Max Martin Reveals 'Magic' Method For Writing Songs With Britney Spears, Taylor Swift

Fans of pop music have likely heard the name Max Martin before. With over 70 U.S. Top 10 hits and 22 No. 1s, including Taylor Swift's "Shake It Off" and Britney Spears' "Baby One More Time," Martin has become a force in the genre.

Now, the private producer is letting outsiders get a behind-the-scenes look at how he crafts his successful songs.

In a new interview with the Telegraph, the hitmaker reveals that one of the things he sees as an integral part of songwriting is collaboration. "If you're working with someone whose point of view is really far from yourself, like a young girl in her twenties, the story needs to come from them," he shared, adding, "I like being around people who keep me curious. Experience might be one part of the puzzle, but beat-making and trendsetting, it's a young person's game."

Elaborating on that idea, he said, "In the whole history of pop, from Elvis to Motown to Whitney Houston, great artists have had songs written for them by teams." However, the musician also shared that while he believes collaboration is great, there isn't a right or wrong way to do it. "I think art is art, however it's made," he told the publication.

Word choice is another thing that Martin uses in any way he sees fit. A particularly noteworthy instance of his flexibility in terms of sentence structure came in 2014's "Break Free," Ariana Grande's collaboration with Zedd," where she sang "Now that I've become who I really are" and "I only wanna die alive."

Addressing his method, he explained, "If we come to a place in a writing session where one word might be better sense but the other option sounds cool, I will always pick the one that sounds appealing to me." He then added that "you're golden" if you "say something meaningful with the right sort of phonetics."

He also revealed that the vocals and spacing of the aforementioned words can also play a big part in what works and what doesn't.

"There's a lot of singers who are not maybe considered great but have a sound that's unique and are geniuses in telling the story. If you've done your job, it should feel like no one else can sing that song," he stated. As for the wordplay he includes in his chart-topping songs, Martin said he plays with "super-busy" verses and subsequent "long notes."

"But the thing that happens within the method has to be free-flowing and creative in order to be great," he said, adding, "That's the magic part."