Super Monster

Editors’ Notes “When I listen to it, it’s sort of a reminder that I am lovable,” Claud tells Apple Music of their sparkling debut LP, the first release on Phoebe Bridgers’ Saddest Factory label. “I deserve to feel love. Sometimes people forget that they're capable of giving and receiving it.” Deeply melodic and deeply felt, Super Monster is a set of genre-agnostic bedroom pop that surveys the entire spectrum of romantic feeling. “I wrote this record to be very visible, in the sense that I am a multifaceted human being and my story is not shown in coming-of-age movies or these huge shows that are always about straight cis couples,” the Brooklyn singer-songwriter says. “I'll write music for the rest of my life, but I don't have to put it out. The only reason why I want to put it out is because there's so little representation of queer and trans and nonbinary people falling in love and having well-rounded lives that don't just revolve around the hardships of being queer.” Here, they guide us through the album track by track.

Overnight
“I liked the idea of a warning as a first song. Like, ‘Here's a heads-up: A lot of these songs are love songs, and I tend to jump into things.’ It's about any time that I felt I was falling in love or starting something new.”

Gold
“I was really angry when I wrote this song. I felt super betrayed, not just by one person, but by a series of things that had happened. It’s almost recognizing and sort of breaking the news to myself that this person was not there for you when you needed them, or these people were not there for you when you need them. Sometimes I just need to get the anger out and then I can move on.”

Soft Spot
“I was at a party and I was thinking a lot about one specific person, and everywhere I looked, it felt like I was seeing them. But it wasn't them, and anytime somebody brought them up it felt I got all mushy and soft and I would blush. I approached the song as ‘This is sad and this sucks.’ But one thing that I came to terms with as the song was developing was that maybe it doesn’t suck—maybe it's nice to be able to just smile whenever you want because you can think of somebody.”

In or In-Between
“I'm so bad at reading social cues, and I never believe that somebody is into me, just because I feel like I'm conditioned to assume that they're not. It's a song about unachievable or unrequited love. Feeling like you're never going to know what this person is thinking, you're never going to know if they actually are into you the way that you're into them.”

Cuff Your Jeans
“I had a dream where I was trying to get on a train to go see a friend and the train kept getting delayed or the train wasn't showing up or my ticket would blow away in the wind. It felt like I would never be able to see this person again. Which was a real feeling that I was feeling in real life—like, what if I never get to see this person again? What if, by the time I see them again, they've moved on or something?”

Ana (feat. Nick Hakim)
“I was at a point in my writing where I was getting sort of sick of writing about my own life. So I imagined myself as this 40-year-old man who decides that he needs to leave his wife to go find himself. The whole story is like a letter to his wife, who I named Ana. I think I was trying to say that if you really love somebody then you will work on yourself. Because if you love somebody then you know that they deserve the best.”

Guard Down
“When I get in a nervous situation or when I get protective of myself or my feelings, there's a voice in my head that says, ‘Don’t let your guard down, don't make yourself vulnerable.’ And this song is about that feeling, and confessing, ‘Holy shit, I’m going to be an adult in a few months. I'm going to be turning 21, and what do I have figured out? And what do I not have figured out? And I've been spending all this time alone—is isolating myself really helping me? Or is it just making it worse?’”

This Town
“I grew up in a suburb of Chicago, and it felt like a small town because generations of the same families stay there. I think for the longest time I really wanted to leave, and I did it, and that was the best feeling ever. But this song isn’t talking about any town in particular—it’s more alluding to the fact that I want to run away from a problem, and right now.”

Jordan
“Growing up, my grandparents lived in the same town as I did and I lived in their house a few different times throughout my childhood. But the house behind theirs was Michael Jordan's, and it had 23 on the gate. My grandpa and I used to always walk the dog past and he’d always point out the gate because he thought it was so cool, but Michael Jordan was never there—the house always seemed empty. I think it turned into some type of love song, not for Michael Jordan, but for someone else. I don't want any headlines being like, ‘Claud writes a love song for Michael Jordan.’ It's just not true.”

That’s Mr. Bitch to You (feat. Melanie Faye)
“Somebody called me a bitch, and I was so offended that I responded, ‘That's Mr. Bitch to you.’ And then my friend overheard the conversation and he just jumped in to say, ‘Hi, sorry to interrupt this argument, but Claud, did you write that down? That's a really great song title.’ I just feel like one of the most offensive words that a man could call somebody who's essentially not a man is a bitch. So the song sort of turned into a fuck-the-patriarchy-type song.”

Pepsi
“That’s Melanie Faye playing that guitar solo—she’s so fucking good. It's so crazy. She actually sent me 37 takes of the guitar solo and I had to piece it together. I don't know what I'm going to do when I play that song live, because nobody's going to ever be able to replicate that solo.”

Rocks at Your Window
“Maybe it was [John Cusack] with the boombox standing at somebody's window like, ‘I love you, come down here.’ I was thinking about that and how big and beautiful a romantic gesture that is, but also how annoying and invasive it is as well. It's like, 'Okay, get out of here. You're embarrassing me.’ I've never actually thrown rocks at anybody's window, but I am the type of person to do that.”

Falling With the Rain (feat. Shelly)
“My mom was really sick last year. I found out that she had to get a big surgery, and it really scared me and I was just really, really, really sad. I was going through a really dark period. I wanted it to conclude the record because I like that sentiment: I’m feeling down right now, but I'm going to bounce back.”