings, both musically and otherworldly, and I just, I hope I get to do this for the rest of my life.
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