Gracie Abrams’ The Secret Of Us was one of 2024’s biggest albums and there’s more where that came from: Abrams has been back in the studio with the album’s co-producer, Aaron Dessner.

A new Billboard cover story reveals of a recent studio session with Dessner, “Abrams says they went in hoping to nail just one particular song, but emerged 12 hours later having worked on ‘a bunch’ of tracks for the next project, which comes together in her head more and more with each scattered studio session.” Abrams herself also said, “Aaron and I are catching each other in these little pockets between hectic times. Every day that I live with the music, things start to become a little clearer. There’s something we’re starting to crack that is making both of us feel energized.”

Benny Blanco also offered some laudatory words about Abrams: “What’s so cool about her music is that she really tells it how it is, whether it makes her look great or not so great. […] She makes these songs that are huge in stadiums now, yet they also still feel like she’s whispering them into your ear in your bedroom at three in the morning. […] She’s just a force to be reckoned with.”

Abrams also spoke about performing in stadiums while opening for Taylor Swift on The Eras Tour, saying, “I think having had the privilege of opening for Taylor in the stadiums that we played, to now have a visual reference and a real sense of what it feels like to be on a stage in that environment… It’s something that I miss and desperately hope to earn over time.”

Read the full feature here.