{"id":741887,"date":"2026-07-30T22:10:23","date_gmt":"2026-07-30T19:10:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/willow-on-the-thread-big-tech-and-her-lifelong-music-practice\/"},"modified":"2026-07-30T22:10:23","modified_gmt":"2026-07-30T19:10:23","slug":"willow-on-the-thread-big-tech-and-her-lifelong-music-practice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/willow-on-the-thread-big-tech-and-her-lifelong-music-practice\/","title":{"rendered":"Willow on \u2019The Thread,\u2019 Big Tech, and her lifelong music practice"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"content_blocks\">\n<style>\n<\/style>\n<style>\n<p> article.custom .custom-title, article.custom .custom-media .caption {\n   color: #ffcc00;\n }<\/p>\n<p> article.custom .custom-attribution, article.custom .custom-attribution a {\n   color: #ffcc00;\n }<\/p>\n<p> article.custom .content_block blockquote.pull_quote {\n   color: #ffcc00;\n }\n<\/style>\n<div id=\"content_block-282920\" class=\"content_block flush title center_align\">\n<div class=\"content_inner_wrapper\">\n<div class=\"custom-title\">\n      WILLOW\u2019s lifelong practice\n    <\/div>\n<div class=\"custom-description\">\n      A conversation with the artist about music, tech, and the value of practice.\n    <\/div>\n<div class=\"custom-attribution\">\n<div class=\"author\">\n    <span><br \/>\n      By <span class=\"credit_name\">Steffanee Wang<\/span><br \/>\n  <\/span><\/div>\n<div class=\"photographer\">Video <span class=\"credit_name\">Ethan Holland, Tommy Maidment<\/span><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"custom-media\">\n<div class=\"triple_gutter_left triple_gutter_right image center_align\">\n<p>  <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/thefader-res.cloudinary.com\/private_images\/w_1440,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:best\/willow-still-2_ie8n62\/willow-the-thread-interview.jpg\" srcset=\"https:\/\/thefader-res.cloudinary.com\/private_images\/w_220,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:best\/willow-still-2_ie8n62\/willow-the-thread-interview.jpg 220w,https:\/\/thefader-res.cloudinary.com\/private_images\/w_300,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:best\/willow-still-2_ie8n62\/willow-the-thread-interview.jpg 300w,https:\/\/thefader-res.cloudinary.com\/private_images\/w_400,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:best\/willow-still-2_ie8n62\/willow-the-thread-interview.jpg 400w,https:\/\/thefader-res.cloudinary.com\/private_images\/w_600,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:best\/willow-still-2_ie8n62\/willow-the-thread-interview.jpg 600w,https:\/\/thefader-res.cloudinary.com\/private_images\/w_750,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:best\/willow-still-2_ie8n62\/willow-the-thread-interview.jpg 750w,https:\/\/thefader-res.cloudinary.com\/private_images\/w_840,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:best\/willow-still-2_ie8n62\/willow-the-thread-interview.jpg 840w,https:\/\/thefader-res.cloudinary.com\/private_images\/w_960,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:best\/willow-still-2_ie8n62\/willow-the-thread-interview.jpg 960w,https:\/\/thefader-res.cloudinary.com\/private_images\/w_1260,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:best\/willow-still-2_ie8n62\/willow-the-thread-interview.jpg 1260w,https:\/\/thefader-res.cloudinary.com\/private_images\/w_1800,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:best\/willow-still-2_ie8n62\/willow-the-thread-interview.jpg 1800w,https:\/\/thefader-res.cloudinary.com\/private_images\/w_2400,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:best\/willow-still-2_ie8n62\/willow-the-thread-interview.jpg 2400w,\" sizes=\"100vw\" alt=\"Willow on \u2019The Thread,\u2019 Big Tech, and her lifelong music practice\"><\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"custom_share_buttons_top \" style=\"\">\n<div id=\"new_socials_bottom\" class=\"new_socials_footer  \">\n<p>      <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"\" width=\"40\" height=\"40\" src=\"https:\/\/www.thefader.com\/assets\/FDR_SocialSharing_Facebook-747312c39722d47504a80f02500b8d4ad2e36acf922bad1c83799db1bc77f605.png\"><br \/>\n      <!-- <span>Share<\/span> --><\/p>\n<p>  <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" target='\"new\"' href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.thefader.com%2F2026%2F07%2F30%2Fwillow-the-thread-interview%3Futm_source%3Df%26utm_medium%3Dtw%26utm_campaign%3Dshare&amp;text=Willow%20on%20%E2%80%99The%20Thread,%E2%80%99%20Big%20Tech,%20and%20her%20lifelong%20music%20practice&amp;via=thefader\" class=\"new_social_footer_button twitter new_social_share_button\" data-ga-event-category=\"Social Share\" data-ga-event-label=\"Twitter\" data-ga-on=\"click\" data-ga-event-action=\"cilck\"><\/p>\n<p>    <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"\" width=\"40\" height=\"40\" src=\"https:\/\/www.thefader.com\/assets\/FDR_SocialSharing_Twitter-8d78f695280aa3f8a4461702c68e9fcbfd6042af1600c62d49fdec4b735fb57a.png\"><br \/>\n    <!-- <span>Tweet<\/span> --><br \/>\n  <\/a><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<style>\n<\/style>\n<div id=\"content_block-282921\" class=\"content_block paragraph text triple_gutter_right triple_gutter_left center_align\">\n<div class=\"content_inner_wrapper\">\n<div class=\"paragraph_wrapper center_align\">\n<p>\n            &#8220;When people listen to my music or they come to my show, I want it to feel like they&#8217;re literally being healed from the inside out, like it&#8217;s a spiritual, shamanic experience.&#8221;\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            This is what 25-year-old WILLOW says when she envisions her end goal as an artist, singer, songwriter, instrumentalist (and the list goes on). For her, delivering a spiritual experience goes hand-in-hand with achieving peak physical performance, sharpening her skills as an artist to the point where her ability and performance can become tangible enough to move a person. &#8220;It almost reminds me of what I imagine ancient Greek people used to feel like in the old Olympics. <i>This is what humanity can do!<\/i>&#8221;\n          <\/p>\n<div class=\"\" style=\"padding-bottom: 20px; margin-top: 20px; text-align: left;\">\n<\/div>\n<p>\n            For the past decade and a half, WILLOW has been diligently chipping away at this mission: publicly, through the release of nine studio albums, but also privately, through the nurturing of a widely varied and disciplined artistic practice that&#8217;s included taking up the bass, drums, piano, and cello, and following every esoteric music theory rabbit hole that crosses her path. Since breaking out in 2010 with &#8220;Whip My Hair,&#8221; WILLOW&#8217;s musical sound has moved through R&amp;B, neo-soul, pop-punk, and rock, all of which served as training for the ambitious sonic palette she&#8217;s mining now: one rooted in progressive jazz and that embraces a dense musicality.\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            Her latest album, <i><a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_new\" href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=8PxHPjn7l24\">The Thread<\/a><\/i>, is a culmination of this heads-down practice, a 10-song record of nimble instrumentation, rich stacked harmonies, and insane runs and riffs. There&#8217;s a masterfulness to the music, where you can notice the complexity of the arrangements but listening still feels effortless.\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            WILLOW came into The FADER office to discuss the evolution of her music practice and her thoughts on the state of the world, tech, and her hope for the future. Watch the conversation and read a tran<a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/download-scripts-themes-apps\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"9\" title=\"Download Scripts &amp; Themes &amp; Apps\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">script<\/a> of the interview below.\n          <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"content_block paragraph triple_gutter_right triple_gutter_left\">\n<div class=\"content_inner_wrapper\">\n<div class=\"\" style=\"padding-bottom: 20px; margin-top: 20px; text-align: left;\">\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<style>\n<\/style>\n<div id=\"content_block-282919\" class=\"content_block breaker triple_gutter_right triple_gutter_left embed\">\n<div class=\"media_wrapper\">\n<div class=\"\">\n    <iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"WILLOW on &amp;apos;The Thread,&amp;apos; big tech, and her music practice: The FADER interview\" width=\"640\" height=\"480\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/PBII5tf7Huw?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<style>\n<\/style>\n<div id=\"content_block-282916\" class=\"content_block paragraph text triple_gutter_right triple_gutter_left center_align\">\n<div class=\"content_inner_wrapper\">\n<div class=\"paragraph_wrapper center_align\">\n<hr><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<style>\n<\/style>\n<div id=\"content_block-282915\" class=\"content_block paragraph text triple_gutter_right triple_gutter_left center_align\">\n<div class=\"content_inner_wrapper\">\n<div class=\"paragraph_wrapper center_align\">\n<p>\n            <b>The FADER: How are you feeling, WILLOW?<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            WILLOW: Oof! That&#8217;s so crazy just hearing you say that. Ninth studio album.\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>What a journey it\u2019s been.<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<div class=\"\" style=\"padding-bottom: 20px; margin-top: 20px; text-align: left;\">\n<\/div>\n<p>\n            Wow. I am just so grateful to be able to put two records out this year, which is something I&#8217;ve never done before in my entire career. Very daunting, but I don&#8217;t know, I have a lot to say, and I feel like it just feels right, right now.\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>Yeah. I feel like both records \u2014 and we&#8217;ll get into this a little bit \u2014 but they complement each other really well, I think. Like two sides of you growing into yourself as an artist.<br \/><\/b><br \/>Yes. 100%. <i>Petal Rock Black<\/i> came from a place of like me challenging myself and being like, \u201cOkay, like, you&#8217;ve been practicing, you&#8217;ve been studying. So now let&#8217;s see what you can do when you put yourself in a room with the piano, the bass, the drums, and the guitar, and let&#8217;s just see what comes out.\u201d Many a days recording that album, I was like, <i>I feel like I&#8217;m scratching the bottom of the barrel here in terms of my creative ideas, but also my technical abilities<\/i>. I feel like when you&#8217;re scraping the bottom of the barrel, the bottom of the barrel gets bigger in terms of what you have to draw from creatively.\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            And then <i>The Thread<\/i>, on the other hand\u2014shout out to my good homie Chris Greatti, this is our third album that we&#8217;ve made together. Our first project was <i><copingmechanism><\/copingmechanism><\/i>, second one was <i>Empathogen<\/i>, and now this one, <i>The Thread<\/i>. It&#8217;s so interesting going from having so much pressure on myself every single day walking into the studio and being like, almost a little bit afraid and anxious, like, &#8220;Here we go. Like, what&#8217;s going to come out today? I hope it&#8217;s something I can use!&#8221; But then walking into the studio with, you know, my really good friend and collaborator, the sense of ease with our support of one another, and me knowing his strengths and weaknesses, and him knowing my strengths and weaknesses, and us being able to\u2026\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>Work together.<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            Exactly. And it felt just like a breath of fresh air after really scraping the bottom of the barrel for like two and a half years.\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>I do want to rewind a little bit and talk about <i>Petal Rock Black<\/i> because I think a lot of people don&#8217;t know the challenge you put yourself through. You played almost every instrument on that record. You wrote and recorded alone, except for an engineer.<br \/><\/b><br \/>My engineer, good friend, shout out to Adam Schoeller. Love you, bro.\n          <\/p>\n<div class=\"\" style=\"padding-bottom: 20px; margin-top: 20px; text-align: left;\">\n<\/div>\n<p>\n            <b>It almost feels like a \u2014 I don&#8217;t want to say a torture session, but like&#8230;<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            Bro, yeah! Yeah! I&#8217;m so glad that you&#8230;\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>What inspired you to be like, \u201cOkay, let me put myself through this insane challenge?\u201d<br \/><\/b><br \/>I was going through a lot emotionally, and you know, collaboration is amazing. Like, it&#8217;s one of the deepest ways to create something beautiful, but I just felt like in order for me to really become the musician that I really want to be, like listening to Prince, Stevie Wonder, you know what I mean? I am setting a pretty high bar for myself. I feel like in order for me to be able to move forward on that journey, I really wanted to see, <i>What can you really do?<\/i> Let\u2019s see what you can really do when no one else is like, \u201cHey, maybe, maybe it should be in three. Maybe we should make the kit go like this. Oh, I really like that idea.\u201d Because we love collaboration, it&#8217;s awesome. But sometimes the purity of your idea can, not get lost, but it just becomes something different when other people are there to be like, &#8220;Maybe it should be like this,&#8221; you know? And to be able to just see the purity of my vision, and to be like, &#8220;Okay, what is really there?&#8221;\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>To see your true baseline.<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            True baseline. Of like, \u201cOkay, I\u2019m not playing video \u2014 I\u2019m not doing videos on Instagram, this is like a full album!\u201d You know what I mean?\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>So how do you feel about the result?<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<div class=\"\" style=\"padding-bottom: 20px; margin-top: 20px; text-align: left;\">\n<\/div>\n<p>\n            Obviously, you know, listening back, already there are things that I would be like, \u201cOkay, I would change this here and there.\u201d But that\u2019s why we love albums and that\u2019s why we love listening to artists\u2019 older music, because it shows their growth, and it shows places where unexpectedly different creative sparks arise that then come back later in odd ways. But I don\u2019t know, I feel like most of my favorite artists have that capability of being able to go into a room with instruments and create something uniquely themselves. And I was like, \u201cThis just needs to become a practice for me.\u201d Like every two years, or every, I mean every year, that&#8217;s a lot, I would love to get to a point where I could do that.\n          <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<style>\n<p> #content_block-282925,  #content_block-282925 blockquote.pull_quote, #content_block-282925 .img_caption .caption {\n   color: #ffcc00;\n }\n<\/style>\n<div id=\"content_block-282925\" class=\"content_block breaker triple_gutter_right triple_gutter_left pull_quote\">\n<div class=\"media_wrapper\">\n<blockquote class=\"pull_quote\"><p>I feel like when you\u2019re scraping the bottom of the barrel, that\u2019s how the bottom of the barrel gets bigger.<\/p><\/blockquote><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<style>\n<\/style>\n<div id=\"content_block-282917\" class=\"content_block paragraph text triple_gutter_right triple_gutter_left center_align\">\n<div class=\"content_inner_wrapper\">\n<div class=\"paragraph_wrapper center_align\">\n<p>\n            <b>To create something completely by yourself?<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            And that being a recurring thing that happens over my career, because then you really get to tap back in. Now when I do another collaboration, I&#8217;m going to be extra solid in my ears and my capabilities and my technical abilities. &#8216;Cause sometimes, we can go into rooms with really amazing musicians, and this has happened to me so many times where I go into a room with a really amazing musician and they&#8217;re like, \u201cOh, it should be like, or maybe it&#8217;s like, or maybe it&#8217;s like&#8230;&#8221; And I&#8217;m like, &#8220;Damn, I wish, like, I feel like I&#8217;m not following you.&#8221; And I hate that! Like, I want to be right there with you and be like, &#8220;Oh yeah, what if it was in three? And then, oh, it could also&#8230;&#8221; you know? So it&#8217;s also a pursuit of wanting to be able to communicate with other musicians and play with other musicians that I really respect as well.\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>I feel like the language and being able to speak technically, that&#8217;s a hard skill. Not a lot of musicians or singers or songwriters have that.<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<div class=\"\" style=\"padding-bottom: 20px; margin-top: 20px; text-align: left;\">\n<\/div>\n<p>\n            Yeah, and being able to say your idea, yeah.\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>I do want to talk about collaborators, because throughout your career, you&#8217;ve worked with such a wide range of people, and on <i>The Thread<\/i>, your only feature is the amazing Mei [Semones]. We love Mei.<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            Right.\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>For people who don&#8217;t know, she&#8217;s this virtuosic guitarist in Brooklyn. And as soon as I heard that song, I was like, \u201cI think that&#8217;s the song that Mei is on,\u201d cause her style is just so distinct. I read that you got in touch with her just through DMs?<br \/><\/b><br \/>Yes.\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>What are you looking for when you are looking for a collaborator? What made you be like, &#8220;Oh my god, I need Mei for this project&#8221;?<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            Well, I had been listening to her music for many, many months before I contacted her. And I was just soaking in her sense of melody and rhythm and, it&#8217;s not very often that you come across an artist like Mei. You know even her look, her style, and the way that she presents herself is very, um&#8230; Miles Davis said something really interesting, he said\u2014can I curse? I don&#8217;t know if I can curse.\n          <\/p>\n<div class=\"\" style=\"padding-bottom: 20px; margin-top: 20px; text-align: left;\">\n<\/div>\n<p>\n            <b>Yeah, go ahead, please!<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            He said, &#8220;A motherfucker got to look like he play.&#8221;\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>Correct, yeah.<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            And it&#8217;s like, if you&#8217;re going to come into the space wearing khaki pants and Crocs, you know, I might not be like\u2026 I might not look at you and be like, &#8220;I want your energy in my band.&#8221; Or I might look at you and be like, &#8220;Are your chops khaki pants and Crocs as well?&#8221; You know what I mean?\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>The vibe is important.<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            The vibe is very important. And Mei comes into the room in her power and her, you said virtuosic, in her virtuosity. And she&#8217;s just so inspiring. And that&#8217;s really what I&#8217;m looking for in a collaborator, is somebody who inspires me to dig deeper into who I am as an artist. Iron sharpens iron, you know what I mean? I&#8217;m always looking for that, for that kind of situation.\n          <\/p>\n<div class=\"\" style=\"padding-bottom: 20px; margin-top: 20px; text-align: left;\">\n<\/div>\n<p>\n            <b>What was it like working with her on that song?<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            It was amazing. I mean, ah, I kind of felt bad &#8217;cause she was so busy, and she was in L.A. and just doing so many things. And so I tried to make the session as easy for her as possible. I had been listening to her music for so many months before, so I felt like I had a really good idea of maybe the kinds of chords that she would like. And so I did a rough sketch, and I left a section for her to just do whatever she wanted with. And that&#8217;s where, that&#8217;s the section of the song where everything cuts out and it&#8217;s just the guitar, and it&#8217;s um, &#8220;I kissed desire and I called it grace.&#8221; And that&#8217;s the part that I was like, &#8220;Take it away, Mei!&#8221; That was amazing. Just so easy, you know? It&#8217;s beautiful when you can work with someone who really knows who they are, because then there&#8217;s not a lot of like, \u201cOh, well, should it be&#8230;?\u201d It&#8217;s like, no, we know what we&#8217;re trying to do here, you know?\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>Something about this record, and I feel like maybe a lot of people feel it, is it just, it does feel like a culmination of your artistry, and like you finding your niche. I feel like a lot of it started with <i>Empathogen<\/i>. Maybe this is just me coming from the outside, but it did feel like there was a change in your artistic practice where you were, you know, embracing complexity, embracing denseness.<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            Yes.\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>I&#8217;m curious, what happened between <i><copingmechanism><\/copingmechanism><\/i> and <i>Empathogen<\/i> that led you onto this path?<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            I was in a really interesting position before I met Chris. I was just kind of like, &#8220;Ah, man, like I&#8217;m trying to find that next creative spark.&#8221; And Chris came into my life, and we started recording <i><copingmechanism><\/copingmechanism><\/i>. And what&#8217;s really interesting about Chris is that he&#8217;s a classic rock guy. He loves prog metal and all of that, but one of his favorite bands is Queen. And so we would listen to these Queen songs and he would break down the harmonic structure of these insane vocals, like almost orchestral vocals, like in Queen. And I started jamming [to] a lot of Queen and because harmony has always been really important to me, I mean as a singer, but also just my ear, I&#8217;m always craving just like more stacks, more harmonies, you know what I mean? So listening to Queen was really, really inspiring to me. And then bringing that inspiration of those kind of orchestral harmonies into a prog metal space with <i><copingmechanism><\/copingmechanism><\/i> was a really interesting sound for me.\n          <\/p>\n<div class=\"\" style=\"padding-bottom: 20px; margin-top: 20px; text-align: left;\">\n<\/div>\n<p>\n            After that, I was so interested by that harmonic structure and how that works that I did a course online. I actually took a college course on functional harmony before I started recording <i>Empathogen<\/i>. And I don&#8217;t work like, I&#8217;m not like throwing out chord names and, you know what I mean, saying all that stuff. I don&#8217;t really work like that. But just having that in my space, and that being an everyday practice for me, I feel really went into the making of <i>Empathogen<\/i> in a deep way. And it&#8217;s so interesting, I love that it shows, that you can hear it, you know what I mean?\n          <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<style>\n<\/style>\n<div id=\"content_block-282926\" class=\"content_block paragraph embed triple_gutter_right triple_gutter_left center_align\">\n<div class=\"content_inner_wrapper\">\n<div class=\"media_wrapper\">\n<div class=\"\">\n    <iframe data-testid=\"embed-iframe\" style=\"border-radius:12px\" src=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/embed\/album\/6x9IdAz7Br6NnlK7BBJubL?utm_source=generator\" width=\"100%\" height=\"352\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"\" allow=\"autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; fullscreen; picture-in-picture\" loading=\"lazy\"><\/iframe>\n<\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<style>\n<\/style>\n<div id=\"content_block-282927\" class=\"content_block paragraph embed triple_gutter_right triple_gutter_left center_align\">\n<div class=\"content_inner_wrapper\">\n<div class=\"media_wrapper\">\n<div class=\"\">\n    <iframe allow=\"autoplay *; encrypted-media *;\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"450\" style=\"width:100%;max-width:660px;overflow:hidden;background:transparent;\" sandbox=\"allow-forms allow-popups allow-same-origin allow-scripts allow-storage-access-by-user-activation allow-top-navigation-by-user-activation\" src=\"https:\/\/embed.music.apple.com\/us\/album\/the-thread\/6769524450\"><\/iframe>\n<\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<style>\n<\/style>\n<div id=\"content_block-282918\" class=\"content_block paragraph text triple_gutter_right triple_gutter_left center_align\">\n<div class=\"content_inner_wrapper\">\n<div class=\"paragraph_wrapper center_align\">\n<p>\n            <b>I want to talk about this idea of practice, because you&#8217;ve brought it up, I read your <i>New York Times<\/i> piece today that came out. You had this really great line that I think a lot of people who aren&#8217;t musicians can take some wisdom from, but just the value of practice. You said something like, \u201cI learned recently that the only thing that I need to do is practice and work on my instrument.&#8221;<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            Yes!\n          <\/p>\n<div class=\"\" style=\"padding-bottom: 20px; margin-top: 20px; text-align: left;\">\n<\/div>\n<p>\n            <b>What does your music practice look like on a daily basis?<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            Because my mind works so musically oriented, like you, it&#8217;s really great to be able to sit down and do scales, and there have been moments in my life where I have done that, and I&#8217;m going to have to do it again and again! But right now in particular, I&#8217;m more zeroing in on specific songs, like listening to Ella Fitzgerald songs, or transcribing her scat solos, or listening to some Wes Montgomery guitar lines and trying to learn that. Right now it&#8217;s me zeroing in on specific artists, or Tigran Hamasyan. My drummer just put me on to Tigran Hamasyan the other day.\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>I have no idea who that is.<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            He calls it punk jazz, that&#8217;s what Tigran calls it. And it is punk jazz. It&#8217;s really out-there music with a lot of complexity and harmonic dissonance. But I&#8217;ve been jamming that, and even listening to Mei&#8217;s music and analyzing her shit and learning those lines, that&#8217;s been my main thing recently.\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>What is your primary instrument that you&#8217;re playing? Still guitar?<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            I would say that my voice is my primary instrument. And I was just talking the other day, I was like, I&#8217;ve had the same vocal coach since I was eight years old. There are times where we\u2019re really working, like if I have a big tour to go on, or if there&#8217;s something specific I&#8217;m trying to learn how to do with my voice. But I was like, &#8220;Damn, I need to hit up&#8230;&#8221; Tim Carter, I love you, bro! I was like, &#8220;I need to hit up Tim and and do some more lessons,&#8221; because like, it&#8217;s been a minute. I never want to get on the slack vibe. I always want to be keeping my technique good. But I&#8217;ve been focusing on other instruments so much that I\u2026 I\u2019ve been singing and I&#8217;ve been learning the shit, but when you really tap in with your voca, it&#8217;s different.\n          <\/p>\n<div class=\"\" style=\"padding-bottom: 20px; margin-top: 20px; text-align: left;\">\n<\/div>\n<p>\n            <b>What other instruments are you playing. Drums, bass?<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            So, guitar, drums, bass, piano.\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>Any instruments that you want to learn?<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            I wanted to learn the cello, and I spent a year and a half on the cello, and I fell off. I hate that! I hate that so much! But yeah I feel like I need to just chill and focus, because trying to spread my time across so many things, that&#8217;s the curse of wanting to do everything. It&#8217;s like, &#8220;Oh, so you&#8217;re not going to spend three hours practicing on one thing, you&#8217;re going to spend one hour practicing on this, one hour practicing on this, and one hour practicing on this,&#8221; which isn&#8217;t as potent as &#8220;I&#8217;m just going to spend all my time doing this.&#8221; I need more organization on that front, if I&#8217;m going to be honest with you.\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>I want to talk about the themes on <i>The Thread<\/i>. As I mentioned, I was at your listening party last night, and the topic came up about the desire to connect with people, which is throughout the record, but also this idea of wanting to extend empathy and compassion to the people around you. There&#8217;s this lyric in the album where you say, &#8220;Compassion is the medicine we seek,\u201d positing it as the solution to this distance we&#8217;re feeling with each other nowadays.<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            100% yeah.\n          <\/p>\n<div class=\"\" style=\"padding-bottom: 20px; margin-top: 20px; text-align: left;\">\n<\/div>\n<p>\n            <b>How do you think we got to this place where empathy and compassion feels rare?<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            This is my hot take. Okay, are you ready?\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>Let&#8217;s hear it.<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            I think that humans, we&#8217;ve strayed so far from human nature. Like, not a fan of zoos, but even at the zoo, you see every animal has a different habitat. The way that the plants are, the way that the ground is, every animal has a different thing because animals need different things, because they come from different places on Earth, and their bodies are made of specific nutrients that, you know what I mean? Every animal is specific, and humans are like that. We have needs, because we&#8217;re animals. And one of our needs is we need to feel seen, we need to feel protected on some level, and cared for on some level. And we&#8217;ve strayed so far from human nature that with my music, I&#8217;m always just trying to bring us back more toward human nature energy. We&#8217;re completely and utterly consumed by this idea of progress and expansion, but not the kind that&#8217;s beautiful and blooming, the kind that&#8217;s cancerous and weird, you know?\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>Exploitative.<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            Exploitative and violent. And that is not our nature, and there are people who benefit from us living that way, and it just turns out that we&#8217;re in a space in time where they&#8217;re the ones who are kind of on top right now, you know what I mean? But as artists, we&#8217;re always trying to steer, steer the minds and the hearts of this beautiful human animal towards our nature, which is to care for one another and create systems of mutual aid and creativity and community. That is really what human nature is, and sitting around the fire and telling stories and singing and, and hitting the drum, you know what I mean?\n          <\/p>\n<div class=\"\" style=\"padding-bottom: 20px; margin-top: 20px; text-align: left;\">\n<\/div>\n<p>\n            <b>Does that feel like one of the biggest callings for you, creatively, as an artist? A responsibility to steer people toward these innate needs?<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            Yeah, 100%, because an animal doesn&#8217;t lash out with aberrated behavior if all of its resources are taken care of. An animal doesn&#8217;t do weird shit if their environment is what they need it to be. If their environment is not what they need it to be, now, things start going on and some darker turns might take place because the animal is trying to survive. And humans are just in a really precarious position right now where our resources are not getting taken care of, and a lot of people are suffering, and that&#8217;s pushing us into a direction where we need to be reminded more and more of who we are.\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>I would love to hear your thoughts on the role <a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/technology\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"4\" title=\"Technology\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">technology<\/a> plays in this, cause I see, even while you&#8217;re speaking about, you know, nature and the organic world, the complete flip of that is tech, which is where we&#8217;re headed right now, and the embrace of, not even just AI, but <a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/social-mediaa\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"1\" title=\"Social Media\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">social media<\/a>.<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            Yeah. We&#8217;re going to have to get really disciplined with the way we use our time, because these things are happening. Like, it&#8217;s not like they&#8217;re coming. Like, they&#8217;re here. So now the only question is, <i>who are we going to be in that environment?<\/i>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            That&#8217;s what we really need to be focusing on, and we need discipline not to let these crazy forces that are, where we&#8217;re living amongst, just rip us off of our path and completely fling us into cosmic space. This might be a another hot take, but obviously issues and unethical things lie in the technology itself, but I would even take it further as to say it by itself is not necessarily the problem, it&#8217;s the way that humans use it, and the way that we delegate it out to who gets to use it, in what ways and how intense that usage is, and what the resources of that usage are. Where is that taking away from, in turn, for these people to use it? I think that&#8217;s what we really need to be thinking about.\n          <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"content_block paragraph triple_gutter_right triple_gutter_left\">\n<div class=\"content_inner_wrapper\">\n<div class=\"\" style=\"padding-bottom: 20px; margin-top: 20px; text-align: left;\">\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<style>\n<p> #content_block-282929,  #content_block-282929 blockquote.pull_quote, #content_block-282929 .img_caption .caption {\n   color: #ffcc00;\n }\n<\/style>\n<div id=\"content_block-282929\" class=\"content_block breaker triple_gutter_right triple_gutter_left pull_quote\">\n<div class=\"media_wrapper\">\n<blockquote class=\"pull_quote\"><p>Miles Davis said, \u201cA motherfucker got to look like he play.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<style>\n<\/style>\n<div id=\"content_block-282928\" class=\"content_block paragraph text triple_gutter_right triple_gutter_left center_align\">\n<div class=\"content_inner_wrapper\">\n<div class=\"paragraph_wrapper center_align\">\n<p>\n            <b>Do you think there&#8217;s a sustainable way?<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            I think there is a sustainable way, I just think there&#8217;s not a lot of energy being put into that conversation of trying to figure out like, \u201cOkay, all of this is going on and it&#8217;s terrible and it&#8217;s bad and we don&#8217;t like it. Okay, great, but let&#8217;s go into proactivity mode.\u201d Where it&#8217;s like, \u201cOkay, we have these resources and they&#8217;re being used in not a good way. How can we use our brains to try to come up with our weird, smart ideas of how to combat that?\u201d Because it&#8217;s also all about knowledge as well. I&#8217;m not a coder. I&#8217;m not sitting here figuring out how to code stuff, but if I did, maybe I could figure out a more sustainable way to do this.\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>With your determination, I feel like you would.<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            Bro! I&#8217;m sticking to trying to steer us towards human nature in the music. I can&#8217;t be coding now! I&#8217;m like, &#8220;Bro, I cracked the code, literally!&#8221;\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>Do you have hope? How hopeful are you these days?<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<div class=\"\" style=\"padding-bottom: 20px; margin-top: 20px; text-align: left;\">\n<\/div>\n<p>\n            I think about it like this, right? When we were back in the day, like back, back in the day, like before culture even existed and we were just out there with the elements trying to survive and keep ourselves together. We were probably like, &#8220;Oh my goodness, tomorrow is not promised. This is really scary. I don&#8217;t know if I have hope.&#8221; There&#8217;s no iPhones in the scenario. There&#8217;s no political overlords! In this scenario, all there is is humans and the natural world, and we&#8217;re still in that position of feeling like maybe not have a lot of hope, as well, you know what I mean? So I don&#8217;t think that hope is the thing to have.\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            I think the thing to have is a sense of pinpointed awareness of, what do we want to be doing with our moments? Because thinking about, &#8220;Oh, do I have hope for the whole thing?&#8221; I don&#8217;t think that&#8217;s the right question to be asking. I think the right question to be asking that we can use is, how in every single moment am I creating an environment that is accepting and loving and is more geared towards human nature? Sometimes that&#8217;s really hard, &#8217;cause sometimes some weird shit is going out there in the world and it&#8217;s like, &#8220;Am I going to say something about this? Am I going to stand up and try to steer this moment towards human nature?&#8221; You know what I mean? Really courageous people do that. Greta Thunberg is doing that. You know what I mean? There are people who are doing that with their lives, and we just should be thinking about, what&#8217;s our way in our moments that we want to be steering our environments towards human nature?\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>I want to end on a more positive note.<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            Yeah, let&#8217;s do it, I love it.\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>Given the record and where you are, it feels like you&#8217;re just on this path of growth and progress, and there&#8217;s so much determination in you wanting to forward your abilities and skills. What is your vision of your artistry in like five years? What are you developing? What are you hoping to develop?<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            My goal is to develop my spiritual and creative reflection of the human experience to be so potent and at such a high level equal to my technical ability. I want when people listen to my music or they come to my show, I want it to feel like they&#8217;re literally being healed from the inside out, like it&#8217;s a spiritual, shamanic experience.\n          <\/p>\n<div class=\"\" style=\"padding-bottom: 20px; margin-top: 20px; text-align: left;\">\n<\/div>\n<p>\n            I went to go see Esperanza Spalding, actually in New York not too long ago, and multiple times breaking down in tears, watching her channel&#8230; Like, not only is she channeling, but it&#8217;s also the sense of practiced, her abilities are just insane. The way that she&#8217;s singing in odd time, playing a different odd time in a polyrhythm, I&#8217;m just washed over by this sense of complete freedom with the sharpest efficiency, and it&#8217;s just magic. It truly is magic. It almost reminds me of what I could imagine ancient Greek people used to feel like in the old Olympics. You know what I mean?\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>Just someone at their peak.<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            Yeah, like ancient Greeks are just at the edge of their seat like, &#8220;This is what humanity can do!&#8221; That&#8217;s how I feel when I look at my favorite musicians, and it&#8217;s not only about the physical feat. It&#8217;s a spiritual thing. And that&#8217;s a lifetime practice, you know, so I&#8217;m going to be doing this until I&#8217;m no longer, hopefully.\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>That&#8217;s amazing. That&#8217;s a great practice to dedicate yourself to.<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            Hopefully, thank you.\n          <\/p>\n<p>\n            <b>Thank you so much, Willow. Thank you so much for coming. That was a great conversation.<\/b>\n          <\/p>\n<div class=\"\" style=\"padding-bottom: 20px; margin-top: 20px; text-align: left;\">\n<\/div>\n<p>\n            I had a great time.\n          <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<style>\n<\/style>\n<div id=\"content_block-282923\" class=\"content_block paragraph text triple_gutter_right triple_gutter_left center_align\">\n<div class=\"content_inner_wrapper\">\n<div class=\"paragraph_wrapper center_align\">\n<hr><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<style>\n<\/style>\n<div id=\"content_block-282922\" class=\"content_block paragraph text triple_gutter_right triple_gutter_left center_align\">\n<div class=\"content_inner_wrapper\">\n<div class=\"paragraph_wrapper center_align\">\n<p>\n            <b>Credits:<\/b><br \/>Executive Producer: Jon Cohen, Anthony Holland<br \/>Creative Director: Nadine Ng<br \/>Director of Photography: Ethan Holland<br \/>2nd Camera: Tommy Maidment<br \/>Editor: Quinton Dominguez<br \/>Lighting Tech: Jesse Zhou<br \/>Sound Mixer: Alexander Zooi<br \/>Score: Luisa Bryan<br \/>Talent: Willow<br \/>Interviewer: Steffanee Wang<br \/>Special Thanks: Eloy Lugo\n          <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"content_block paragraph triple_gutter_right triple_gutter_left\">\n<div class=\"content_inner_wrapper\">\n<div class=\"\" style=\"padding-bottom: 20px; margin-top: 20px; text-align: left;\">\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><\/p>\n<div class=\"author\">\n    <span><br \/>\n      By <span class=\"credit_name\">Steffanee Wang<\/span><br \/>\n  <\/span><\/div>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<blockquote><p><strong><span style=\"color: #ff6600;\">If you liked the article, do not forget to share it with your friends. Follow us on\u00a0<span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"><a style=\"color: #ff0000;\" href=\"https:\/\/news.google.com\/publications\/CAAqBwgKMN63nwsw68G3Aw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\">Google News<\/a><\/span>\u00a0too, click on the star and choose us from your favorites.<\/span><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<blockquote>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>If you want to read more Like this articles, you can visit our <span style=\"color: #ff9900;\"><a style=\"color: #ff9900;\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/social-mediaa\/\" target=\"_blank\" >Social Media category.<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"color: black;\"><a style=\"color: #ff9900;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thefader.com\/2026\/07\/30\/willow-the-thread-interview\" target=\"_blank\" >Source<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>WILLOW\u2019s lifelong practice A conversation with the artist about music, tech, and the value of practice. By Steffanee Wang Video Ethan Holland, Tommy Maidment &#8220;When people listen to my music or they come to my show, I want it to feel like they&#8217;re literally being healed from the inside out, like it&#8217;s a spiritual, shamanic&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":741888,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefader-res.cloudinary.com\/private_images\/c_limit,w_1024\/c_crop,h_501,w_962,x_0,y_1,f_auto,q_auto:eco\/willow-still-2_vnzdr0\/willow-still-2_vnzdr0.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[28101,87515,71136,32342],"class_list":["post-741887","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-social-mediaa","tag-pop","tag-experimental","tag-jazz","tag-willow"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/741887","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=741887"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/741887\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/741888"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=741887"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=741887"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=741887"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}