One of our Sports Directors, Roman Aguilar, got to chat with Greta Kline of Frankie Cosmos! They talked about their new album, Different Talking, their love for playing live shows, and everything in between. Kicking off their West Coast tour, the band’s second stop is in San Diego. Frankie Cosmos will be in town on October 10th at Quartyard. Get your tickets now before the show sells out!

KCR: First of all, my name is Roman Aguilar. I’m one of the directors on San Diego State’s college radio station for KCR. To get started, Different Talking has been out for a couple months now. What’s it been like to kind of let it be released and get the reception from it that you have been?

Greta: It’s been really cool. You know? It was hard the first couple of months to kind of like, tell what people—how people were responding. But just being on tour for the last week, it’s really nice to see what songs people are shouting out, and people knowing some of the words to the new record. Just feels good like that. People are listening to it, and, yeah, really excited about having it out and getting to play the songs.

KCR: A lot of the time, I think your music and the band in general get thrown into a lot of DIY, bedroom pop genres. In a digital world of Spotify, a lot of that music can still feel almost timeless, where people think someone like you “stays” that same age. Do you feel like you can kind of balance that image that music like yours has with who you are now?

Greta: Now that’s interesting. I mean, I do think doing what we do, like, you do kind of get stuck in the life of like a 20-year-old. I think touring and being a musician can feel like a real young person’s kind of work. But I do feel like what I’ve experienced with this record is a lot of people that listen to Frankie Cosmos are my age, and they feel like they’re growing up with me. And I think that’s been something that’s really nice to hear — sort of like, the music is there for you whenever you’re ready to find it. And like, you can grow up and kind of, like, it can hit you in different ways, or you can find ways into the different records as I grow up, too.

KCR: And on that note, talk a little bit about the album cover. What was kind of the inspiration behind it? Was that a play on still having a little bit of childlike whimsy to you and the music as well?

Greta: I definitely felt like a playful, kind of childlike energy around making this record. And I think we all felt a little refreshed and sort of naive, making a record in a new way. The title came from something that my, like, three-year-old godson said. So I sort of wanted to bring in this childish energy. And I thought that that kind of self-serious four-year-old picture of me just kind of captured it nicely, and everybody liked it.

KCR: In terms of your writing process — I know you’ve said before that aging changes how you write. Do you look at your writing process any differently than you would have five to ten years ago?

Greta: I mean, I think songwriting is just something that’s part of my life and my rituals and stuff that I’m always doing. And just like life, I kind of get a little better at it every year because it’s like, I’m just figuring out how to live and how to take care of myself and how to express myself. And I’m sort of like chipping away at this sort of deeper understanding of myself that I think songwriting gives me. So I do think it just changes, it ebbs and flows, and it changes the way that life does for anybody.

KCR: Six studio albums down now — how do you measure yourself in terms of success compared to when you were just uploading tracks to Bandcamp or SoundCloud?

Greta: Totally. I mean, the process that we go through now is something that I never would have imagined when I was making those Bandcamp songs and demos. I’ve only really done it those six times or and then some, but it’s something that you don’t spend as much time doing when you’re a working musician. Learning to record in a studio—it’s something that I get a little better at every time. I understand a little bit more about the technology and terminology of recording. But it’s something that I’m still learning. And I think having that history that I have of self-recording on my laptop definitely still affects my processes with recording in general.

And yeah, I think as far as success, I never would have imagined the level of success that we’ve achieved. And I can only live in the moment and just feel lucky to be on tour and to get to play the songs, and hopefully people keep liking it.

KCR: Going a bit more into the album itself, I wanted to pick a couple of the tracks. I thought “Against the Grain” and “Bitch Heart” particularly touch on missing your past self while still finding peace and solitude. How do you navigate that balance between nostalgia and growth when you’re writing?

Greta: I guess, like, in terms of the musical nostalgia and the sonic stuff that we’re playing with, it’s definitely something that I attribute to my bandmates’ contributions. I think, you know, I write stuff that can be kind of vague or esoteric, and they kind of help me build a world around it a lot of the time. I feel like those are some songs where the musical elements really ground the feeling for me. And both of them also came from messing around a lot and just having a playful kind of mentality about music making, which I think we all really appreciate in each other.

KCR: I’m curious — if you were starting from scratch now, do you think the DIY approach you came into would still work today?

Greta: I think it’s definitely really different now. I think DIY, in terms of an in-person community, is probably just not the way in for a lot of artists now. There’s a lot more internet stuff and TikTok, and other ways that people find each other. But I also think musicians continue to find ways to connect with each other and hopefully not completely isolate ourselves. I’d like to think that there will always be some space for DIY exploration and supporting each other. Ultimately, we’re all small artists working towards trying to put on a nice show or make a nice record.

We are still doing the same thing, but I do think I got very lucky in terms of the time that I was doing it. It’s probably a lot harder now to reach through the void and get discovered.

KCR: I found your music through Close It Quietly when that came out. Going back a little bit, you were writing and playing shows around the time you went to NYU. What was your come-up like during that period, and when did you feel like you could make something out of nothing in that scene?

Greta: Totally. I mean, at the time that I was in college, I was not very involved in my college culture. I was from New York, so I already had my scene of people that I grew up with. I remember feeling actually pretty uncool in terms of my college community—they never saw me around at their college parties because I was out doing something totally different at these DIY shows.

It was sort of like I was doing this kind of Hannah Montana double life: student by day, nerdy student, and then secretly a rock star. And by rock star, you know, obviously the most minimal sort—playing to 20 people that are singing along, which feels amazing. I did feel very lucky because I grew up in this community of music that I was able to find myself in, which I took with me into adulthood.

Playing shows at houses and illegal warehouses—there are so many people working to make that stuff happen, and when it does happen, it’s at the hands of the whole community. College is a really great way, especially if you’re not in a city you’re from, to find a built-in community. That’s why college radio is so amazing. Colleges that put on shows and have a theater or something they can bring bands to—it’s a great way to find your like-minded people.

KCR: When you play cities like San Diego and go on tour now, how does it feel to finally put this music out on the road and see how people react?

Greta: Yeah, it feels amazing. It feels like putting the album out becomes real once you take it on the road. For me, at this point, it’s always a little like, “Where does the song go once you put it out?” But it’s cool to be making it continually in the room and watching people react and sing along. That feels really good.

KCR: Do you feel like the future of Frankie Cosmos as a group is brighter than it was when it started?

Greta: I think, you know, I try not to trip out too much about the future. It’s hard to know. Every album, I always think, this could be the last album, this could be the last tour — you just never know. But I feel excited about where I’m at right now, and getting to work on the stuff we’re working on feels really fulfilling. I’m just happy to be doing it.

Roman: If a 19-year-old in their dorm discovers Frankie Cosmos today, what do you hope they take away from your music?

Greta: Ooh, I hope that it makes them want to sing a song or start a band or write a poem or make a painting, and just express themselves and do something away from their computer.

KCR: That’s a good way to put it for sure. Perfect. All right, yeah, thank you. That’s all I have for you. I really appreciate your time.

Greta: Thank you so much for having me!