.png)
.png)
Interview: Wishy
Interviewed by Olive McCagh
Wishy's sophomore LP, Nature's Pill, is for mending a broken heart; their bouncing drums and brash vocals pair perfectly with an attempt to escape reality. The Indianapolis-based indie band allowed intention in their "crammed" studio space, toying with hypothetical retellings of their own romantic frustration. They embrace the weird, and the fun, and the DIY of it all, working alongside long-term BFF and producer Ben Lundsmaine. From Indiana to California, to Brisbane, Australia. The whole world is learning the name Wishy, and the lyrics of Mona Lisa. I got to chat with the masterminds behind it all, Nina Pitchkites and Kevin Krauter, not only to test their memory (sorry), but to get an extra taste of that Wishy magic, chatting all things effects, songwriting, and children's choir.
I was wondering what the last song was that you finished on the record?
Nina: That we finished? I don't remember.
Kevin: Dang, that's a hard one. No, that's a really good question.
N: Was it like ‘Headscratcher’ or?
K: No, I feel like that one was dialled in pretty early on. I'm trying to think maybe ‘Sensational’ is the one we added the most finishing touches to.
That or ‘Kiss Kiss Kiss’. That one we really messed with till the very end. That one and ‘Party World’. Those ones were the most amorphous for a while.
Had you been testing these tracks on the road before you started recording the album?
N: I think some of them, like ‘Blitz’, we've been playing; we played it like two or three years ago. I remember the first time we opened for Momma; I think we played that song. But I think there were others from the album.
K: I think ‘All The Rage’, maybe before the album, before we recorded it, we had, or maybe not. No, we had jammed that one and ‘Lovesick’..
Yeah, those were like pretty easy ones to kind of work out with the band before going into the studio. And ‘Mona Lisa’, maybe.
Or maybe we learned that one in the studio. The thing is a lot of the songs, well, those three in particular, we played all together in Ben's tiny little bedroom studio and learned them for the first time. Some of them for the first time in there.
So, it felt like band practice.
Do you think the tracks changed a lot? Those ones that you were testing on the road when you went into the studio.
N: I don't know if they changed that much. I mean a lot of these songs are like reverse engineered where like, we write them first and then learn them later, like touring wise.
K: I think they were all pretty much written. Or no, they definitely weren't. I don't know. It just depends on the song.
N: Sorry, we’re bad at this… [Laughs]
No, you’re so fine, you have a 12-track album, you are allowed to forget the fine details of every single song. There's a lot, a lot of music.
N: It just feels like a hodgepodge a lot of the time.
K: A lot of it was not done before the studio. And that's kind of like a common thing. That's a normal thing that happens for us.
When you say that you write before and you're touring your other set lists. Do you mean two sit together, write the song, you write the parts for everybody, and then you keep it away? Then open that back up and revisit in the studio. Is that what you mean by that process?
K: Yeah, we'll have a new song. And we don't really have super consistent band practices where we're constantly learning new stuff. We practise when we need to for a tour. So, when we’re on tour it's kind of hard to learn a new song.
We don't have all that much time to just do some random practises. But recently we've been in new song learning mode. And it's been really fun. It's the fun-est mode for practising. Practising the same old set gets pretty boring.
N: I'm so excited for this new era, specifically because of that. I love the old songs, but I've been pining for the new crap. And I'm so glad we pretty much know almost the whole album at this point.
K: Yeah, with the whole band.
N: So that's really exciting.
I wanted to ask if the single choices were really obvious for you guys, or if that took like a lot of discussion to choose and decide which ones to release first?
N: It was hard because they're all such, I don't know, we have a lot of, I guess, “bangers”.
I feel like a lot of the songs in the album are like “radio ready”. So, to me, it was like, I don't really care. ‘Lovesick’ and ‘All The Rage’ to me sounded like singles, they sounded like they could be on the radio. And to me, those two specifically were the ones that make sense.
K: Yeah, I agree. Those were like obvious ones. It's also a discussion that like, ultimately, I'm not really thinking about what's the single, maybe like the first and second, but beyond that, it's kind of just like leave that conversation to the label and the manager and the radio team. That's kind of beyond my interest.
Your album explores the complexities of love and life. I have to ask whether you prefer singing about heartbreak or love?
N: To me, performing is always more of a sonic experience in terms of how I feel when I'm performing versus what the lyrics of the song are about.
But also, there are times where I am actually trying to tap into the emotion of the song. But to answer your question, I think maybe, I don't know, love, because love is much more fun than heartbreak.
K: I feel like it's easy to sing about heartbreak. It's not as easy to sing about love sometimes. But you know, they go hand in hand. So, I feel like that's where we end up most of the time.
Could you tell me about recording in LA? Was there anything particular you loved about the studio space that you worked in?
K: Yeah, it's our friend Ben Lumsdaine’s house/studio. He just lives in a two-bedroom in Silver Lake. And one of the bedrooms is actually not even a bedroom; it doesn't have any windows; it's his studio.
And it's very small. But we've been doing stuff there since the beginning. When we started this band, me and Nina went out there to just like record some songs just for fun. That was part of the whole genesis of this project was that studio, that little space in his house. So, it felt really good to go back there and do this album after doing Triple Seven in a big studio. Which was really fun, but also big, you know. I feel like going into this one, we wanted to shrink the space and make it feel a lot more close and immediate sounding and feeling.
Like I was saying, playing all the songs together, crammed in that tiny room, you can really feel the drums while you're tracking. There's just a sense that you can feel it translate when you listen back; you can tell we were all in a very small room together.
There's something about going to spaces where you feel comfortable, and you trust the people you work with. What about you, Nina? Was there anything in particular you love about the tiny room you were in?
N: Pretty much what Kevin said, just the closeness of it. I just love the sentimentality of it in terms of, this is kind of where Wishy took off; it was in this little room. And we didn't know yet, but we kind of did know it. I like returning there because I'm just always reminded of, you know, “the good old days”.
But they're all good old days. But you know it's just more personal. I know we're getting more opportunities now to work with other producers and work in bigger rooms. But I think like me and Kevin and also the whole band, we're humble folk, I guess. I don't think you need to have all the bells and whistles of a giant room and state-of-the-art technology to make a good record. Not that Ben doesn't have great gear, like he totally does.
But you know what I mean? He's from Indiana, like us and so anytime we work with him I'm just reminded of our humble roots.
Nostalgia is a very strong emotion. And I think that's really nice that you guys can tap into that as well, while you're entering a new stage and new record as a band.
K: I think there's an element to it as well, where it's like, Ben moved away from Indiana and lives in LA and has this sick little studio. So, it's really exciting to go there and be like, “Oh shit, we're in Los Angeles.” Like, this is a good homie of ours and he’s doing his shit out here.
I feel like every project we've worked together on, because he and I have made like three albums together before Wishy. Every project feels like a big level up. So, it really feels cool to like work alongside him and see his process deepen and our shared language get more thorough. Every time we make an album, we're learning so many new things about what you can do in the studio. So, that's just really exciting to have a long-term working relationship like that. And to work with someone like Ben Lumsdaine, who’s first of all
the best guy on earth, like one of our best friends and just so good at what he does and so open to trying anything and thinking outside the box.
I was wondering what your favourite vocal or guitar effect to play around with is.
N: Great question. Me, it's probably delay. I'm so shoegaze vocals-coded with the things I like to hear. And I don't know I just love feeling like I'm in a big, cavernous room or underwater or something. Love that crap.
K: We did a lot of blown out vocals on this album. I feel like that was a vibe that I was really obsessed with. But I agree with Nina, especially a really nice well-timed delay. When I hear that, I'm just like, “Oh, yeah”.
I feel like guitar distortion is like such a simple effect that has endless possibilities of shape and sound, and that's really fun to mess around with.
N: I will say anytime I'm producing vocals on anything of my own, I'm always using a telephone effect. I don't know. I love it. Something about it just feels so cute and fun. Like, yeah, ‘I’m around the phone’.
Where would you say Wishy's comfort zone is? Is it in the studio, on stage or in the confines of a private writing session?
N: Maybe the studio. I think it more used to be like a recording studio space, but now it's just like an all-purpose kind of space that our guitarist Dimitri has rented for like 10 to 15 years. And in the beginning when we first started practising there, they had a lot of bands practising there all the time. It's just like a big multipurpose unit. But we've practised there for the last five years, since the inception of the band. I think to me, that's what it would be just because we're all so familiar with that space.
I mean it's not physically much of a comfort space right now because there's no AC in the building. So, it’s really fucking hot.
K: Yeah, it's pretty uncomfortable right now.
N: But like, okay, emotionally and mentally.
K: Emotionally, spiritually. It's a great spot to kick it.
N: We've had parties there. I had my birthday party there in December. It was awesome.
K: Ben's studio also is a pretty comfortable zone. The amount of time spent there at this point, every time we go back, it's like back in the saddle.
You two in particular have been working together for a long time. I was wondering if you could maybe each tell me your favourite thing about working and writing together as collaborators?
N: Favourite thing? Just like how similar of a vision we both have. I think that's so cool and important. It's crazy that the music we'll click on I don't really know many other people who like care about it as much.
K: I know exactly what you're talking about. Like we're in the van and we were listening to like kids choir music and everyone else is just like, “Yo, can we turn this off?”. And me and Nina are just like, “I love this shit”. [Both laugh]
N: Dude, that's so funny you said that because I was thinking that.
Yeah, we were driving in the van around Connecticut to a show and it was this beautiful day, and we started listening to Vashti Bunyan because like why wouldn't you when you're looking at beautiful Connecticut houses in the snow? And then it evolved into listening to children's choir songs and Kevin had put it on and then Dimitri was just like, “Can we change this?” And I was like, “I liked it.”
K: You can’t please everyone.
N: It's okay, to each their own, but that's my answer.
K: I feel like we get excited about really similar specific things that are important to me to. If I can get excited about this weird thing with another person, then I know I can really fuck with your artistic tilt. Because there's a lot of broad stuff that you can be like, yeah, “we both love My Bloody Valentine”, for sure. But there's weird little specific stuff, because we both did choir and shit, where we have a similar experience in this way.
So, our approach to like regular indie music history comes from a weirdly similar place.
That's super lovely. I feel like yeah, that's one of the hardest things in a band is like having similar vision, similar tastes or similar passion for things and similar understanding. So you guys obviously have that, and it makes it a such a cohesive project
N: And also, even our personal values, I think, in terms of direction with the band and, this is more of a holistic answer. I think we're both aligned in terms of, we still want to be good people and not get caught up in the bullshit of it all, like the music industry. Just a similar ethos and I don't really know where we would be without that. Because there are co-songwriters out there who write great together, but maybe they beef super hard. I don't know, I think about Oasis, like they have a similar music taste, but they're never staying together as a band.
Nature's Pill LP is out now
Buy/stream here
