Frankie Cosmos: Greta Kline Talks New Album and Single 'Vanity'
Indie-rock outfit Frankie Cosmos is storming through the streaming charts, with 1.6 million monthly listeners on Spotify and a growing cult following in Asia.
Led by Greta Kline’s signature dreamy, minimalist lyricism, the band crafts introspective songs that explore heartbreak, self-discovery and the passage of time.
Their recent hit ‘Vanity' was released in Apr. 2025 and quickly garnered nearly 200,000 streams on Spotify.
Frankie Cosmos is the stage name of Greta Kline, who first cut her musical teeth on the internet, sharing music independently on the quintessential DIY platform Bandcamp. She began to perform under the alias Frankie Cosmos in 2011. The band is made up of Greta Kline, Alex Bailey, Katie Von Schleicher, and Hugo Stanley.
Frankie Cosmos is set to release their latest album "Different Talking," on June 27, 2025 via Sub Pop. “Different Talking” is Frankie Cosmos' sixth studio album. Their most textured album to date; "Different Talking" is a luminous meditation on the quiet conflict of growing older and holding space for our past selves. This bittersweet collection of songs honors the wide-eyed courage and comfort of her early twenties, while charting the chanteuse's evolution into uncharted emotional terrain.
"Different Talking" marks the first time Frankie Cosmos has self-produced and arranged tracks without external studio producers. The result is an album that feels more experimental and expansive, blending elements of country-fried noodling with delicate synth textures.
Ahead of the album’s release, Frankie Cosmos released their lead single 'Vanity,' a track that embodies the tension between “adult and kid, government and governed, planet and blade of grass,” as Greta describes it.
They have also followed up with their latest single, 'Bitch Heart,' released on May 7, 2025, alongside an official music video directed by Eliza Lu Doyle.
Ahead of the album’s release, The Beat Asia spoke with Greta from her apartment in New York about the challenges of self-producing "Different Talking" and the inspirations behind the new single 'Vanity.'
Congratulations on the upcoming release of your album "Different Talking." How are you feeling as it nears release, and what does it mean to you after six albums?
Thank you, I'm excited! There's a lot to do, which is fun. Every record feels special to me. When I’m in the world of the record, it always feels like the most exciting thing I've done, but this one is particularly meaningful because of the way that we recorded it.
I feel especially proud of what we were able to achieve without a producer, and the sound [of this album].
The title of the album "Different Talking" is very evocative. How did you come up with this name? Could you tell us about what sort of feelings or personal experiences inspired the songs on this album?
It came from something my three-year-old godson said. My band started using it as a slang term, and we just thought it was a cute phrase. But it started to mean that something is different based on the tone of how you're saying it, either [in a] good or bad [way]. We would use it when we were making the record to describe a guitar tone, or a take of a song, or the coffee that day. So when Alex said, 'Different Talking,' everyone in the band was like 'Yes,' because it became part of the way that all of us speak.
How do you think this album fits in with the broader scope of your work?
In the scope of all my records, I like to think that my songwriting follows my aging process and the way I reevaluate my feelings with distance and hopefully some more wisdom as I get older.
A huge difference is the personnel on the record, having two new bandmates from the previous albums. Katie and Hugo brought their own different styles and that changed the sound a lot.
The fact that we recorded it ourselves had a big effect on the sonic textures we were making. We all felt close to the actual sounds, because there was nobody between us and the computer, and we gave ourselves a lot of time.
This album marks the first time Frankie Cosmos has arranged and recorded without an external producer. Can you share a bit about what your experience collaborating with the rest of the band was like?
It was exciting and scary, but not easy. We were developing our chemistry as a band, because we hadn't played that many shows the four of us, and arranging the songs while we were recording them.
I've never spent more than 10 days recording an album. We were recording ['Different Talking'] for 40 days, and it was the most time we've had to take breaks. That was a huge part of it — hanging out with each other and being able to explore and try stuff out, it was a really rewarding recording experience.
It got me back in touch with feeling naive and young about music, and it felt good, but also hard. There were times when I was losing my mind. I realized that so much of a producer's job is to tell the band when to stop and come back to something, so it was a test of strength.
Did you face any other challenges during this process?
A big challenge was trying to record to tape. We had started recording, and it kept cutting in and out. We realized the tape was defunct and had to get a new one.
Katie and I were like, it doesn't have to be tape, but Alex and Hugo really wanted to record to tape. We were just butting heads a little bit about how much the physical part of recording affects the process, and how much we all cared about that. So it all worked out, and we were able to do the basics to tape, which was really cool. Katie was working hard on the tape machine; it's a lot to maintain!
That’s an interesting way of recording music. Why did you decide to do this?
It's a cool way to record, because you don't have as much freedom, and you have to get it in a certain number of takes, you can't re-record over tape too many times or it starts to lose quality.
I did my first two records to tape — 'Zentropy' and 'Next Thing' were both two reels of tape. It's part of why my records — up until the last two — are how the band sounds live. It’s like we're playing our live set and you're just hitting record and capturing everything at the same time. I'm glad that we ended up doing it [recording to tape], because it is a way more organic process.
Given your experience self-producing this album, would you consider going down this route in the future?
I think I would. If you had asked me the day we finished, I would be like, 'I'm never doing that again.' But now that it’s been eight months since we finished recording, it feels amazing.
It's really up to Katie, I would say, because she did the most physical labor, being the engineer. She was cleaning the inside of the tape machine every day with a Q tip and making sure it was in good shape. Also having to play her instruments near the machine so that she could hit record, because it was just the band, there was nobody hitting record for us.
Is there a song on "Different Talking" that you feel particularly proud of?
I picked 'Vanity' as the first single because it was the one that I wanted to play for my friends first when we finished the record. But I don’t know if I have a favorite. I guess I was really proud of 'Margareta' because we played it live a couple of times, and it was hard to get the take when we were recording it because it felt like a live song. Maybe that’s the one I’m most proud of at the moment.
Congratulations on your lead single Vanity’s recent release! What were your inspirations for this single?
I never know what the theme of a record is until I'm done. Time is a big one for me, just being a part of the universe and feeling small in the universe in a cozy way (or a scary way!)
I’m trying to find humor in some deep rage I have and turn it into something that’s fun, and see what comes out of it. That's part of songwriting for me, just following the song and not feeling so much ownership over where it's heading.
Can you walk us through the creative process behind 'Vanity?'
I was in a part of New York that was kind of empty, and passing this big cemetery called Green-Wood Cemetery. I had just walked five and a half miles and probably had another mile left in my walk, and I was singing to myself because I was alone.
I have the audio recordings of me singing 'Vanity' to myself, the melody, and the words for the chorus. When I went home, I tried to figure out what chords to put behind it. There's a version where I put these minor chords behind it, and it sounds a bit spooky. The part about speaking to the planet 'oh Jupiter' just happened.
What does 'Vanity' personally mean to you, and how do you think it will connect to listeners who may be grappling with similar feelings?
It’s an angry song, but it's also fun and funny. It’s about getting older and finding outlets for your anger and laughing at it, and that being a path to forgiving yourself for having feelings.
I'm obsessed with this old Liz Phair demo, which is about feeling like an ant in Alaska. Everyone has felt that, and the beauty of that, and feeling part of the universe is part of what 'Vanity' is about.
I’m interested in time and that it's expanding forever in both directions. For me, 'Vanity' is about being 30, and [being] 16, and remembering being 16 when you're 30. Those are like the bookends of the song, but time makes them expand in both directions. It’s about forever being part of the line of time moving.
Are you doing any upcoming tours to Asia?
We don't have any planned right now, but hopefully this is something that we will work on for next year or the coming years!
What’s next for Frankie Cosmos? Any upcoming projects or music?
Just this record. I'm really excited to get the whole thing out. Thank you for talking to me about it. I hope everyone likes the rest of the album!
Watch the Official Video for 'Vanity' on YouTube here, and the music video for 'Bitch Heart' here.
Stay connected to Frankie Cosmos on their website, Facebook and Instagram.
Get the latest curated content with The Beat Asia's newsletters. Sign up now for a weekly dose of the best stories, events, and deals delivered straight to your inbox. Don't miss out! Click here to subscribe.
