On practicing patience

You’ve said that Bunky Becky Birthday Boy is inspired by Alexis’s late dog, Riz. Was Riz a Sleigh Bells fan?

Alexis Krauss: Well, she was a mysterious creature. But based on the love that she showed us, especially on tour and all of her many zoomies on the tour bus, I’m going to say she was a pretty big fan.

Derek Miller: We also hear her on the first track on Bitter Rivals. She’s the dog at the beginning, so she’s technically a performing, contributing member of Sleigh Bells.

Alexis: Exactly. She could ask for royalties. “Bunky Pop” was Derek’s effort to make a track that embodied her and her spirit, and I think he really succeeded in that. That song really does make me think of her in so many ways.

Derek: We turned the idea of Riz as a human being into half of the record. The other half would be Roxette, who represents Alexis. I’m definitely a little more Bunky Becky, a little more Riz—like a dog who playfully wanders into a room and starts knocking stuff over. They mean well, they’re just loud. Riz had a seizure in 2022. She was unconscious for two or three minutes, and Alexis called me crying. A week later, I got the idea to try to write an anthem for her. I tried to make a track that felt like her sprinting through a field, basically. Even though it is specific to a dog, it works in a less specific context as well. It’s really just about two friends. Even though there is autobiography in there, it’s really about any friendship that lasts. There’s going to be lots of ups and downs and you see each other through all of it.

You’ve worked together for almost two decades. What keeps your collaboration generative and invigorating?

Alexis: If it felt tired and stale, or if there was animosity that had built up, I don’t think we’d be doing it. Not that we wouldn’t care enough to try and fix things, but at this point, our relationship is so solid and the creative relationship is really pretty fluid. It’s something we both look forward to.

Derek: This is advice that I’ve given to younger artists who have asked me about the creative process: try to make music that you are, at least temporarily, madly in love with. Maybe it’s just a riff, maybe it’s a verse in a chorus, maybe it’s a complete arrangement. I want to get to a place where I record a new idea and I get in bed at night and I listen to it 19 times in a row staring at the ceiling, and on the 20th time I’m like, “This is madness. Go to bed.” So I put my phone down, I turn the lights out, and five minutes later I put my earbuds back in, turn the light on and listen to it three more times.

I feel like I’ve been in that zone since I was a teenager. Since I was 16, I’ve had at least one piece of music that I am absolutely dying for people to hear. Doesn’t mean it’s any good. Sometimes it is, sometimes it’s trash. You never know. But if you’re in that space where you’re madly in love with what you’re working on while you’re working on it, it’s very, very easy to move forward. And that’s the space that we’ve been in really since the beginning.

The first thing we recorded together was Infinity Guitars… We recorded the first rough vocals for Infinity Guitars [for a few hours] before we heard a knock on our door; it was these two kids that lived down the hall. I started to apologize, but they said, “It’s cool, what is that?” And I remember looking at you, Alexis, and looking at them and being like, “I guess that’s our new band.”

The riff on “Wanna Start a Band?” was something you’ve been working on since 2014. When do you know when it’s the right time to revisit old work?

Derek: Anyone who makes records, especially if you’ve been doing it for a while, has a mental Rolodex of existing sessions with moments that are really great. You don’t know what the texture or the tempo or the key should be, but you know that there’s something there. All I had for “Wanna Start a Band?” was the ascending part of the riff. That’s all it was. It was this little pleasurable thorn in my brain that just sits there until I solve it. It took a long time to find the verses and the rest of the riff. It turns out it took almost a decade.

I think I’ll probably make records for the rest of my life. I don’t know who will listen or if they’ll be any good. I don’t mind if I have to wait years. I think it’s just about having patience. Right now I have 30 or 40 sessions, and each of them has something really special, even if it’s just a bar. I don’t mean to make it sound momentous, by the way. There’s just a couple of ideas, but in my life, it’s momentous.

Alexis: Derek is really discriminating about the best ideas. There’s been multiple times where we’ve recorded something and I’ve gotten really excited, and then I’ve gotten almost pissed at him because he starts to doubt it. Then there’s the process of mourning the shape that it had taken. There’s a song that I fucking loved that didn’t make this album. But there’s been very few times, if any, where that patience hasn’t paid off in terms of creating a song that I think was better than what we had initially. I think that patience has really benefited the band.

Do you ever try to purposely disconnect from the creative process?

Alexis: Derek, one thing I’ve noticed is that when you’re in that more contemplative state of brainstorming or developing a direction for one of the new records, you’ll often do this thing where you’ll say, “I’m making tracks for [another] artist. This isn’t Sleigh Bell’s music.” I love that idea. I love the idea of Derek producing for other people. But in the back of my mind, I always know he’s going to switch soon and send me a song that we can work on. I think that’s a way that you maybe step into a more exploratory mindset.

Derek: I love when that switch happens. That happened recently with something I shared three weeks ago. We don’t have any vocals written yet, but in my mind it was for somebody else. It’s just a fun game to play, to trick yourself. Every time I do it, I’m convinced: “This time, it’s not going to be for Sleigh Bells. I’m going to keep it out of that lane. I’m going to keep crash cymbals and cymbal chokes and high-game guitars out of the mix. Blah, blah, blah.” But it usually tends to come back around, if I love it enough.

Something I love about Sleigh Bells is how consistent the vision is. How much is that natural, and how much is it through an intentional shaping of the record?

Derek: I feel like it happens naturally. We’ve gone pretty far outside of what we would consider to be the Sleigh Bell sound. I always use a track from 2017 called “And Saints” as an example. For that song, I literally made a list of everything recognizable as Sleigh Bells and was unable to do any of those things, any of my usual tricks. So we ended up with a really simple Arp synth, some lush pads, Alexis’s vocal, and that’s it.

Alexis: I think one of the reasons why that melody took the shape the way it did is because it came out in one longer melodic take, which doesn’t always happen. A lot of our stuff will go part by part, or verse by verse, and then we’ll work on the bridge. That one all came together at once; I think it was because the track had space for that.

Derek: I have to resist my natural impulse to impact the speaker really intensely. I like cyan; I like things that are bright and shiny and aggressive, but in a pleasurable way. I want it to be joyful and euphoric. Most music that’s sonically aggressive has a very dark, heavy aesthetic. Lyrically, it’s very dark. The artwork is very dark, the merch is very dark—and I love that. That’s great. I just feel like there’s so much more to be explored with music that is sonically intense and aggressive but is more playful. 100 gecs is a great example of that. I was so excited the first time I heard 100 gecs. Bits of Poppy’s record I Disagree as well, are really fun and playful. Just so it’s crystal clear, I’m not shading metal or hardcore. I come from that. I love those records, but there’s really a lot of room to mess around. It’s a big sandbox with not a lot of people in it.

I think it’s fair to argue that many artists who often get classified as hyperpop, like 100 gecs and Poppy, were heavily inspired by Sleigh Bells. How did you feel when you encountered this newer crop of artists who share elements of your sound?

Derek: It was so exciting to hear the next wave of artists who are exciting and inspired and connecting. It’s truly an honor. At first, it can make you feel old, even if you’re in your 30s. And a little scared, which is natural. I’ve exchanged really, really lovely messages with Dylan Brady from gecs. It was great to hear directly from them that they were influenced by us. In turn, they have influenced us: I borrowed from gecs on Texis and a little bit of this record. It’s like the circle’s complete.

It’s not even borrowing a specific thing… It’s just the feeling. There’s just a life and a spark and a spirit and a playfulness that I feel like, at our best, we have. And when you hear it in another artist, it just makes you want to step up and be great as well. Not in a competitive way. I feel like we’re only ever in competition with ourselves.

Alexis: Personally, I’ve never felt particularly compelled to identify with a specific genre, but I do agree that listening to Poppy’s album or listening to 100 gecs, there is that feeling of just wanting to lose your shit. There’s this completely un-self-conscious, rowdy intensity—but then also this saccharine sweetness and playful giddiness. The marriage of these components is so compelling. As Derek’s said, it’s a feeling. It’s a spark. To be considered amongst bands who are really doing that well, it’s a huge privilege and a huge honor.

Derek: We should mention Charli [XCX] as well, who finally reached the masses with that sound. Right after True Romance came out, Charli opened our UK Reign of Terror shows, and within three minutes of the first set, I was like, “Enjoy this moment because she will never be opening for us again.” Even then, as a little kid, she was great. To watch her do her thing has been really incredible and inspiring, especially with Brat.

Why do you feel like that intense, over-the-top sound is speaking so much to this current moment?

Alexis: I spend a lot of time with young people and teenagers. I think young people have access to so much music and so many different ideas and styles. You seldom hear about a young person talk about a guilty pleasure. Kids are so much more exploratory and open to so many different genres. When I was growing up, marrying pop and hardcore wasn’t groundbreaking, necessarily. Bands have been doing it for a long time in different ways. But there was always this feeling, at least for me, that there was almost something shameful about pop, or that hardcore was more authentic. Young people have a disregard for that, and it’s created so much more space for young women and femme people to go to, say, a Turnstile show. That band is so exciting. You look at their fan base, and those shows never would’ve looked like that 20 years ago.

How did the lyrics for the new record come about?

Derek: A lot of times the instrumental will inform the lyric, or I’ll have something kicking around. I’ll send an instrumental and then a lyric file to Alexis and say, “Go nuts. Do whatever you want, move things around, change it.” Once she gets her hands on it, she definitely colors it in the best way.

Alexis: I think of melody first. When I’m listening to a track, I’ll usually just start with some mumbles or syllables. Once I have a melody that I think is worthy, I’ll try and add the lyric into that… A lot of times it’s a piecemeal assembly. But there have been multiple times where Derek is like, “No, this is really what I think should be said here.” I love that this record has a narrative it’s telling. You’re going through a relationship with the characters, a storyline, especially with regards to Riz. It’s almost like a word scramble: How do I put this together in a way with a melody that’s going to do the track justice?