Interview: Grammy-nominated songwriter Toby Gad talks re-imagining his greatest hits, telling Madonna to 'f*** off', and passing the torch to new talent
Toby Gad has offered an unfiltered, fly-on-the-wall account of working with music's biggest stars.
Toby Gad, the Grammy-nominated songwriter and producer behind hits by John Legend ('All of Me'), Beyonce ('If I Were A Boy') and Fergie ('Big Girls Don't Cry'), has re-imagined the greatest hits of his career with rising stars, and some familiar faces (Keke Palmer, Aloe Blacc and Victoria Justice) on the LP 'PIANO DIARIES - THE HITS', the deluxe edition of which is out now.
The extended collection features an exceptionally talented group of underground singers, such as Jerub, Elijah Blake, Justin Jesso, Antonique Smith, Shuba, Mae Mae, Alex Kinsey, and Casey Abrams.
Here, the lyrical genius - who has also co-written and produced tracks for the likes of Miley Cyrus, One Direction, and Selena Gomez, to name a few - gives Contact Music a fly-on-the-wall insight into working with some of music's biggest stars, including the intense five weeks he spent with Madonna working on her 2015 LP 'Rebel Heart' that saw him tell her to "f*** off".
Gad spilled he's still in touch with The Queen of Pop to this day and got her seal of approval of the new version of 'Living For Love', featuring the exceptionally gifted singer JERUB, and explained why it was important to "pass the torch to new talent".
The pianist further shared insights into Miley Cyrus' worth ethic from an early age, having worked with the 'Flowers' hitmaker in her Hannah Montana era, and recalled the moving story of Demi Lovato recording 'Skyscraper' through tears before entering rehab.
Hi Toby. Where did the idea to re-imagine your greatest hits come from?
It actually started two years ago I was a judge on German Idol. All the contestants wanted to sing my songs and wanted to hear the stories of how these songs were written. And then I thought, why not pass the torch to new talent and re-record these songs. Some of them, like Fergie's Big Girls Don't Cry are 20 years old already. All of Me is more than 10 years old. So I felt it is time to pass the torch to new talent and re-record them. And so we set out to find artists who were interested and who are good to re-imagine these songs, and I was always looking for opposites.
How did it feel revisiting your hits after so many years?
You know, for most of my career, I would be in the studio and write song after song after song, sometimes two songs a day, sometimes three sessions a day. It was mad the time, and at that time, I would write a song and then say goodbye at the end of the day to the song. And then years later, some record labels would release them or not, and some of them might become hits or not, but they were out of my life, the songs. And now I'm looking back, and I say, 'Oh, these are actually songs that are my songs, as much as they are John Legend, Beyonce and Madonna's songs.' So I'm rediscovering that these are actually my babies too, and I have such a great time bonding with my babies again and performing them on stage.
Nottingham singer JERUB features on the new version of Madonna's 'Living For Love'. Has The Queen of Pop given the track her seal of approval?
I sent it to Madonna, and she emailed back, what a fantastic voice, and she loved it, and was really into it. Most of these songs, I shared them with the original artists as well.
X Factor winner Louisa Johnson is on Jessie J's 'Who You Are'.
I love Louisa. She's the youngest X Factor winner in the UK, and she's a dear friend, and we've performed quite a bit together now. We also just recorded a Christmas song for end of the year. She's a wonderful artist.
You must be so proud of Keke Palmer, Selena Gomez, and Victoria Justice and how far they have come, having worked with them all when they were child stars?
Miley was 14 years old, she was so funny and so entertaining. Same with Selena Gomez, Victoria Justice, Keke Palmer, and Selena Gomez was also so sweet. Miley was incredible. I worked with her on several of the Hannah Montana albums, I think three of the albums, we did a number of songs together, and already at that age, they were unstoppable. And you would think child stars at the time were kind of pushed into this, but it was the reverse. Miley would just dictate her parents and dominate everyone and say, 'No, I want to work. I want to do this. I want us to sing longer.'
You worked with One Direction.
Yes, they all came to my studio. We did several songs together, Truly, Madly, Deeply, is my favourites of what we released together. And the boys, they came to my studio, house in LA. They all took their shirts off and jumped in the swimming pool.
That was such a crazy time for them at the height of their fame?
Yes. They've come a long way. They're amazing. They're all so talented. I mean, kudos to Simon Cowell.
You worked with Simon on The X Factor. What was that like?
I worked on The X Factor, season two and season three, on the music production. And I recently had a phone call with Simon again, because I circled back after I was a judge, and I showed him my work as a judge on German Idol and he actually likes it. And I would love to be a judge on one of his next shows. It's such an experience to be a judge.
Tell us about working with Madonna on Rebel Heart?
She's a hard worker. She stays in the studio until late. Diplo was the first to leave, which really upset her at the time. Yeah, she came in around 3pm and worked, worked, worked, and then around 6pm or so, her kids came in and made a big mess out of the studio, and in every corner started making noises and sounds like for an hour, it was chaos. And then the kids would leave again, and then she would stay until maybe 10/11pm, and very dedicated, really hard worker, and that's why she is where she is today. I have so much respect for her.
When you first meet her, there are these rumours that if you do anything wrong, if she doesn't like you or so, then she will go to the bathroom, and then her manager will come back and hand you your flight ticket and say you've got five minutes to clear the room because she doesn't want to see you anymore. So we were all scared the first day or so, but then after we wrote two or three songs, it became time to record these songs, and I was at the mixing desk, she was in the vocal booth. And usually when I record, I'm very much into great, authentic vocal performances that emote a lot and have texture and make you feel something. And as much as Madonna is one of the best performers the world has ever seen, I felt vocally we could maybe get a little further with it pushing her. And I said, maybe you can do it again. Maybe you can put more feeling into it and sing it again and sing it to someone you love. And then she was like, 'F*** you Toby, I'm not singing this again'. And I was like, 'F*** you. You will sing this now.'
And from that moment on, I mean, there was silence in the room, and we were just waiting for her to go to the bathroom, but that didn't happen. And for some reason, that was a real icebreaker. From that point, we were just like siblings trying to make the best art together.
Have you had any strange requests in the studio?
There are some singers who come in and they can only sing if there is Auto Tune. I'm always against that. For me, it needs to be a raw, heartfelt, authentic performance that is real, that can make you cry, like when we recorded Skyscraper with Demi Lovato, for instance, she was a mess when she came in and just in tears when she sang it, and we all cried because it was so emotional. And then after she did that performance, she went to a rehabilitation place for three weeks, and when she came back, she said, 'Toby, I'm good now. I'm cured. I'm happy. I want to re-sing the song'. So we spent another day recording it, and I spent two days editing that vocal. And after that, we trashed that vocal because it had no emotion, like really, the messy performance, the raw performance, that's the performance that you hear, and that's the performance that gets under your skin, and that really connects with the words and feels real.
Do you have concerns about the rise in the use of AI in songwriting?
There is the type of AI that will make the computer smarter and help us to be more creative. That's the AI I love. And then there's the type of AI that tries to outdo us and write songs better than us and create art better than us and do everything better than us. I don't like that AI. I don't think it's good for us. I think it's not going to be good for civilisation as a general, and it's coming everywhere, and I don't know. I don't like computer written songs and computer-generated art that competes with ours. I think we should preserve the human artistic expression.
Who is left on your bucket list to work with?
It has changed so much. I used to always look up to the mega stars. Now I want to work with artists who want to perform with me. Whoever wants to be on stage with me and has a voice that is memorable and authentic and incredible and blows me away. These are the people I want to work with.
Finally, you have an exciting podcast, Songs You Know. What guests are coming up?
Jessie J. We had a long conversation that we filmed that's gonna come out in a month. And we just talked about the time when we wrote Who You are. It was based on when she came to LA for the first time, and was worried that LA was gonna be this fake place, and she tattooed, 'Don't lose yourself in the blur of the stars', and fittingly, in the blur of the stars in Hollywood, don't lose yourself like be true to who you are. When she explained that to me, I knew there was a song in it, and we wrote that song fairly quickly, just about her feelings of being true to herself. She is such a genuine artist, and also seeing her on the podcast, I don't know how many years, like 15 years later, is full circle.
Stream 'PIANO DIARIES - THE HITS' now on all major platforms.
