Ellie Goulding felt "depleted of artistic inspiration" after her last tour.
Ellie Goulding
The 'Close To Me' singer wrapped her 'Delirium World Tour' - comprising of 88 shows - in August 2017, and looking back the 32-year-old star has admitted she'd lost her music-making mojo when she moved to New York after the extensive run.
Ellie instead opted to do normal things, which she admitted became "very lonely".
The British star - who lived in the Big Apple to be near to her now-fiancé Caspar Jopling - recalled: "I finished touring, moved to New York, and I was jaded, depleted of any artistic inspiration.
"I just started cooking, going to the dry cleaners, learning piano. "New York doesn't really have the same rock'n'roll scene it used to, and it was very lonely."
However, not feeling pressured to put out a new record gave the the 'On My Mind' hitmaker the "freedom" to write songs that came naturally to her.
Ellie recalled: "I'd often book studios and there'd never be anyone else there.
"But it gave me a kind of freedom, because there was no one telling me to release an album. I wasn't forcing myself to write pop songs about boys and relationships, which I used to be so obsessed with when I was younger."
Among the new tracks on Ellie's long-awaited follow-up to 2015's 'Delirium' - details of which are yet to be announced - is a song titled 'Love I'm Given', about finding the one.
Asked if she has written about her engagement to the 26-year-old art dealer - who proposed in August - the 'Army' singer told The Guardian newspaper: "I have a terrible habit of analysing things to within an inch of their lives, so I didn't want to overanalyse what I had with him - it's something much more pure, and something I didn't need to explain to myself in a song.
"But on one new song, 'Love I'm Given', maybe I was reflecting on how I finally felt I'd found this person that was loving me for the right reasons."
Ellie has previously opened up about her struggle with fame and admits her soon-to-be husband enabled her to be herself "again" after pretending to be "tough" on the outside for so long.
She said: "I don't think I ever got over being thrust into the spotlight, so I put on quite a tough exterior. I never had time to myself, and any time I did was in a hotel room somewhere - I'd probably had a few drinks, knocked myself out.
"I don't know how I could have possibly given a good version of myself to anyone: friends, boyfriends, family. So I'm very grateful Caspar came along, because I feel like I was able to be myself again."
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