Meghan Trainor for Issue #10

On her forthcoming album, Treat Myself:
“It symbolizes a moment in my life that I had after my second surgery, where I kind of crumbled emotionally and physically. My body just kinda gave up on me and I had to remind myself that I can say ‘no’ and that I have to focus on myself and treat myself.”

On her anxiety and how Carson Daly helped her work through it:
“I couldn’t explain it to my own parents– like, they didn’t understand when I was like ‘my head’s on fire, my back feels like someone has a flame to it’ or ‘I have nausea and I don’t know why’ and it was just ’cause my adrenals were all messed up. Hearing Carson Daly explain exactly how I felt was better than a doctor; it was like ‘Oh, a regular human being who is in the industry feels like I do’ and I told him ‘you don’t know how much that saved me.'”

On the gender disparity in the music industry:
“I feel like all women in music right now are slaying but there just needs to be more of us. I would love to see more songwriters. I’m so used to– and I hate that I can say I’m used to– like, when they set me up with a producer: it’s a man, it’s always a man. I recently wrote with a woman and she was a producer, and I just hugged her and I was like ‘you’re the first female producer I’ve ever gotten to work with and I need more of you,’ like, this is so sad. And so I just want to see more of us all over, even in the entertainment industry in general: more directors, more executives.”

On turning to other strong female artists for inspiration:
“[Ariana Grande, Demi Lovato & Selena Gomez] have been through so much and I just really look up to all of them and how strong they are and how they can continue their careers and still do this. There are some days in this position when you’re like ‘is this all worth it? Should I like, go take care of myself for a minute and all the hard work I’ve done– just throw it all away?’ and they just keep pushing, and that really keeps me pushing, and I hear them in interviews say they surround themselves with good people and that’s what I try to do.”

Pre-order the Winter 2018 issue featuring Meghan Trainor and many others here.