AMY SHARK: THE FUN OF IT ALL

Vasili Papathanasopoulos
Aug 3
23 min read

AUGUST 2026

Photographs by Vasili Papathanasopoulos.

Shirt and Trousers, Zero Meaning. Boots, Prada. Jewellery, ACAUÃ.

By the time an artist reaches their fourth album, the expectation is often to reinvent themselves. Amy Shark does something far more interesting on soft pop: she trusts herself, and in doing so delivers the most assured, intimate and fully realised record of her career.

When Shark and I first spoke about her fourth studio album, soft pop, back in March, the conversation didn’t begin with the album itself. It began with everything that came before it. For an artist who has spent the last decade moving between breakthrough moments, huge expectations and the pressure of following up some of Australian music's most recognisable songs, the idea of making a fourth album came with a different kind of weight. The excitement was still there, but so was the exhaustion that can come from repeatedly returning to the same vulnerable place: writing songs about yourself, sharing them with the world, then doing it all over again.

The release cycle around 2024’s Sunday Sadness found Shark pulling away from stepping back into that process. It's a feeling that feels almost contradictory from the outside. Here was an artist with a celebrated catalogue, a devoted audience and the ability to continue building their legacy, yet the reality of maintaining that momentum had become difficult to ignore. “After Sunday Sadness, I was like, "I'm not doing this again. It's too hard. It's too hard. Next minute... I've just learned a lot. It's my fourth album, so I just wanted to kind of feel fresh again.” That final thought - wanting to feel fresh again - becomes the key to understanding soft pop. This isn’t a record made from a desire for complete reinvention or to distance herself from the songs that built her career. Instead, it feels like a return to curiosity.

That moment became the unlikely starting point for soft pop. Not a reinvention, exactly, but a reset - an opportunity to return to the part of music that made everything else worthwhile in the first place. The album that followed would become her most self-directed yet: written entirely by Shark, built around restrictions rather than excess, and shaped by a desire to reconnect with instinct. The title itself feels like a contradiction, which is part of its appeal. soft pop suggests something gentle and uncomplicated, but underneath the bright colours and playful presentation is some of Shark’s most revealing songwriting. It is an album about insecurity, relationships, regret and growth - but it is also an album about laughter, confidence, sexuality and embracing every part of herself without needing to justify any of it.

The record’s identity began with limitations. Rather than entering the process with endless possibilities, Shark created boundaries: she would write the album herself, strip away the safety net of large-scale production, and travel to Wales to record with producer Dann Hume. Those restrictions became the thing that gave the record its shape. “I think it really did the album justice by taking a few risks and being really disciplined and having a really clear vision, which I don't think I have had on other albums.” For Shark, the clarity came from knowing what she did not want. After years of being associated with certain sounds and certain expectations, soft pop gave her the opportunity to question what people thought they already knew about her. It is a record that still sounds unmistakably like Amy Shark, but it allows more space for everything that exists within the scope.

Top and Jeans, Zero Meaning. Shoes, Adidas x Song For The Mute. Jewellery, ACAUÃ.

The result extends beyond the music itself. With its fluffy teal visual identity, soft pop became a fully realised world - something Shark had admired in other artists but never expected to create herself. “This is a soft pop world. I used to be so jealous of artists that used to say, "Oh, I've just created a world," you know, like the Brat campaign, and Taylor [Swift] does it all the time. And you're just like, "How do you do that?" But this kinda happened naturally and it felt so fun. That's probably the biggest word, is just fun.”

That word - fun - becomes the key to understanding the album. Not because soft pop avoids emotional depth, but because Shark has reached a point where she no longer sees vulnerability and enjoyment as opposites. The sadness, the humour, the awkwardness and the confidence all belong to the same person. It is also the result of an artist arriving at a different stage of her career. Looking back at the albums that came before it, Shark describes each one as a different lesson in understanding who she was as a songwriter, and what she wanted her records to represent. “When I think about it, my first album felt like a bit of a fluke somehow. I had these songs ready to go and I didn't know if they were gonna relate to anyone. I didn't know if it was gonna be a success or not. And then I think my second album, I was probably a little cocky thinking, like, "I know what I'm doing." Third album fell off the rails - no idea. I still put a body of work together that I was proud of, but I didn't feel like I had created a world. I didn't really understand how to do that. So by the fourth album, I feel like - I said this to an artist the other day - I'm like, 'If you can hang into your fourth album, I feel like you really know what you're doing.’” There is a sense of arrival in that reflection. Not because Shark believes she has everything figured out, but because she understands the value of trusting the process. soft pop feels like the work of an artist who has stopped chasing certainty and started following instinct - allowing the songs to become what they need to be.

For all the confidence and clarity that eventually shaped soft pop, its beginnings came from a period where Shark had lost touch with the part of herself that usually came naturally. It was not necessarily writer’s block; it was something more difficult to explain - the absence of momentum. “I don't know if it was a writer's block, It was more I just wasn't writing. I just was being lazy. Nothing was inspiring me to. I was feeling fully exhausted through every part of my life.” As an artist whose career has been built on turning everyday emotions into songs, that disconnect was particularly frustrating. The demos, the ideas, the small moments that usually spark a song were no longer pulling her forward. It took an outside push to break that cycle.

Her husband Shane became that push. Knowing Shark wanted to work with longtime collaborator Dann Hume after seeing his studio in Wales, he created a deadline before she had the songs ready to meet it. “He knew I wanted to get over to work with Dann [Hume] because I had already seen his studio, so it was like a little cherry on top that I had to work towards - because I had no songs to get there.” The solution was simple, but effective: create something she had no choice but to rise to. “Shane was like, 'I've locked in Dann. Hopefully this motivates her. It'll probably make her mad for a minute,' which it did [laughs].” That pressure became the beginning of the album’s entire philosophy.

Inspiration is often romanticised, but soft pop was built through discipline. The excitement returned because she had committed to making something exist. “Then it wasn't until I started getting through all the songs and getting some good stuff out, I was like, 'Oh, man, I forgot how fun this was.’” That feeling became the turning point. Once the songs began arriving, the process became addictive again. But the challenge was different from previous records. Without relying on the usual studio environment or external production ideas, Shark had to build the foundation herself. “That's all it was, really. It was the discipline and being okay to have this weird challenge of writing it all myself and not being in a studio hearing beats and stuff. It was literally me on guitar. It was really tough and hard, but also just a cool challenge.” That simplicity became one of the defining characteristics of soft pop. The album’s emotional impact comes from the fact that there is nowhere for the songs to hide. The writing has to lead; the personality has to carry the production; the feeling has to arrive before anything else.

Shirt and Skirt, Song For The Mute. Boots, Prada. Jewellery, ACAUÃ

The isolation of recording in Wales only strengthened that focus. Instead of choosing a location built around distraction and industry energy, Shark found herself in Barry - a small Welsh town where the quiet became part of the creative process. “No vibe whatsoever,” she tells me. “I think that was a good thing because I just worked, you know? It wasn't like if I was in London, I'd be very tempted to go out and I'd be tempted to wrap up our session early, to go to a gig or go somewhere.” The lack of a traditional music-world atmosphere was exactly what made it useful. Away from the noise surrounding the industry, Shark could concentrate on the songs themselves. “To be in Barry in Wales, it was such a beautiful little town. Very inspirational in different ways, just because it wasn't sceney or vibey. It was like cute little pubs and they all had their locals, and cute little cafes and fields and old cottages. A different kind of scenery for me.” soft pop does not feel like a record chasing a moment; it feels like one created away from expectation. The songs were allowed to develop at their own pace, shaped by instinct rather than outside pressure. And that space gave Shark something she has always chased in songwriting: the ability to look back, understand herself better, and find new meaning in experiences she thought she already knew.

That isolation ultimately gave Shark wasn't simply uninterrupted time to write. It created enough distance to see her own life differently. The Amy Shark who wrote Adore, Mess Her Up or I Said Hi often captured emotions while she was still living inside them - or at least closer to them. soft pop approaches many of the same feelings from further down the road. The hurt hasn't disappeared, but it had settled into something more reflective. Rather than reopening old wounds, Shark is interested in understanding why they hurt in the first place. “I think the older I get - like each day that goes by, I'm getting better at looking at things differently. And I think that's the joy of still songwriting, and when you're not twenty one it's like for some reason we fear getting older, but I wrote about things in the heat of the moment that it's really quite a good thing when you get older. You can look at things from a different way. You look at it a little calmer, or just from a different perspective or like I've just matured a little bit and I've calmed down a little bit. It's actually interesting. I learned a lot about myself, you know?” she laughs.

That quiet maturity is woven through every corner of the record. The songs still wrestle with failed relationships, childhood, jealousy, insecurity and love, but they rarely stop at the initial emotion. Instead, they ask what those experiences look like years later, after memory has softened some edges while sharpening others. “Apart from the songs that are obviously topics that I hadn't really gone near, there are topics that I have maybe revisited mixed with how I feel now and mixed with other similar feelings. Like, maybe something similar has happened again where it's reminding me of that same feeling that I had when I wrote that song or whatever from a previous album.” You can hear that evolution across soft pop. The Biggest Dick doesn't document a single relationship so much as it stitches together fragments of several, written by someone who finally feels secure enough to examine the insecurity that once consumed her. Not Old Enough To Drive revisits one of the most painful chapters of Shark's life without the urgency that often accompanies heartbreak, whilst Singapore Noodles captures the joy of connection in its simplest forms.

Our Last Fight, which sits as a personal favourite, captures the emotional contradictions of wanting to appear unaffected whilst still deeply invested. Ruins quietly flips the perspective of Mess Her Up, imagining what the other person might have to say all these years later - imagining a conversation with someone from her past rather than simply reopening the wound. The ability to resist the past without being consumed by it is something Shark attributes to getting older. “You look at it a little calmer, or just from a different perspective or like I've just matured a little bit and I've calmed down a little bit.” For Shark, maturity hasn’t meant becoming less emotional. If anything, it has given her more freedom to explore these emotions.

Nowhere is that more apparent than on Child of Divorce. The song looks at love through the lens of someone who understands their own complexities, acknowledging the ways past experiences can shape how we move through relationships. Its not a song searching for someone to blame. There is a similar tenderness in Singapore Noodles, which finds meaning in the smallest moments of connection. Rather than chasing some grand romantic gesture, the song celebrates the ordinary details - the kind of memories that seem insignificant when they’re happening but become the ones people hold on to.

Shirt and Trousers, Zero Meaning. Boots, Prada. Jewellery, ACAUÃ.

There's a generosity in that writing that wasn't always possible. Rather than assigning heroes and villains, soft pop often finds itself sitting somewhere in the middle, accepting that people - herself included - are rarely as simple as they seem. “So I think it's just like, I'm constantly evolving. It's very interesting to me to unlock weird codes in my brain, and I think I could only do that on this one by being so isolated.” Left alone with little more than a guitar, those thoughts had nowhere to go except deeper. “There was no choice but to get all up in my head - and it's obviously not a good thing to get in your own head in everyday life. But for this line of work I'm in, to get in your own head is the best thing ever. Because you go down these rabbit holes, and you remember things, and and you're like, 'Oh, wow, I can't believe how mad I was then,' and I remember being so mad that I can write about it a little more. I can look from their side of things now or you know, I'm not crying on the floor whilst trying to write about it.” It's a deceptively simple observation, but perhaps the clearest explanation of why soft pop feels so different. Shark hasn't become less willing to expose herself; she's become more curious about herself. The songs still contain the same emotional candour they've always had, yet they're no longer chasing catharsis alone. They're searching for understanding.

That's precisely why the songwriting lands with such force. Many of these stories are intensely personal, almost diaristic in their detail, yet the feelings underneath them remain remarkably universal. Few listeners will have lived the exact circumstances behind The Biggest Dick or Not Old Enough To Drive, but almost everyone recognises the sting of jealousy, regret, gratitude or longing they uncover. Great songwriting has always been about closing the gap between one person's experience and everybody else’s. On soft pop, Shark achieves that more consistently than ever before.

If you spend enough time with soft pop (much like I have - including a two hour stint stuck on the tarmac at Barcelona airport in sweltering heat), another quality begins to reveal itself. For all of its emotional excavation, this is an album with a grin on its face. Shark has never written from a place of striving for perfection, but there's a noticeable lightness in the way she approaches vulnerability here. Embarrassment becomes a punchline. Heartbreak is interrupted by a joke. Even the album's most confronting moments are often punctuated by an unexpected lyric, an absurd turn of phrase or a playful production flourish that reminds you not to wallow for too long. The emotional honesty remains un-compromised; it's simply delivered by someone who's learned that self-awareness can be just as disarming as self-pity.

"I think I've never been scared of being brutally honest about how not perfect I am, and how I'm like every other person, just making mistakes and it's okay to talk about that. The whole album is I guess talking about so many insecure situations and moments in time from a way more secure place, but it's also really cheeky. It's like, 'okay, well, that really hurt, but I'm also gonna laugh about it and I'm also gonna put these funny sound effects in.’" That tension gives soft pop much of its personality. The record can move effortlessly from the quiet gratitude of Child of Divorce to the swagger of Like A Doll, from the aching reflection of Not Old Enough To Drive to the breezy warmth of Hotel Towels, without ever feeling emotionally disjointed. Rather than settling into one mood, Shark allows every side of herself into the room. "I feel like it's quite a fearless album. I'm fluffy, I'm loud, I can be corny, I can be sexy, I can be horny, I can be all these things. That's what I love so much about it, start to finish it's not just a beautiful album sonically, but it's such a journey. It's like there's so many fun stories in it.” It's difficult not to notice that same personality sitting across from me over zoom exactly one week following the album's release. Shark's answers are thoughtful, but they're rarely solemn for long. Almost every heavier observation is followed by a laugh, a tangent or a joke at her own expense. “You are the funniest person in the music industry," I told her. “that is the nicest thing anyone's ever said,” she responds. “I mean, I think I'm hilarious, but I don't know if anyone else thinks that.” That exchange earns one of the biggest laughs of our conversation, but it also explains something fundamental about soft pop. Humour isn't there to distract from the difficult moments; it's part of how Shark processes them. The album understands that life rarely unfolds in neat emotional categories. Pain and joy, confidence and insecurity, sincerity and absurdity often exist in the very same conversation. soft pop refuses to separate them.

The hooks remain immediate, the melodies effortlessly memorable. The difference lies in what she chooses not to rely on. "Firstly, I just was really hyper aware that it's my fourth album, and that people have really made their mind up about me. I kinda wanted a sound that if it came on anywhere, the people that have made their mind up in the way that for some reason they don't like me, they won't necessarily hear it and jump straight to, 'Oh, that's an Amy Shark song.' Yeah. I wanted it to have slightly different sonics so that people would second guess if it was me. Even the people that love me and know and love my stuff, I wanted them to be like, 'Oh, wow. Like is it or isn't it?’" It's a fascinating ambition for an artist four albums into her career. Many musicians spend years chasing a recognisable sonic identity; Shark deliberately set out to blur hers. Not by abandoning the qualities that have defined her songwriting, but by stripping away the production cues listeners had come to associate with her. In doing so, she trusted the songs to carry the recognition instead.

“The only thing I was concerned about when we started recording was the vibe. I was like, 'I don't wanna overthink things. If the guitar sounds cool and maybe it's not perfect, that's sick.' I don't want it to be a perfect album. I want it to be a cohesive album, but that doesn't mean perfect. You can hear that trust in every song across the album. Without towering production filling every corner of the mix, the smallest details suddenly become impossible to miss: the rasp that creeps into a line, the subtle shifts in phrasing, the warmth in Shark's lower register, the vulnerability in a vocal that's allowed to remain imperfect. Rather than exposing weaknesses, the stripped-back arrangements reveal just how expressive her voice has always been. There is a remarkable amount of light and shade in these performances, and soft pop gives them room to breathe in a way her previous records rarely could. For all the discipline behind its creation, the finished album never sounds restricted. Quite the opposite. The limitations become liberating, allowing the writing, the performances and the emotional nuance to occupy the foreground. It's a reminder that bigger production doesn't necessarily create a bigger feeling. Sometimes removing layers is what finally allows a song to say everything it needs to.

Top and Jeans, Zero Meaning. Shoes, Adidas x Song For The Mute. Jewellery, ACAUÃ.

Of course, "stripped back" is a relative term. soft pop was never intended to become a purely acoustic record, and Shark is quick to point out that finding the album's sonic identity took just as much experimentation as its songwriting. "We kind of just had to feel it out, you know? Dan was like ‘it can't just be acoustic, because you're not folk. These songs are so pop.’ He was like it wouldn't do them justice if we didn't find this particular balance.” That balance is one of the album's quiet triumphs. Acoustic guitars remain at the centre, but they're never treated as a limitation. Instead, Hume's production gently expands around them, introducing subtle electronic textures, understated percussion and flashes of modern pop that never overwhelm the songs themselves. The record constantly resists being boxed in, occupying a space that feels unmistakably contemporary without chasing contemporary trends. “I really trusted him in doing that, and I think that's where you hear the 808s come in, and when you hear the certain production he added - it's just super pop still. All the energy had to come from me, had to come from my guitaring and the feeling of that and the energy in my delivery. There were all these other little things we just had to work extra hard on, because we couldn't fall back on this big, expensive sounding production, because that just wasn't the vibe of this album.”

There's an irony to that statement, because soft pop never feels like it's lacking anything. If anything, the absence of excess makes every decision feel more intentional. When a synth enters, it matters. When the low-end swells beneath a chorus, it carries weight. Nothing exists simply because it can. The same patience extended to the recording process itself. Much like the writing sessions, the studio sessions needed time before its own language began to emerge. "It was a lot of feeling it out, and after we did The Biggest Dick and we did Child of Divorce and we did It's Kinda Hot, we were like, 'oh, we get it now. I think we get where we're going with this and how it's gonna make sense as a body of work.' It took a few days, but once we were on a roll it was kind of like writing the thing; it sucked the first few days, but then I was on a roll.” That sense of discovery is audible across the record. Rather than sounding like a collection of songs recorded one at a time, soft pop feels genuinely cohesive, each track informing the next until a distinct musical world gradually reveals itself. It's the very thing Shark told me she'd envied in other artists; the elusive feeling of creating not just an album, but an era. That world extends beyond the music itself. The teal aesthetic, the artwork, the visual campaign and even the introduction of Devlin - the fictional character who unexpectedly found herself woven into the soft pop universe - share the same playful commitment to instinct over strategy. "It's not me, it's Devlin. She's from LA. She's an up and coming actress. I just wanted to give her her first role," Shark laughs. "Devlin was a lot of fun, and a character that I didn't expect to enter the campaign. But nonetheless, she did. Like I said, I had to go with my gut and honestly, dude, I was having so much fun, and that's another main part of it, was I just wanted to have fun through this whole thing. She was a lot of fun.”

The wider details, like Devlin, speak to something larger. soft pop succeeds because it never feels over-calculated. Every creative decision, whether musical or visual, follows the same internal logic: trust the instinct, commit to the bit, and don't lose sight of the enjoyment that inspired the project in the first place. By the time the album reaches its closing moments, that sense of freedom has become infectious - not just in the music itself, but in the world Shark has built around it.

Perhaps that's why soft pop feels like such a natural continuation of Shark's catalogue rather than a reinvention of it. The DNA is still unmistakably hers. The difference is the confidence with which she now wears it. It's impossible to have that conversation without mentioning Adore - which celebrated its tenth anniversary last month. Shark speaks about it with none of the fatigue that often follows an artist's biggest hit. There's no desire to escape it, rewrite its legacy or pretend she's moved beyond it. Instead, she talks about it with the appreciation of someone who understands just how unlikely those moments really are. "I don't believe any artist knows what's gonna be the one. You just keep trying, and you just keep putting stuff out there and getting better at your craft.” Looking back, she remembers creating Adore at a point where expectation had almost disappeared. "I thought heaps of my songs were good, and you have high hopes for all of them. But I think by the time I got to Adore, I had proper given up. But that's what the universe does. The universe waits until you are in the gutter with nothing left, no hope left in the tank, and then it goes, and then it turns.”

It’s a story that draws similarities to her current album. While the circumstances are vastly different, soft pop also arrives after a period of uncertainty. Neither album was made by someone chasing a guaranteed outcome. Both were made by someone simply trying to write the next good song. "So no, I had absolutely no idea. It was so cool because I had written so many songs. So when that happened and I had to write an EP, I was like, 'well, I've got so many songs, and they're all kind of in the vein of this…’ But once I heard it back and everything, I wasn't thinking, 'Oof, this is gonna change my life.’" There's something refreshing about that perspective in an era obsessed with algorithms, virality and manufactured moments. Shark still talks about songwriting like someone chasing the work itself rather than the outcome.

Even now, when Adore unexpectedly finds her in a supermarket or a shopping centre, the excitement hasn't worn off. "When I'm at a supermarket or somewhere and that guitar starts, it's so cool to have that. It's like an iconic sounding guitar. You could only dream of having that moment. So I feel so lucky, and I'm never gonna be one of those artists that's like, 'oh, God, I can't listen to that song or don't make me play it, or I'm not gonna play it anymore.' I just think it's the coolest song ever. I owe so much to it, so I would never leave it out.” It's an attitude that says a great deal about Shark herself. Gratitude, rather than reinvention for its own sake, has quietly become one of the defining themes of her career.

Shirt and Skirt, Song For The Mute. Boots, Prada. Jewellery, ACAUÃ

What matters to her is intention. "For me, I think I get more out of having people relate to songs. I don't believe I roll too many people in songs. It might just be a little bit of a trigger when I hear it, but it's not like I'm saying their names and I'm really quite respectful in my interviews. So as long as I'm like that, I don't really care.” Even then, she admits there are moments where she knowingly accepts the complications. "If there is an uncomfortable song for that person to listen to, maybe I wanted you to. Maybe I wanted you to listen to that.” She laughs, but only slightly. "I think the most heat I get is from friends and family and then I just have to weigh up if the juice is worth the squeeze. I think I'm better at navigating around those things now, but it's definitely something that crosses my mind from certain songs.” The pressure, she explains, doesn't necessarily come from listeners recognising themselves. ”So it's just being okay with that. And like I said, you can't have everything. You can't have the coolest job in the world and then not have to go through a bit of stress or pain or a bit of complicating situations.”

That perspective circles back to what makes soft pop so effective. The songs never feel confessional for the sake of confession. Every deeply personal detail exists in service of something bigger, which is why they're able to resonate so broadly. Shark might begin with her own life, but she's ultimately writing about emotions that rarely belong to just one person. Those feelings outlive the specifics that inspired them. The conversation drifts into a story that perfectly captures both her sense of humour and the changing landscape of pop songwriting. "It was funny. I was talking to one of my husband's, dad's mates who is a little younger than him, and he was saying the same thing. He's like, 'God, you really share a lot. Like, you share a lot.’" Shark's response was immediate. "And I go, 'Hey Brian, I'm gonna put a song on for you and just tell me if I share as much as this.' I put on, um, Chappell Roan's Casual and he's like, 'Oh, oh my Lord,'" she bursts into laughter. "I'm like, 'Yeah. So you shut the fuck up. I'm okay,'" she laughs again. It's one of the funniest moments of our conversation, but it also speaks to how Shark views vulnerability. She's never treated honesty as a gimmick or a marketing tool. It's simply the language she's always written in. If anything, soft pop proves she's become even more adept at deciding not only what to reveal, but how to reveal it. The result is an album that feels fearless without ever becoming performative-a collection of songs that invite listeners into Shark's world while somehow leaving enough space for them to find themselves there too.

The next stage for soft pop is seeing how those songs change once they are no longer confined to the space where they were written. For an album that began so privately, the live show becomes another kind of transformation. “I’m so excited about it, because I can kinda just see it and hear it,” she says. “I think these songs are gonna explode with the boys. With lights and production and the band and mixed in with Adore and I Said Hi and Mess Her Up, I just think it’s just gonna be such a fire set.” What’s interesting is that Shark has never approached songwriting with the stage in mind. The songs are not built around a planned crowd moment or a calculated reaction. Their live potential comes afterwards, when the emotion already embedded in them finds a different kind of energy. “I try not to think about live shows [when writing], I’m not one of those artists that’s like, ‘I’ll write this because that’ll end up being this, and that’ll end up having a clap section there or I’ll get the audience to do this there.’ I don’t think about that at all.”

Instead, the moments she looks forward to most are often the ones she never anticipated creating. “It is a real treat when it ends up having a few moments where after the record’s done, you listen back and you’re thinking about it in a live sense and you’re like, oh man, there’s so many accidental moments that you didn’t even plan [laughs] in songs that you’re like, ‘This is just gonna be off its head.’” That feeling of discovery extends to the audience that has followed Shark throughout her career. Her connection with listeners has always been built on the idea that the details may come from her life, but the emotions belong to everyone. A song can begin with one specific memory, one person or one moment, then take on an entirely new meaning once someone else hears it. “I think I’ve just built a really lovely following, you know? It’s far and wide. I’ve done a lot of regional work, and I think ever since being on Australian Idol, that has also cast the net out pretty wide - which is amazing.”

By the time the album reached listeners not even a fortnight ago, all the things that shaped it became part of its story. The process was just as important as the final product, and that is something Shark feels more strongly about with this record than any before it. “Not gonna lie, I felt like yesterday, I think when you sort of see it on the chart [#1 on the ARIA Australian Album Chart and #2 on the Global Album Chart] - you’re so proud. But also, it’s just taken up so much of my life. So I think it’s like the secret’s out, all the secrets are out, all the songs are out.” There is a strange vulnerability in releasing something so personal. For months, the album existed as a world only she and her closest collaborators knew. Suddenly, the songs that carried old versions of herself, private thoughts and moments she had spent years processing were no longer hers alone. “It was a really weird feeling because I think it’s the first album that I’ve really just gone so hell for leather on and I also just had the best time with the whole team as well.” That enjoyment feels like one of the biggest breakthroughs of soft pop.

The album exists because Shark accepted the limitations in front of her rather than fighting against them. She removed the things she thought she needed and found a different kind of freedom. The imperfections became part of the identity. The rough edges became part of the charm. The moments where her voice cracks, the places where the production pulls back, the songs that refuse to be overly polished - they all contribute to a record that feels alive. “I just think there’s so many things in life now that are so achievable. You just need to sit with your phone, record it on your phone and it’s like this, it’s just so achievable.” Perhaps the most fitting thing soft pop can leave behind is not a particular lyric or a particular story. It is the reminder that creativity often arrives when you stop waiting for the perfect moment. “I hope they listen to it and go, ‘Oh fuck, I’m gonna go and do the thing that makes me the happiest.’” It is a fitting place to leave an album that started with Shark wondering if she had anything left to give. soft pop is proof that sometimes stepping away from what you think you should be, can lead you closer to who you are.

https://youtu.be/mSzzrBCYfrM