You're listening to Song Exploder, where musicians take apart their songs, and piece by piece tell the story of how they were made.

I'm Rishi Kesh Hirwe.

This episode contains explicit language.

Gracie Abrams is a singer and songwriter from Los Angeles. She started putting out music in 2020, and in June 2024, she put out her second album, The Secret of Us.

She was nominated for a Grammy for Best New Artist, and this year she's up for another Grammy for best duo performance for her collaboration with Taylor Swift.

But for this episode, I talked to Gracie about her song, I Love You, I'm Sorry. It was produced by Aaron Dessner at Long Pond Studio in upstate New York, and it was co-written with Audrey Hobert.

Coming up, you'll hear the isolated tracks from the studio recording, but you also get to hear a lot of the voice memos that Gracie recorded during the writing process.

I think it's so nice to have these raw moments documented, because as you'll hear,

they give you an insight not just into the song, but into the relationship that Gracie and her co-writer

Audrey have as friends. That's just the way life goes. I like to slam. Doors closed. Trust me, I know it's always about me.

I love you. I'm sorry.

Okay, I'm recording on my side.

We're recording as well.

Great. Ready?

I'm a very open book, so I'm ready to get into all of it.

Let's start at the beginning.

Do you happen to remember the exact moment when the idea for the song first came to you?

Oh yeah.

I had just made a plan to hang and talk with my ex-boyfriend who I used to write lots of songs about.

And at this point, was he already your ex?

Yeah, it had been like two years, like having never run into each other, you know, no real

communication. I had just felt so much, not even residual love, but just like real love for

...