AMBER MARK: STILL FIGURING IT OUT

WORDS MAISIE JANE DANIELS

Amber Mark was raised between continents — from Tennessee to New York, Miami to Berlin, with formative years spent across Asia — her world has been shaped by constant change, cultural crossover, and a deep sensitivity to sound and feeling.

With Pretty Idea, that sense of movement settles into something more intentional. The project feels like both a release and a reflection — a body of work that carries the emotional weight of time, quietly held and finally let go. Blending warmth with vulnerability, it captures an artist stepping fully into her own rhythm.

Fresh from an intimate run of U.S. shows — where upgraded production and a fuller live sound mark a clear evolution — Mark remains most connected to the human side of performance: the shared, often unspoken exchange between artist and audience. It’s here, in the space between dancing and feeling, that her world comes into focus.

Now, as she brings Pretty Idea to the UK, the promise is simple but powerful: a live experience rooted in emotion, release, and connection — what she describes as “dance crying.”

In conversation with F Word, Amber reflects on her global upbringing, the realities of life on the road, creative collaboration, and the quiet moments she returns to in between — offering a glimpse into an artist who is still evolving, still feeling, and still figuring it all out.

Maisie Daniels: Welcome to F Word, Amber! If you were going to introduce yourself, how would you do it?

Amber Mark: My name is Amber Mark. I’m figuring it out. Musically, I would say I'm a singer-songwriter and producer. Emotionally, I would say I'm all over the place. I like to put my feelings into song, as many artists do.

Maisie Daniels: You’ve lived across many different places growing up, can you talk us through those different places and how that's shaped your sound and taste in music?

Amber Mark: My mum loved to travel. She was a hippie traveller woman. When I was born, I was born in Tennessee. We lived between New York and Miami for a while, and then we ended up going to Asia. She brought me to India when I was nine years old, and she wanted me to have that experience, so she took me out of school and I was homeschooled. We lived in Thailand for a bit, then we went to India and we did a little bit of Nepal.

In between all that time, during the summers, I was flying back to New York to stay with my family there. So I was still having that New York base in my life, and then later on in my pre-teen years, we moved to Berlin. My mum was German, so she decided to live there for a while, and then eventually I moved back to New York and finished out the rest of my high school years between New York and Miami.

I’m between New York and LA now. So it's been a lot of travelling around, mostly as a kid. Now with the job that I've chosen too, but it definitely was a huge inspiration for me. I feel like when you're a kid, you absorb so much information so quickly, and so I think a lot of my taste in music has to do with what my mum was listening to at the time, and then just my surroundings growing up as a kid, and all the different sounds I heard. I think I subconsciously, even if I don't realise it, am attracted to those sounds and use them.

Maisie Daniels: You’ve been touring since the end of February, and you’ve now finished the American leg of it. How are you feeling now that that chapter is closed?

Amber Mark: It was amazing. It went by really fast. It always goes by really fast. It was a smaller tour in terms of the locations — we didn't do that many — but it was really cool. We definitely upgraded in terms of stage design. We added a guitarist to the band full-time, which was pretty exciting. So it was cool to witness the growth in real time. That was pretty awesome.

And then, of course, getting to see fans singing along — that's always like the ultimate dream, and just such a good feeling. When people connect to it on their own, in their own ways, it's such a beautiful feeling. It's the best part about being an artist — touring and performing.

Maisie Daniels: What do you do to reset physically and mentally after these tours?

Amber Mark: This is a really good question, and I don't know that I've really necessarily figured it out. I hide away in my little cabin in LA, and I'm just there with my cat.

Maisie Daniels: What’s your cat’s name?

Amber Mark: Her name is Malu, but she has like 50 billion names — I don't think I ever call her Malu. Unless maybe I’m upset with her or something, I use her full name, but right now I've been calling her Mooshm or Mushu.

Maisie Daniels: Cute! So you hide away…

Amber Mark: I become a homebody. Not that it's a bad thing, but you have to exert a lot of social battery when you're on tour, meeting the fans and everything. It’s really the most exciting part of the tour. But as somebody who requires a lot of alone time just to refresh and recharge, it can be a little draining. But it doesn't really hit me till after the tour, and then I just don't want to see anyone.

Maisie Daniels: I can imagine you're on high alert, lots of adrenaline, and it’s like someone's pulled a switch out.

Amber Mark: Yeah, it does feel a little bit like coming down from drugs post-tour — not that I would know — but it does feel like there is a pretty intense comedown.

I get really emotional with goodbyes and those moments of change where you’ve been doing something routinely for a while, and then all of a sudden there's this switch-up. But I guess it wasn't as intense for me because I knew that we were going to continue the tour in the UK, but it probably will be after this tour.

Maisie Daniels: Last year you were on the North American tour supporting Sabrina Carpenter, which is amazing. How has that experience shaped you as an artist?

Amber Mark: I mean, it was amazing. She is such a powerhouse. It's so inspiring just watching her do her thing and how much she does — the whole production behind everything she does, and just how much work she puts into it — it’s amazing to witness.

Some of those venues were bucket list locations for me. I've been dreaming of performing on the stage at MSG for pretty much all my life. That was just so surreal that I was even given that opportunity. It was just a dream.

We're very close friends, so it's cool to get to tour with someone I call my bestie.

Maisie Daniels: You have the likes of Rebel Rae, who's supporting you on your tour. How does it feel being on the other side of that dynamic?

Amber Mark: We had two supporting acts in North America — we had Rebel Rae and also Sherwyn. Sherwyn and I are really close friends. He wrote a bunch of the songs with me — the past two records I've done, he's been very heavily involved in those.

I highly recommend touring with your bestie. It's really fun. It's always a very supportive atmosphere, the sense of community between all of us… and they're both really talented. I just feel very blessed that I get to have them on tour with me.

Maisie Daniels: How are you feeling about the “Pretty Idea” era now it's out in the world?

Amber Mark: Honestly, it feels really good because I've been sitting on some of the songs for years. I'm happy that people are connecting with them and at the shows, people are singing along to them.

I was really exploring a different sound with this record — not drastically different to when I was first an artist — but I had gone down a really intense yacht rock phase, as crazy as that sounds. So it was interesting to see where we went when we wrote those songs.

Maisie Daniels: ‘Don’t Remind Me’ with Anderson Paak is such a great track and video! How did that collaboration come about?

Amber Mark: Anderson and I have known each other for some years. We actually met at a Silk Sonic show in Vegas. Obviously I had known of him. I don't know if he had known of me — I think he did, I don't know.

So we had kind of connected through that, and then we would always just see each other out and about. And Sherwyn — he's one half of the twin — and his twin, Kendo, they work together. Kendo, his twin brother, is a producer, and so’s Sherwyn. He is very into the writing side of the process. They're a really good duo, and I work very closely with them, and they work a lot with Anderson as well.

I had been working on the record, and Kendo was going into the studio to work with Anderson and was like, I'm going to play him the album, because the album was kind of done at that point, and we were just talking about features, etc.

Honestly, that song — when we made it — I thought, this is an Anderson song. So it was serendipitous that he ended up being a part of it.

I go to bed quite early in Los Angeles and he’s a very late-night session kind of guy. Anderson works into the early hours in the morning, which could never be me. I woke up that morning to a text from Kendo with a demo version of his take on the second verse. I didn’t even know they were doing that, and if he wants to breathe on any of my songs, I'm happy.

I guess he connected to “Don’t Remind Me”, and that was the song he ended up picking. One thing led to another, and we were going back and forth because, you know, we wanted ad-libs and stuff like that, and just trying to make sure that he was happy with everything and how it sounded.

Then we asked him to be part of the music video, and that's when we really bonded over the song. I didn't even see him during the whole actual process of making the record — that was all done in his own time. When we shot the video, we were able to celebrate the song, and he's such a good vibe. He's so funny. Yeah, he has such good energy — all smiles constantly. I'm so blessed that I got to have a song with him.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CvhIZDYEjw8

Maisie Daniels: Who would be your dream collaborator at this point in time?

Amber Mark: Stevie Wonder is number one. And then Sade — it’s not anybody really contemporary. They’re legends.

Maisie Daniels: The Pretty Idea tour diaries are really fun. I'm really enjoying seeing the little snippets of the behind the scenes.

Amber Mark: We were going for Spinal Tap…

Maisie Daniels: How important was it to show the behind the scenes?

Amber Mark: Honestly, it wasn’t important to me at all — it was more important to management [laughs]. I get we gotta show more personality, and at first I was like, why? But now I obviously understand why.

But I didn't really see the vision until we started filming it. My bestie, Satya, who was filming all the behind the scenes, comes on tours with us. We're all so close, so she was able to really capture everything. We couldn’t have gotten that with a random person who just came on tour with us, because she's really close with the band, and she's really close with me — we’ve known each other since we both lived in India.

She was able to capture the goofy sides of all of us. And then on day one of rehearsal in Nashville, when she started filming, we concluded that we were going to go for this “The Office” version of tour diaries and experiences that were happening. We would lean into it for the confessionals. So the drama between the guitarist and the keyboard leans into that.

It all stemmed from reality, so that's where I had the Spinal Tap/documentary side of it, but it’s all real. Everyone really loves each other. There's no actual beef. It’s very entertaining.

Maisie Daniels: You’re heading into the UK side of the tour now. How are you feeling about this side of the leg?

Amber Mark: I'm very excited. First of all, I love London. I love the UK. It’s always fun to go to completely different countries. I feel like America is amazing to travel as well, but it's just interesting going to different countries and getting to experience that.

Maisie Daniels: What can fans expect from the live show?

Amber Mark: Well, I will be singing [smiles].

I would say they can expect a feeling of release, emotionally. There's some quite emotional moments. Then there are some moments where it's just a lot of dancing and moving and very up-tempo. I like to call it “dance crying”, or “cry dancing”.

Maisie Daniels: Does what you request in your rider change, depending if you're in the UK — do you ask for English breakfast tea?

Amber Mark: No, we haven't changed it. But now that I'm thinking about it, we probably need to change the riders to fit the UK, because you definitely don't have Spindrift here — we have that on the rider. I’m in the UK, so we should get crumpets…

Maisie Daniels: What energy are you bringing into summer 2026?

Amber Mark: Hopefully a lot. I say that now, but as soon as the summer hits, I want to be going to this place, that place, travel here and there. And then it's August, and I'm like, I haven't really gone anywhere unless it's on tour.

But I also love staying at home. I don't know — spontaneity is nice…

Maisie Daniels: Last question — what’s your favourite F word? It can be any F word!

Amber Mark: Fairies — I used to be obsessed with fairies when I was a kid.