Heartbreak is, it must be said, part of the fabric of the human condition. But Jersey-born, Carolina-raised multi-hyphenate Asiahn—pronounced “Ahh-zee-yahn”—says it’s about what we do with the time between heartbreak and new love that matters most. “We need a break,” she says. “We need to live. And we need to remember who we are.”

The singer-songwriter—known for penning hits for massive stars like Jennifer Lopez, Pitbull, Drake, Lil Wayne, and Dr. Dre—sat herself down for a long, hard conversation about what’s next after heartbreak. “It’s time to learn about yourself,” Asiahn remembers thinking. “It’s time to remember what you want out of love. And it’s time to explore yourself: your sexual side, your spiritual side, and your mental side. And after you’re done healing, you’ve gotta get out there and actually live life.”

Living life and reconnecting with herself led Asiahn to create her new EP, The Interlude, her third body of work—a project that serves as a “brief pause to breathe” between the second and third installments in her critically adored The Love Train series. Lush with live instrumentation, sensual moments, and “trappy, ethereal vibes” throughout, The Interlude is a tight, five-track EP that introduces new sides of Asiahn’s personality that fans haven’t seen before. “They’ve only gotten to experience me being deep or fun with subjects around love,” she says. “Now I get to show them something entirely new.”

All the songs on The Interlude started from organic, “bomb jam sessions,” Asiahn remembers. Magic started happening once she gathered her creative team for a writers camp in Atlanta. “Once the musicians got their groove, it took me about 15 minutes to write each song,” she says. “Then it was time to record. I co-produced the tracks by picking and choosing which additional live instruments I used. In some instances I told them what to play, or let them vibe out, and I placed the parts where I wanted them”

The Interlude kicks off with a mission statement in “My World,” a song about inviting someone into your space but establishing the rules and setting boundaries that accompany blossoming new relationships. “Gucci Frames” looks back on the people we’ve all left behind, the friends whose toxicity dragged us down, the hangers-on who always want to be there for our highs but never feel like staying for our lows. “Like, no, you weren’t a great friend to me before, so I don’t want you to be a great friend to me now,” Asiahn says, laughing. “This is me saying: I’m so sorry, I can’t see you with my Gucci frames on!”

“Get Away” shows Asiahn’s musicality in its purest form as it tells the story of wanting to escape reality with someone. And create and love in a world that lets you, just be you. “I wanted to be involved in everything in a very Berry Gordy Motown way,” she says. “A lot of people don’t know that I play a lot of instruments, so to be able to lock in the sounds I wanted to hear? Being involved in every step of the process? That’s all so important to me, because at the end of the day, my music is my identity, and I can’t expect anyone else to know what I want to say and how I want to say it. I’m the best person to tell my own stories.”