When we connect over Zoom on a warm summer evening, Tayla Parx is in the thick of the post-album-drop press circuit. She joins the call from her car, having just exited another interview. In a few days, she’ll be flying from Los Angeles to New York to do it all over again. But despite the rush of promotional demands swirling around the Grammy award-nominated artist’s third album, Many Moons, Many Suns—out now from her Taylamade, Inc. label—Parx’s effortlessly upbeat energy proves she’s the calm in the center of the storm.
It’s taken a moment for her to get back here—to this energy, this particular spiritual vibe. The last four years of the singer-songwriter’s life were rocked by major changes. Her engagement ended unexpectedly. She departed, amicably, from longtime label Atlantic. But these endings paved the way for new beginnings: returning to her roots as an independent artist with complete freedom over her music; playing Donna Summer in the Casablanca Records biopic Spinning Gold in 2023; moving to Nashville earlier this year, where the 30 year old is starting a sustainable ranch and soaking in the historic country scene. “It's been really fun, just getting grounded again after living in LA for so many years,” she reflects.
Many Moons, Many Suns chronicles these peaks and valleys through Parx’s deft lyricism, not shying away from the painful memories but refusing to wallow in them, either. Case in point: wistful opener “Dream Hotel.” The dynamic soul-pop single crystallizes the album’s larger themes of heartbreak and healing as intertwined, often overlapping experiences. In the song’s moving chorus, the Dallas native voices the often-contradictory feelings that follow a breakup. “'Even as I fall apart, I wish her well,” she sings of an ex, adding, “And I think that I'm okay/ But only time will tell.” Embracing the paradox of pain and goodwill, uncertainty and hope, the song echoes her larger struggle to get where she is today.
“[‘Dream Hotel’] is about going through my many moons and many suns, which for me represents the darker days, and then also the other side of those days when you come out on top again,” Parx explains. “You’re really riding with me through that journey—and, man, some crazy things go down. That's heartbreak. But how do you get on the other side of it? You’re really seeing me try to figure that out in a lot of different ways throughout this project.”
A genre-bending medley of country, pop, soul, ballroom, house, and other influences, Many Moons, Many Suns will make you forget you’re listening to a breakup album. While her words speak of sorrow, Parx’s original sound carries listeners to lush sonic heights on tracks like the euphoric “Flowers” and unapologetic banger “Era.” The latter single features Australian singer-songwriter and rapper Tkay Maidza, whom Parx toured with earlier this year.
“We ended up just really kicking it off, honestly. It was great,” she recalls of their time on the Sweet Justice North American Tour. “We were watching each other [perform]. And we're like, ‘We need to do a song together!’ Like, it had to happen.”
Parx, of all people, knows the power of a good collaboration. As a songwriter, she’s helped pen some of the biggest hits of the last few decades, including Panic! at the Disco’s “High Hopes,” Ariana Grande’s “Thank U, Next,” and Khalid and Normani’s “Love Lies”—all of which were Billboard Hot 100 top-ten singles in 2018. More recently, she’s lent her talents to tracks for artists of the moment like Troye Sivan, Kali Uchis, and Janelle Monáe. Whatever magic it takes to become a hitmaker—to conjure up that invisible spark of something that turns a good song into a blazing chart-topper—it’s undeniable that Parx has it.
Like many artists, her relationship with music has been a lifelong affair. “I've been singing since I could talk,” she jokes. Early memories of her childhood spent between Dallas and Corona, California are soundtracked by R&B legends (and singer-songwriters) Babyface and Brian McKnight. But despite her affinity for singing, writing her own lyrics wouldn’t come ‘til later—the multitalented creative was too busy being a child star.
Growing up, Parx trained under renowned singer, actress, and dancer Debbie Allen. At just 9 years old, she landed a job as a performer at the prestigious Kennedy Center in Washington D.C. A determined triple-threat before she’d even finished elementary school, the rising star stood out. It wasn’t long before Hollywood came knocking. Parx, who was still going by birth name Taylor Parks, appeared on several Gen Z-favorite shows (among them: Gilmore Girls, Everybody Hates Chris, and True Jackson, VP) before landing her breakout role as Little Inez in the 2007 film Hairspray.
While other child stars struggle to eclipse their early accomplishments as they age, Parx’s outstanding track record in the music industry proves she’s no mere kid wonder. She’s written songs seriously since she was 17, blessing us with too many infectious pop earworms to count. Writing for other artists, she reflects, can be easier than writing for herself. “You download all this information from another artist, when you're writing for them [...] and it has to come from a place of being like, I'm listening to all that you are. And I want to make sure that I'm representing that in the most authentic way,” she explains. “It's a little bit harder to take [that mindset] when you're writing for yourself, as a singer-songwriter—because it's harder to put up that mirror to yourself, and to have those same hard conversations and try to figure out what your subconscious is trying to say.”
With Many Moons, Many Suns, she’s managed to tap into her soul once more. The album represents Parx’s evolution as both a creative and a person. Building off the glossy, multifaceted sounds of her 2019 debut We Need to Talk and its melodious 2020 follow-up Coping Mechanisms, Many Moons, Many Suns is the product of a mature artist who knows what she wants to say and just how she’s going to say it. This is the most Tayla Parx a Tayla Parx album could be: brimming with feelings, seamless genre switches, and quotable lines that could’ve been taken from your last Notes-app diary entry.
Making it happen meant trusting the process—and being open to the universe’s intervention. “I thought that I had the album done nine months before it was actually finished,” she recalls. “Because I decided to go back in [the studio], randomly. I was talking to the team and living life and all these other things, and I figured, let's just go in for a week and see if there's anything more that I have to say. And there were about four songs that came from that, that weren't originally on the album. I'm so thankful that I did it, because some of those records are my favorite ones.”
Now that the album is out in the world, Parx’s fans—whom she affectionately refers to as her ‘Taylatots’—are eagerly awaiting the opportunity to experience its 13 songs live. Luckily, she plans to deliver. “We're about to be able to go through my many moons and many suns together, live, this fall,” she tells MOOD. “I'm going to be heading to LA, New York, Chicago, London and a few other spots. I'm very excited to start announcing those official dates.”
In the meantime, she’ll be returning to Nashville to develop her new ranch and a sustainable merch drop, the latest in a string of miscellaneous ventures (i.e. contributing voiceover work to the beloved The Sims video game franchise) that have kept her busy outside the studio. To reference the metaphor frequently applied to Snoop Dogg, Parx has completed the main story—now, she’s just doing side quests. Expect no half-hearted effort, either. Talking with the seasoned singer-songwriter, you get the sense that she’ll always find something new under the sun.
“I feel like my whole life is [doing side quests],” she says with a laugh. “I'm always doing something outside of music, just making sure that it's still something that inspires me. And I'm able to make decisions creatively based off of that. So, I'm always chasing that inspiration. I'm always chasing my curiosities.”
With many moons and suns still to pass, Parx is poised to expand her TaylaMade empire to celestial heights. Feel free to grab your telescope. This is one star you won’t want to miss.
