Disco Sweat (album)

## **Disco Sweat***Unreleased album*

**Disco Sweat** was the first iteration of Carly Rae Jepsen's fourth studio album, which would later go onto become Dedicated (2019).

Work on the album commenced between 2015 and 2016, though it was ultimately scrapped and largely repurposed into songs for Dedicated.

## **Track listing**

#### **Draft track listing**

*§ Draft track listing shared by insiders*

## **Background**

Disco Sweat was originally conceived by Jepsen as early as October 2015, during a "really prolific" writing phase she was going through after the release of Emotion. The project was envisioned as an "understated; dreamy, sexy disco" type of sound, inspired by the likes of ABBA, the Bee Gees, Feist, and Donna Summer. At the time, the project was still in its early writing stages whilst Jepsen was on tour.

Jepsen expressed she was very eager to work on new music and cited a stroke of inspiration that wasn't apparent when development of her previous album began; which took roughly three years to produce. Because of this, she hoped to release new music by the end of 2017.

## **Writing and development**

#### **Early development with Dev Hynes**

Early in development, in June 2016, Jepsen worked with musician Dev Hynes to record and produce the original demos she had written on tour in the studio. Jepsen states that, whilst on tour, she had written a total of seventeen "little demos" with Tavish Crowe and Jared Manierka. With Dev Hynes, it's likely Jepsen recorded the tracks Disco Sweat and No You, as well as the original versions of This Is What They Say and Julien.

#### **Development in Sweden**

Towards the end of June 2016, Jepsen took a trip to Sweden to work on new material for the project.  She states, at the time, she was eager to meet Swedish songwriter and producer Patrik Berger, being a fan of his work on Robyn's 2010 song Dancing On My Own.
 At this point in development, Jepsen states she had written an extended-play's worth of music for the project and had been working on recording the additional demos she had written on tour. Whilst in Sweden, Jepsen worked with Emotion collaborators Mattman and Robin, Shellback, and Rami Yacoub, developing seven or eight new song ideas whilst there.

Whilst working on the project with Jepsen, Berger felt that the disco influence was too constraining. He advised her to "open the doors to everything", to which she says this was "mind blowing for her" at the time and agreed, saying "it’s one thing to have intention but it’s another thing to be so narrow when you’re in a creative space that you can’t let the magic come to you." Jepsen later elaborated on this by saying, "the idea of it being exclusively disco was sort of pigeonholing me because it wasn’t coming out naturally".

#### **Project scrapped and Dedicated**

After their discussion, Jepsen and Berger wrote For Sure together, alongside fellow Swedish songwriters Pontus Winnberg and Noonie Bao. In July 2016, For Sure was the first song written for Dedicated post-Disco Sweat, although the new direction of the project was still yet to be decided on. Regarding the song's relation to the original project, Jepsen commented, "I don’t know what [that song] is, but it's not disco, it's a mamba or something".  It was also around this time that Party For One and Fake Mona Lisa were written.

In August 2016, Jepsen discussed the disco influence for her next project and stated she was instead "allowing [herself] the freedom to not be totally committed [to just one sound]".  Later in August, Jepsen attended a writers camp in Maderas Village, Nicaragua, and, alongside collaborators Kyle Shearer and Nate Cyphert, would rework the original Disco Sweat demo of Julien into the version of the song that was included on Dedicated. The new version of the song would see a reworked production and sound from Shearer, and would inspire Jepsen to decide on the new direction to take the project in.

From this point on, Disco Sweat was scrapped and work commenced on what would later become Dedicated. Despite being mostly shelved, various songs from the initial Disco Sweat sessions would be further reworked for Dedicated and Dedicated Side B between 2016 and 2019, such as Julien and This Is What They Say. Ultimately, the Disco Sweat album was never released.

## **Post-Dedicated release**

Shortly before the release of Dedicated in May 2019, Jepsen briefly referenced Disco Sweat in an interview with Vice. She mentioned, "I had every intention when I set out on making *Dedicated* – before I even knew it was called *Dedicated* – that it was going to be this understated 'music to clean your house to' ABBA-inspired disco. I don't know where that idea got lost. There are elements of that: Julien is an example of where we started with that. But other songs from different genres, sometimes a little 90s or 80s, kept winning for me. So I just decided to let go of any mission statement and let the album be what it wanted to be."

Jepsen first officially disclosed Disco Sweat's existence later that month, in which she revealed she had written an entire extended-play's worth of music for the project and spoke of the initial writing sessions she had with Patrik Berger.

Jepsen would later clarify that the project wasn't just an EP, but an entire album that "will probably never be released, and shouldn’t be." Jokingly, she stated that the album is buried in her backyard and was "just for her and her bandmates to laugh at". Jepsen later elaborated by saying that "nobody [else] should ever hear Disco Sweat" and jokingly claims she would only release the album "over her dead body".

#### **Development of The Loneliest Time**

During the initial development of The Loneliest Time in 2020, Jepsen teased the possibility of reworking Disco Sweat and the original material from those sessions. In August 2020, when asked by a fan if she had plans to officially release Disco Sweat, Jepsen replied that she "just might" and, later promised to eventually release some form of disco music in the future "once she figures it out".

Jepsen's statements eventually materialised in the release of The Loneliest Time in October 2022, featuring disco influence in the album's title-track and elements from the song Disco Sweat being reworked into Shooting Star.

#### **Disco Sweat leaks and insider reports**

Snippets for the songs Disco Sweat and No You first leaked online in January 2020, before leaking in full alongside a snippet of the original Julien demo on March 3rd 2021.  Alongside these initial leaks, insiders stated that the album was left in a rough state, not making it past initial production. They described that the project features mostly "guitar-based songs" and that "only about three tracks could actually be considered disco."

A second handful of Disco Sweat songs leaked in December 2022, including Ricochet, Hungry Heart, I Am The Keeper, and Tenderly - these were confirmed to be songs from the Disco Sweat sessions by insiders, who shared their placements on the draft track list for the album.

## **Songs written for the project**

At least twenty-four songs are known to have been written during the development of Disco Sweat, according to Jepsen - though it's likely not all of these songs were intended to make the album. Below is a comprehensive list of the songs that were either confirmed, reported, or speculated for the project:

#### **Confirmed**

* *Disco Sweat*
* *No You*
	+ Both songs were written and had demos recorded by August 2016; snippets of both tracks leaked in January 2020, before they surfaced in full in March 2021.
* *Julien*
	+ A demo of the track was written and recorded for Disco Sweat sometime between prior to August 2016, before it was reworked for Dedicated; a snippet leaked in March 2021.
* *Emergency Love*
	+ In June 2016, during the Disco Sweat sessions, Hynes posted a snippet of a song he and Jepsen were working on in the studio to his Snapchat story.
	+ In June 2023, an insider confirmed the title of the track.
* *I Am The Keeper*
	+ A demo that leaked in December 2022. It was later reworked into Comeback.
	+ The song was recorded during the Disco Sweat sessions but was not included on its draft track listing.
* *Hungry Heart*
	+ A demo that leaked in December 2022. It was later reworked into Disco Darling.
* *Ricochet*
* *Tenderly*
	+ Two demos that were recorded for the album in 2016 and leaked in December 2022.
* *Sails*
	+ A song mentioned by name in an April 2016 interview with Stereogum, alongside Tenderly
* *Feels Like* *(feat. Blood Orange)*
	+ Original demo of This Is What They Say.
	+ Insiders reported that the song originated from the Disco Sweat sessions with Dev Hynes
	+ Dev Hynes was also reported to have originally featured on the track with vocals.
* *So Different*
	+ Revealed by an insider in November 2023

#### **Speculated**

* **Summer Love**
	+ Jepsen stated in May 2016 she was inspired by ABBA for Disco Sweat, an influence that was also apparent on Summer Love.
	+ The song is known to date back to at least October 2016, based on demo leaks. Likewise, the song was co-produced by Patrik Berger, who Jepsen initially approached to work on Disco Sweat with.
* *Four Leaf Clover*
	+ Was written on the Gimmie Love Tour alongside other Disco Sweat confirmed tracks, Sails and Tenderly.

## **Navigation**

* Disco Sweat
* Discography

## **References**

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 @111 "disco sweat has been leaking slowly but no one has caught up on it yet (...)" December 23rd 2022
2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 @111 "(...) i am the keeper is from the same sessions but it's not included in the draft tracklist so.." December 27th 2022
3. ↑ Gevinson, Tavi "The Next Adventure: An Interview With Carly Rae Jepsen". Rookie Magazine. October 16th, 2015. Retrieved April 15th, 2021.
4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Connor, Shawn (May 13th 2016). "Carly Rae Jepsen wears her heart on her sleeve with Emotion" Vancouver Sun
5. ↑ "All That We Could Do With This Emotion". Stereogum. April 7, 2016. Retrieved March 7th, 2021.
6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 @carlyraejepsen "Writing with hero @devhynes today" (Tweet). June 3rd 2016
7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 >@CARLYAGOGO "Carly Rae Jepsen and Dev Hynes in the studio! A new snippet for #CRJ4" June 3rd 2016 - Via Twitter
8. ↑ BlackoutZone "Dev Hynes is who she originally made Disco Sweat with and This is What They Say is indeed a track from that session" (atrl.net) May 7th 2020.
9. ↑ 9.0 9.1 9.2 Cliff, Aimee "Carly Rae Jepsen And Danny L Harle On Their PC Music Collaboration “Super Natural”" TheFader, August 12th 2016.
10. ↑ @carlyraejepsen "Sweden for a while..." (Tweet). June 26th 2016.
11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 11.2 11.3 11.4 The BUILD Queen, Carly Rae Jepsen Is In The House! Youtube, May 29 2019.
12. ↑ Hahn, Rachel "Carly Rae Jepsen: “I Wanted to Be Able to Write About the Confusing Parts of Love” VOUGE, May 20th 2019.
13. ↑ Harding, Charlie; Sloan, Nate "How Carly Rae Jepsen whittled 200 songs down to 12 for her new album" Vox, May 26th 2020
14. ↑ "Carly Rae Jepsen hits the studio with Miike Snow’s Pontus Winnberg" hamadamania.com. July 13th, 2016. Retrieved March 9th, 2021.
15. ↑ @carlyraejepsen "Writing songs and eating apples in Stockholm with #PatrikBerger and @nooniebao today" July 5th, 2016. Retrieved April 5th, 2021. - Via Instagram
16. ↑ 16.0 16.1 @the\_knocks "@carlyraejepsen’s ‘Julien’ is out today!! Took a trip down to @maderasvillage in Nicaragua with some amazing people a couple years..." April 19th 2019. Retrieved March 7th, 2021. - Via Instagram
17. ↑ @carlyraejepsen 'Nicaragua for some writing. 🎶' August 15th 2016 - via Twitter]
18. ↑ @carlyraejepsen "Julien is the song that taught me the heart and direction of this album. Couldn’t keep him for myself any longer." April 19th 2019. Retrieved March 7th, 2021. - Via Instagram
19. ↑ Kheraj, Alim "carly rae jepsen is pop’s underdog come to save us all" (VICE i-D) May 15 2019. Retrieved March 8th, 2021.
20. ↑ Gwee, Karen (July 3rd 2019). "Carly Rae Jepsen made an entire disco album that you’ll never hear" (NME.com). Retrieved March 5th, 2021.
21. ↑ "Carly Rae Jepsen Rates Her Own Albums | PopBuzz Meets" YouTube. February 14th, 2020. Retrieved March 6th, 2021.
22. ↑ In Depth w/ Larry Flick: Carly Rae Jepsen. SiriusXM. August 31st, 2020. Retrieved March 6th, 2021.
23. ↑ CarlyRaeJepsen\_ (July 7th 2020). "lol over my dead body". Retrieved March 6th, 2021 – via Reddit.
24. ↑ @carlyraejepsen (August 25th 2020). "...I promise once I figure out this disco it’s all for you." (Tweet). Retrieved March 6th, 2021 – via Twitter.
25. ↑ @joethehack (August 6th 2020). "...I begged CRJ to release Disco Sweat and she said, “I just might.”..." (Tweet). Retrieved March 6th, 2021 – via Twitter.
26. ↑ Carly Rae Jepsen - Disco Sweat and No You (Snippets) Youtube. January 28th, 2020. Retrieved March 8th, 2021.
27. ↑ 27.0 27.1 27.2 lolcevan (March 4th 2021). "(Leak) Carly Rae Jepsen - Disco Sweat, No You". Retrieved March 6th, 2021 – via Reddit.
28. ↑ Yes To Heaven "Carly Rae Jepsen - Page 62" lanaboards.com, March 4th 2021.
29. ↑ 29.0 29.1 BlackoutZone "This is What They say really evolved and got reworked from what originally was a Disco Sweat song" atrl.net, May 21st 2020.
30. ↑ @111 "so different" Lanaboards.com, November 21st 2023