Ahead of her show Friday at the Palace Theatre in St. Paul, Waxahatchee’s Katie Crutchfield spoke to The Current’s Jill Riley about the making of the acclaimed new album, Tigers Blood.

Waxahatchee is generally accepted as the name of Crutchfield’s music project, but what is it exactly? “Sometimes I look at it like it's a TV show, and there's new seasons,” Crutchfield explains. “And so Tigers Blood was like a new season of the TV show with a whole new cast.”

That cast includes producer Brad Cook, along with musicians Phil Cook, MJ Lenderman and Spencer Tweedy. “That’s the band,” Crutchfield says. “It just all came together really organically.”

Listen to Crutchfield’s full interview with Jill Riley (and read a transcript below) detailing how songs on the album came together, and how Tigers Blood is really like a new season of a TV program, the follow-up to 2021’s Saint Cloud.

Interview Transcript

Jill Riley: Tigers Blood is the sixth full-length album from Waxahatchee, the follow-up to Saint Cloud, an album that kept fans company in the early days of the pandemic, and a title that taught me that there's a St. Cloud, Florida, not just a St. Cloud, Minnesota, which is where I went to school, and I thought, "OK, Katie Crutchfield must have driven through Minnesota, she's got a whole record about St. Cloud," I was completely wrong. So I learned something there. But Katie Crutchfield has assembled an impressive cast of musicians for this new record Tigers Blood. It's out now. And I have Katie on the line with me, Katie Crutchfield, how are you?

Katie Crutchfield: Hi, I'm good. Thanks. How are you?

Jill Riley: Yeah, I'm doing very well. You’re playing the Palace Theatre tonight here in St. Paul, and I wanted to take a little time to check in with you about the new record. We did a listening party when Tigers Blood came out. That was a very cool thing. Talking about the new record, if we could get some of the backstory and talk about the players, because really with Waxahatchee, like, is it a band? Is it a moniker? Is it a rotating cast of characters? So I wonder if we could kind of start with where this record started, being that it was the follow-up to Saint Cloud.

Katie Crutchfield: It's really weird to say this, and I'm kind of like, it's a working thing. So go with me on this journey!

Jill Riley: Sure.

Katie Crutchfield: Sometimes I look at it like it's a TV show, and there's new seasons. And so Tigers Blood was like a new season of the TV show with a whole new cast. 

Jill Riley: I love that though. Yeah.

Katie Crutchfield: I wanted to approach it really similarly to how I approached Saint Cloud. At that time, when I made that record, Bonny Doon was my favorite band, period. And they're from Detroit. If you don't know Bonny Doon, go listen. But I really wanted to hear how their band's sound sounded with my songs. And I took a similar approach with this one. At the time, when I was first, like, writing all the songs for Tigers Blood, MJ Lenderman was my very favorite. And I thought, "Wow, let's get him in the room and see how that feels." And then that sort of spurred the whole thing. So Jake — MJ Lenderman — is a part of the band; Brad Cook, who's like my longtime producer and collaborator, and then his brother Phil Cook, and the great Spencer Tweedy. That's the band.

Gallery: "Tigers Blood" collaborators

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Jill Riley: Yeah, I love it. The first time I heard the Cook brothers was with their group Megafaun. They were part of that kind of world of, you know, Justin Vernon, Bon Iver. So we got to know so many different projects through them. Now, Brad Cook produced the last record, Saint Cloud, you brought him back for this record. Is there something about kind of these two records that you've made together? Do you consider that kind of a turning point or even like a step forward, an evolution somehow?

Katie Crutchfield: I really look at it as pre-Saint Cloud or pre-Brad Cook, and post. I feel like the albums are connected in that way. But I'm not really sure. Like, I could see that it'd be the same forever. You know, I could see us making records for a really, really long time.

Jill Riley: Yeah, when you put out the record Saint Cloud, it came out at a time where people could really spend some time with it. But at a time where I think people were, you know, kind of emotionally vulnerable, had some time to sit with the record and take it in. There's a lot of relatable content, as we like to say, in the album, and but for you, personally and professionally, relatable to quite a few people, but not everyone. And do you feel like you're kind of continuing — you know, the songwriting that you're doing — continuing that kind of journey with this new record?

Katie Crutchfield: You know, I think that when I was younger, I sort of defensively made everything for myself; it was like I really didn't like considering the listener. I liked to try and make something that felt like as authentic to me as possible, and then if people related to it, great. And if not, like, that was fine, too. I think now as I age, I'm really thinking about the listener. And a lot of the time thinking about like, a lot of my listeners are my exact age going through similar things as me. So that's something that every record gets a little bit more in my mind. And I really relish the opportunity to kind of like, try and find a way to bridge the gap between my hyper-specific experiences and how to sort of poetically communicate them in a way that will be relatable to the listener.

Jill Riley: Yeah. I'm talking with Katie Crutchfield of Waxahatchee the new record is called Tigers Blood. Tonight, Waxahatchee at the Palace Theatre. You were talking about the players on the record: producer and musician Brad Cook; you've got Phil Cook; MJ Lenderman — again, this name that we've been hearing a little bit about, but certainly a lot more since we've been playing your new record; Spencer Tweedy, I read that name and I went, "That's very cool to kind of see him come into his own as a drummer," because somebody that, well, I mean, we know his dad, Jeff Tweedy, very well, of Wilco. When when you were assembling this group of musicians, I guess, did you have people in mind before you even put pen to paper? How did this just kind of start to develop?

Katie Crutchfield: There were a few. The first song I wrote for the record was "Lone Star Lake." And then I didn't write any more songs for six months, probably. So I was just kind of like hanging everything on that one song. And it felt like sort of a different vibe from Saint Cloud or for what I had done previously. Then we got Jake in the room, and that was just sort of like the first idea that we ran with, like, let's, let's try and see how that feels. And we jammed with him, and it was really fun. And you know, he played drums some, and it was just me, him and Brad, really, jamming. And then right before he had to leave, we tracked "Right Back To It." And the version that we tracked really sounds super similar to the finished version, or like all of the core elements are there. And then, on a whim, Brad was like, "Why don't we have Jake sang a harmony?" And when we heard that, that was sort of something that we all felt like, "We need to chase this; how this is making us feel, we need to chase that." So that was really a moment, too. And then Jake left, Brad and I kind of had like a long conversation about, "OK, how are we going to do this for real? This jam session was really fun, like, what's next?" And we both decided let's go back to Sonic Ranch, which is the studio where we made Saint Cloud, and let's approach it the same way. And who would be the dream band in that scenario? And you know, within a couple of minutes, we were like: Spencer, Phil, and me, Brad and Jake. So it just all came together really organically.

Jill Riley: I'm talking with Katie Crutchfield of Waxahatchee, talking about the new record Tigers Blood and the basis of "Right Back To It," and that was really the first song that we heard from the new record. Katie, I have to ask you, even in how you have named things, you know, even Waxahatchee, you know, a place, maybe a time and a place, even Saint Cloud, a time and a place. Tigers Blood: a time and a place? Where did that name come from?

Katie Crutchfield: The last song on record is called "Tigers Blood," and when I was writing that song, it was the last song I wrote for the record. The beginning of that song, I'm trying to think of like childhood and innocence and summertime, and I was like conjuring all these memories. And I remember this snow cone flavor that I ate as a kid called Tigers Blood. And so as soon as I thought of that, I was like, "That's got to make it in a song." Even if like, no one knows what that is, it's gonna conjure a good image. So once I put that in the song, I was like, "Well, that has to be the title of the song." And then as I was thinking about record titles, I just couldn't stop coming back to Tigers Blood, it just conjured the right thing. And with Saint Cloud, it was similar where I didn't have like a really deep, great reason for naming the record Saint Cloud; it just was evocative, it conjured something for me, like an essence or something. And that's basically the same story with Tigers Blood.

Jill Riley: Well, this is great because you're helping the image of Tigers Blood, because I think Charlie Sheen just gave it a real bad rap, and we need to bring innocence back to Tigers Blood.

Katie Crutchfield: Yes.

Jill Riley: I'm talking with Katie Crutchfield of Waxahatchee. You know, speaking of time and place, Saint Cloud, but more with Tigers Blood, did you find that you were in kind of, almost like a reminiscent place, like you're here, you're present, but really kind of reflecting on the past?

Katie Crutchfield: I think so. And I've always really tried to do that in my songs. You know, going back into the past really helps track how I've grown and changed. I really listened to these new songs and feel like I'm a different person than I was on my early records. And I like the contradictions. I like seeing the growth. So I do think looking backward is kind of how you establish who you are today.

Jill Riley: Yeah, I would agree. And when we started talking, you know, even talking about, you know, Saint Cloud and continuing with Tigers Blood as a turning point, and a big part of your story is with Saint Cloud, you know, talking about, you know, sobriety and talking about this new chapter in your life. How are things going for you?

Katie Crutchfield: Things are going great.

Jill Riley: Great! I really feel like as far as how the battle shows up in my songs, Saint Cloud, I was like this ball of newly sober anxiety, and with Tigers Blood, I really settled into all of it. So I think you can really hear that in the songs. You know, I think there's a certain amount of of like, settling in, but also of peace and comfort, you know, peace and comfort personally, but also this peace and comfort professionally. And all these, you know, great players that you have around you. Can you talk a little bit about the song "Bored"? And I think we'll go out with that one. Give us kind of the the backstory on it.

Katie Crutchfield: Sure. So that song, it's like a people-pleaser's lament. It's about sort of like feeling like, everything inside is screaming no, but your mouth is still saying yes. And then finally, you just kind of fall apart. And that's like that song is sort of the rage that comes along with that.

Jill Riley: Yeah, I hear. I think there is a certain point in life, and I'm in my early 40s and I struggle with that, you know, this choosing kindness and patience and peace, but then on the other hand, feeling like I'm angry because I feel like a pushover, but then I'm also trying to be kind to people. I am terrible at finding that middle ground, and so I found this song to be really relatable. Now is this the one with the pedal steel on it?

Katie Crutchfield: Yes, it is.

Jill Riley: Yeah, could the pedal steel player Nick Bockrath? What band is he in? You have to remind me. 

Katie Crutchfield: Nick is in — oh my gosh…

Jill Riley: Wait, is it Cage The Elephant?

Katie Crutchfield: It's Cage The Elephant! So I wasn't there when they tracked that. Brad was at Sonic Ranch, and a beautiful thing about Sonic Ranch is that it's like a compound of studios, so you never know who's gonna be next door. Sublime was like rehearsing next to us while we were making the record. So you never know. But Nick was down there working, and Brad was working on a totally different record at that point. We had already tracked “Tigers Blood,” and he just called Nick down and was like, "Can you come play steel? I hear steel on this one part of this one song." Then Brad just sent it to me and was like, "What do you think of the pedal steel?" And I was like, "I love it."

Jill Riley: Yeah, it has, on its own, has just a beautiful sound and like its own voice, but it really just complements the feeling of the song, and really I think the the tone of the record. So that's great. Well, you never know who's going to be down the hallway. So very good that Brad Cook had that connection. So you know what? This record is great. We've been playing like three or four songs from it. I know your fans are looking forward to the show tonight at the Palace Theatre here in St. Paul. Tigers Blood, out now. Waxahatchee — the new season of Waxahatchee! — currently on the road. Katie Crutchfield, thank you so much for checking in with The Current, and I wish you the best on this tour. And you've got quite a tour in front of you.

Katie Crutchfield: Yes, I do. Thank you so much. Thanks for having me.

Jill Riley: All right. You are listening to The Current.

Credits

Guest – Katie Crutchfield
Host – Jill Riley
Producer – Derrick Stevens
Digital Producer – Luke Taylor

External Link

Waxahatchee – official site