JP Saxe says “If the World Was Ending” speaks to the desire to “put love before everything else”
AristaCanadian artist JP Saxe and hitmaking singer/songwriter Julia Michaels have a hit with their duet “If the World Was Ending,” which isn’t about COVID-19, but feels like it could be. It was the first song they’d ever written together, and n…
By ABC Audio on June 15, 2020
AristaCanadian artist JP Saxe and hitmaking singer/songwriter Julia Michaels have a hit with their duet “If the World Was Ending,” which isn’t about COVID-19, but feels like it could be. It was the first song they’d ever written together, and not only did they immediately click musically, they also ended up falling in love.
“I think we both just had a lot of mutual respect for each other’s craft. And I think we both really just wanted to impress each other,” Julia tells ABC Audio about why she thinks she and JP connected so well.
“I mean, that’s crazy for her to say,” laughs JP. “Because I walked into that session like, ‘I’m about to write with my favorite songwriter in the world. I better bring my [“A”] game!'”
During the session, JP only had one line of the song — “If the world was ending, you’d come over, right?” — but Julia picked up on it quickly.
“Very shortly after hearing [the line], she [sang], ‘You’d come over and you’d stay the night,'” he recalls. “And then we talked a little more about the idea, and I will never forget her singing…the last line of the chorus: ‘There wouldn’t be a reason why/we would even have to say goodbye.’
“I got chills in my whole body,” JP remembers. “Like, ‘Oh, my God, it’s so dark and so romantic. And I love it so much.'”
JP explains why the song, originally released in October, speaks to our present moment.
“I mean, when we wrote the song, we had no idea anything like this was going to happen,” he says. “But I think the song speaks to the part of you that wants to put love before everything else. And I think we are living in that kinda time.”
By Andrea Dresdale
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