Niall: The way I kind of look at it is - and I've been kinda saying it to the label, like, just say if I disappear for a year and go write an album and the label's wanting you to bring something out in 3 or 4 months' time, if they come back and the music is good, then the time that I went missing for is nonexistent. You know like Adele. Adele will go missing for three years, she'll come back [sings] "Hello..." on the X Factor. I'm not saying we're all Adele, but the ideology behind it is that if the music's good enough when you come back, then all that time is nonexistent.
George Ezra: But you've said a few things that are really important- you need to live and have life experiences to write, and you need to love what you're releasing. And those two things married, it means that if it does take two years instead of one, that's fine.
NH: Exactly. And love what you're releasing is a big one. If you're gonna spend a year on it, you have to love it, you know? There's no point in releasing stuff that you just kinda half-assed and half like.
GE: Also, it's the recording it and then you're the poor guy has to sing 'em each night, so if you don't like them...that's what I think- I'm SCREWED if I don't like this stuff because I have to get up and sing it each night.
NH: Yeah, even at the end of the tour there, I was saying it to the crowd - I played my last show in West Palm Beach in Florida - and I was saying to them, I've played...I think it was like 82 shows or something this year? And I said to them, I have not gotten bored of singing any of these songs at any point, which is a good feeling. And if you can do that after eighty-something shows, that means you're happy with what you wrote and released. So for me, that's the agenda for the next time around. To be able to do two albums on tour and enjoy it. Cause for me, when I'm writing songs, I'm writing, picturing myself standing in front of a mic, wedges in front, thousands of people in front of me.
- Niall | George Ezra & Friends Podcast
