After high school, Nicole Atkins moved to North Carolina to study illustration in college. This means, of course, that she has the mind not just of a songwriter but of a visual artist. This puts her at an advantage when it comes to songwriting. As she explained to me, her creative process is a visual one. For instance, she sees songs in colors: there's a lot of green songs on her new release Mondo Amore. And when she's in the middle of writing a song, she visualizes its landscape. Actually, she doesn't just visualize it: she inhabits it, from gauging the temperature to feeling the ground. As you'll read in this interview, Atkins discussion of songwriting is at times interchangeable with her discussion of visual art.
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