CNN
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Meghan Trainor sat down with CNN to discuss life after “All About That Bass,” her new album and the importance of self-love.
The American singer-songwriter joined CNN’s “Who’s Talking To Chris Wallace?” this week to discuss her fifth studio album, “Takin’ It Back,” which was released on Friday.
The album is full of upbeat pop songs like “Made You Look.” But throughout the album, Trainor also touches on difficult topics, like her shifting relationship with her body and self-esteem after becoming a mother.
“I noticed the first few songs were kind of heartbreaking. They were sad at first,” she said. “And I was like, no, I’m happier than I’ve ever been. Why am I sad?”
“Remind Me,” the 15th track on the album, started as a meditation on how “it’s really hard being covered in scars,” said Trainor. The musician welcomed the birth of her first child via Caesarean section in February 2021.
“And it’s me singing to my husband, because he tells me all the time, I’m pretty and I’m like, I feel like with the stretch marks and the C-section, I feel like I’ve been ripped apart. And it took me a while to like myself again and to be able to look at my body after all that scarring,” she said.
The album also touches on “mom guilt” and the difference between social media and reality, like in the song “Don’t I Make It Look Easy.”
“My first songs were like about being a mom and about like, don’t I make this look easy,” Trainor said. “I’m exhausted. And I’m a working mom and I have mom guilt. And I tried to make them relatable and put them in every song.”
Trainor has historically been a “melody queen,” starting each song with a melody, she says. But on this album, she focused more on the lyrics and message behind each tune.
“I would sit on my piano a lot before the songwriting session, I would do homework, and I would have an idea,” she said. “And, luckily, it worked every single time, but I was like, I’ll do a chorus and then I’ll let the songwriters come in and we’ll craft.”
Self-love is a recurring theme throughout the 16 songs on the album.
“It’s the hardest thing, and that’s why I write all these self love songs because I’m like, believe in yourself,” she said. “You’re amazing.”
