Girlpool’s former half is marking a return to her guitar-heavy roots after her redefining solo debut in 2024. Now, she emerges with her sophomore album, Lifetime, showcasing her world of freedom and the fortune she’s found from it.

Stories born in Old Hollywood, from the streets of Sunset Blvd to Mulholland Dr, formed a Golden Age in cinema. This structured storytelling approach sees the sole desire of a character fuel plot development as it lunges towards a decisive conclusion – often the triumphant victory or “running off into the sunset” happy ending. It built a foundation that impacted film narratives for decades to come, but fast-forward to the present, people are more interested in being fed complex, non-linear growth over idealistic tropes demonstrated in the late 20th century. 

Harmony Tividad and her change-positive demeanour pursue present-day Los Angeles with a differing approach from Classic Hollywood. Born and raised in the City of Angels, the singer-songwriter could be considered to be what the modern Hollywood narrator represents, as she carries out her exploration of love and freedom. 

Opposite to the fixed nature of Old Hollywood film, Tividad’s world is unbounded, open, and receptive to the new and unknown, while remaining true to the essence of one’s self. The proof is within Lifetime, her second full-length release via KRO RECORDS, embodying the acceptance of life’s equilibrium of transitions and constants. Select songs from the 12-track LP being recorded at Sunset Sound, the famed studio in the heart of Hollywood that has seen the likes of Prince, Elton John, and Janis Joplin, feel almost as poetic as the lyrics she spins from emotional intuition and balanced expression.

As she joins our Zoom call, Tividad is beaming after her Pilates class, carrying a radiance that seeps past my computer screen. We start having a true girl-talk right off the bat when she compliments my Hysteric Glamour shirt before heading onto their site to observe more from the brand for herself. Before I even start asking her about Lifetime, it feels like our conversation could’ve spanned the decades from Hollywood’s Golden Age to her LP release this June 2026.

I express admiration to Harmony for her affirmation-style Instagram posts that I’d seen in passing, prior to learning of her past as one half of indie-rock band Girlpool and listening to former solo works Gossip and Dystopia Girl. “I’m glad it’s a vibe,” she grins humbly. “It was something that was coming to me naturally. Now it feels like I don’t have as much striking my brain there in that way.” 

While it’s fun to think of the next great philosophers using Instagram’s Create Mode feature, it’s exciting to hear of her desire to pivot into more long-form writing. “I’ve just started working on a diary-style book, and it’s already long,” Tividad explains. “It’s more journalistic, direct, and moment-to-moment – but I’m still exploring.” Successfully completing the long haul process of conceiving a full body of work is a hurdle that Tividad hopes to overcome. “[Songwriting] is so concrete. It’s done, and it’s contained. I think committing to a project longer in that way is a little more frustrating because the reward is less immediate.”

In its years of conception, Lifetime became a long-term feat. Tividad and her friend/Girlpool bandmate, Avery Tucker, disbanded in 2022 after nine successful years and four full-length albums together. That same year, the first two songs of Lifetime were recorded with producer Yves Rothman. Despite its later release, the making of the album precedes her 2024 solo debut, Gossip. The two LPs, although heavily contrasting one another, were workshopped around the same time. Tividad created a space to redefine herself as a soloist and intentionally decided against releasing songs from Lifetime before Gossip.  “Everyone was like, ‘[Lifetime] has to be the first thing that comes out post-Girlpool,’ and I said, ‘I don’t want this to be the first thing because it sounds so similar.’ It would set a pretence that everything I do after Girlpool will sound like Girlpool. I wanted [Gossip] to be more of a definitive differentiation.” 

Gossip’s electro-pop and 2010s dance-inspired sound provoked a push away from what was expected of her, while Lifetime prompts a return to the inner self, guided by the therapeutic writing between Tividad and her guitar. It’s a cathartic process. “Even if I’m not putting out that music, it’s my way of handling my feelings,” she says. “I like to be very self-contained, and I don’t like to emotionally spill out.” Lifetime became a happy accident of enough demos to turn into an album. Initially, her belief in the songs wasn’t enough to release them as her own. Harmony offered Lifetime lead single “I’m Still Learning How To Leave You” and album cut “Your Strange Addiction” to a friend she chose to keep unnamed, before ultimately deciding to keep them for herself. “At the time, it made sense,” she admits. “I was sick of myself and didn’t want to function in the way that is classic to me anymore. I feel like I’ve returned to what’s native for myself.”

Though Tividad is consistently in pursuit of growth, upholding essence is the principal value in her life. She is constantly experimenting with comfort, and the more we talk, the more her modus operandi sweeps over me. “I love trying approaches to living that are not unique in the grand scheme, but new to me as a person,” she explains. “I don’t think constants are a good thing to count on. I’ve always been very fluid. I learned that there was nothing to hold me down at a very young age.” 

It’s common to not have a formal approach to emotional processing at that age – or any age, for that matter- but Tividad began to find hers through reading and analysing poetry in school. This led her to write more intuitively and resulted almost immediately in a shift in her psyche. Recognising her writing doesn’t have to belong to anyone else introduced her to a sense of grounding found in her journaling sessions, where she inhabits the ability to be simultaneously present with and detached from her thoughts. 

Tividad is a “big advocate” for everyone to journal, emphasising her point with her “the more I say what I’m thinking and the less I’m thinking about my thoughts, the better it is” experience. After all,self-honouring your emotions is an individualistic process. “For an accountant, running numbers is probably very therapeutic,” she shrugs. “We all have different mediums that are manifestations of how we process our inner world, and it’s about negotiating with our own process.”

The line that comes with expressing emotion on the internet is another topic up for negotiation. While Tividad comprehends it as a small source of strength to play with, it’s not a means to fulfil internal dialogue. “It’s really confusing and not helpful. We’re taught to busy our minds and bodies in these ways, but we’re not taught to reflect and process as much as we should be. It’s so easy to get dysregulated now, into this vacuum of endless data and stimulation. I feel like I’m dysregulated, but I have a good practice of trying to balance it.”

In reciting lyrics from the title track and “In The Light of The Sun”, the songs that best represent the album thematically, Harmony’s overarching message in Lifetime is to embrace life’s messiness and enjoy every moment of it. “It’s painful, difficult, and unpredictable, but we keep going,” she beams. “People fall out of and into our lives. The beautiful part is embracing the moment you have with someone and when it’s gone, accepting it with love and grace.” 

The flow of our conversation allows me to notice the subtle ways that talking to Harmony feels similar to my own journal sessions as we hone in on these key takeaways.  Something sparks when she touches on the multi-layered emotion of resentment, which doesn’t find a place on Lifetime – likely due to her skill of externalising safely in her journal. Intentionally, Harmony chooses to focus on sending well-wishes to those of her past in lieu of animosity. “There’s definitely little touchy moments, but in general, [resentment is] not an emotion I try to put in my work.”

Lifetime’s correlation with Old Hollywood – beyond tracks like “Mulholland Drive” and its recording studio location – lies in its differences. Tividad’s storytelling evolves from the idealistic narratives led by definitive, goal-oriented characters. Instead, she submits to inevitable change and chooses to romanticise feminine loneliness. “It’s a constant process, and I don’t want to be someone who stagnates and decides ‘I’m right’ at a certain age,” she smiles in finality. “I want to keep improving, and I think that should always be the goal of living – to be more compassionate and sensitive.” Harmony’s last anecdote perfectly wraps up our conversation, and with each listen to Lifetime, it’s hard not to feel inspired to set the intention to channel its love, light, and openness to the unknown into my day-to-day life.

Listen to Lifetime…

Words – Izzy Petraglia