Selena Gomez and BLACKPINK hopped on the air with Apple Music’s Zane Lowe on Friday morning (Aug. 28) to talk about their superstar collab on “Ice Cream” and what a blast it was to blend their voices. “I’m so excited. The girls are so cool, and I love their music. I just think that they know… They have this thing about them… I had such a good time with them over FaceTime,” Gomez said in her video chat with Lowe.
And while the original plan was for all of them to be together, but of course the COVID-19 pandemic changed all that. “But it felt so fun,” Gomez added, dipping into the fun she had filming the colorful, playful video for the track, which dropped Friday morning. “Recording the song, having a blast doing that, but then also being on a video set and having these cute looks… [I] hope people just feel good, and I hope they like the song.”
“We’ve been aware of her for a very long time and luckily when this song came out on song cam we had the idea to have Selena on it, because we obviously knew she would fit into it right away,” explained BLACKPINK’s Jennie. “And yeah, it happened very naturally.” And while the song is a perfect summer jam, it obviously comes at a difficult time when all the plans the group had made for the year got scrambled.
Lowe asked them what they would have been doing now if things hadn’t gotten derailed by the pandemic. “I think we would be on our world tour right now,” Jennie said. “Yeah, and then have our little days off in different countries, and maybe do a little tour around the cities, because we never really have the time to go travel around the world, so I think with this song, I hope we could bring that somewhere to the people that are listening at home.”
Rosé added that BLACKPINK have been hard at work on a full-length album for the past eight months. “I think it’s made us more focused into completing the album and making it the best thing we can give to our fans, and perfecting it and everything,” she said. “And so, I feel like this album could get a lot of light and energy to everybody being stuck at home not knowing what to do hopefully this can cheer them up.”
She also noted that they’ve been having so much fun in the studio that they didn’t want it to end. “We were talking to our producer the other day, and he was like, ‘We’re on such a roll right now that we feel like even after, we’re almost at the final stages of completing the album, and we were actually talking about how we should keep this on a roll,'” she said of the studio hours they’ve put in every day over the past two months. “Every single day, even if we have different schedules, we finish our schedule and be at the studio. And because, this doesn’t happen every day, where we’re literally working and producing and recording mode.”
They’ve been recording so much that at this point they’re stripping back songs they’ve already finished in order to pull together the best-possible collection they can for fans. “If we’re gonna half-ass do it, we’re not going to do it,” Jennie said, explaining that the chemistry and friendship they’ve built over the years is one of the keys to their success. “We think the friendship between us is a very important aspect for our group, and we try to keep that in a very naturally, like without love, we don’t have to try too hard, but it’s always needs to be there,” she said. “So, we remind each other all the time that, when you’re going through a hard time, we have the hard time with you. Each year I think we learn so much about each other and so in that way we get to respect each other more and give the space that they need.”
Gomez also talked about what it’s been like to move into late rocker Tom Petty’s house during the coronavirus lockdown. And those it’s not completely finished, she said it already feels like “such a haven… it’s that spirit, and knowing Stevie Nicks was here… There’s so much history, so when I’m in that zone, I feel like it’s very special.” It also helps, of course, that she has super-comfy couches that she takes lots of breaks on.
That said, working on music over Zoom has been a bit of a bummer for the singer who craves human contact. “It’s been very difficult, because I love being with people, and I love creating together,” she said. “So that part, obviously, can’t happen right now, but it’s been so nice. It’s like my little lair.”
In celebration of the release, Selena also unveiled her own ice cream, “Cookies and Cream Remix,” in partnership with Serendipity. The custom flavor is just the start of a major marketing blitz, which will also include social giveaways, “parlor in a box” deliveries and a truck driving sweet treats around Los Angeles. While Gomez is coming off her No. 1 album, Rare, BLACKPINK are slated to drop their debut album, Blackpink: The Album, on Oct. 2.
Watch the interview and the “Ice Cream” video below.
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