Babehoven on the Vision Behind Their New Album

How did you come up with the title of the album?

In what seems like a rapidly changing music industry, there’s a lot of self doubt, a lot of not knowing how to move forward. People rarely see an artist’s lived experience. Ryan noticed many of my lyrics incorporate “seeing” something—a someone, a concept, a feeling. So ‘I see them, I see me’ as a lyric in "Three Red" and as a title reflects the experience of the different realities we all live within, even when we’re literally seeing the same thing. None of us have the same experiences or the same point of view. There’s a Parallax view of ‘my reality’ vs. ‘our perceived reality,’ a difference in looking at someone else’s reality versus their lived reality.

Do you have any songwriting rituals?

Honestly, no! Sometimes I won’t write for months at a time. Sometimes I’ll write 5 songs in a day. It just depends what I’m feeling. I describe the process of songwriting as feeling pregnant with something, knowing there’s something inside of me that has to come out, sitting down and releasing it out of my mind and body without overprocessing it, without judging myself. Sometimes I’ll write a ton of songs without writing any of them down. I write by playing guitar and singing stream of consciousness, recording it to voice memo and then writing it down afterwards. Some songs aren’t meant to be captured and I appreciate that. Some songs are meant to be labored over. Some slip out suddenly. Some come out while I drive in my car sans guitar, sans piano, sans voice memo, and I like them way better than anything I’ve ever released.

What were the most important parts of your routine while creating this album?

Sleeping! Eating well! Taking time to be alone and process. We also chose not to record this entire album at home which was different from other albums. Normally we deep dive into every song, just the two of us, and spend months on end investigating every possible outcome of the song. For this album, we decided to work with other engineers, go to different studios, lighten the load for Ryan on his own to engineer it. It made the process way more fun and relaxed overall. We still got to tweak things once we got home, and add layers as we wanted them, but we didn’t overdo the process by doing it all ourselves.

How do you know when a song is working?

We both tend to get excited and hyperfixated on a song once it’s working. It feels like a blast of energy that’s hard to ignore. It makes me want to jump around and yell out. Often I do. It makes us want to stay up all night working on it together.

How did you pick your lead singles?

We had a lot of help choosing singles. We asked lots of trusted friends, our manager, our label. Ryan labored over the decision a lot too. I have a hard time selecting singles because every song feels important to me. I often like our slower, more emotional songs, which aren’t necessarily conducive to being singles. So I often defer to others to help me decide.

What were some of your core inspirations for the album?

Jumping above stress: The album artwork is a direct nod to the title—I See Them, I See Me—as the goal of jumping over/above is the ability to float through the differences and challenges we face as people. Floating through it, soaring above it. We can mitigate how much we let the chaos of our times in. We can engage but shake it off. We can see it, feel it, but also be carefully and tactically distanced, disentangling ourselves from the web of despair it’s so easy to fall into. The fine line of jumping and falling comes to question here: are we falling from the sky? Are we jumping through it? What is the difference? Is it just the point of view? Are we in distress or are we transcending the pain?

Tuning from Skullcrusher: Ryan and I have been inspired by a tuning that Skullcrusher uses on many of her songs. “Wave,” “Jess,” and “Lasagna” are all songs that came out of us using this tuning. We learned about it when we were on tour with her, and also when Ryan recorded with her. It was exciting to try a new tuning, and it brought about some of our favorite songs on the record. “Wave Has a Place” and “Jess Has a Place” are almost the same song. We just liked the chords so much that we ended up writing two versions of the same song and loved both. We like having them be connected in title too as a nod to their similarity.

Climate change: As always, climate change, fires, floods, uncertainty come out a lot in my writing process. Am I in a Dream is a good showcase of this with the section about LA’s fires. LA is my home and the fires last year really affected me. How do we live when we don’t know how our future will possibly take shape? Do we ever know how the future will look?

Vocal injury: Between demoing these songs and officially recording them, I had a terrible vocal injury. My vocal cord was paralyzed from covid and it’s been a long and challenging recovery process. I was told by a couple ENTs that they were unsure if I’d recover. It was very scary. This is part of the I See Them, I See Me title as well; I see my peers being able to sing, tour, go about life as usual and I could barely speak for a couple months let alone sing. Being totally out of control was very scary especially as music has always been something I fall back onto to process my feelings. I have so much gratitude now that I am able to sing again. I think part of the ‘having fun’ we’re talking about is trying to really enjoy what we can do, the gifts we have. We wanted to enjoy the process rather than stressing about it, especially now that we know what it’s like when I couldn’t do it at all.

Witnessing genocide: Witnessing the genocide of Palestinian people and now the war in Iran is another poignant aspect of the name I See Them, I See Me. Seeing the other, witnessing mass murder, entire cities leveled, feeling distanced from it and not knowing what to do. Who am I? Who are you? Where does the line get drawn?

What was the most surprising challenge you faced?

Definitely my vocal injury! That was a major surprise and obstacle we had to overcome.

When did you start working on this album? How long was the process, start to finish?

We started working on this record before our last record came out. We had over 30 demos by the time we started fully recording this album. It was a two year process.

What are each of your favorite lyrics on the album?

My favorite lyric on this album is from our song “Three Reds”: There is clay inside the earth, rip it out, make a bowl, there are shapes to all the folds, fill them up. There is green inside the green, there is red inside of me, there is blood I see them, I see me.

What’s the strangest thing that’s ever inspired a lyric?

Probably a lasagna!

Your upcoming album follows the Babehoven tradition of titling a song after (presumably) a friend—Annie on Nastavi, Calliope and Marion on Light Moving Time. Can you talk to us about them, and about Jess, who has a song titled after her on I See Them, They See Me?

Annie is one of my best friends from college who had lent me her shoes on the day I had written Annie's Shoes (a very literal title). She is thoughtful, creative, driven and spiritually in tune.

Marion is my housemate and dear friend who lightens every room she walks into. She is deeply wise, warm, welcoming and intuitive. She is like a warm breeze full of fragrant jasmine.

Jess is a friend who is nonjudgemental, available for emotional discussions, eager to deep dive and connect. She is someone who you can turn to in times of distress. She’ll give you a big, long hug and a kiss on the cheek. She makes everyone she meets feel seen right away. She has a magic way of connecting with any person she meets.

Who could you not have done this without?

Ryan. Ryan is my collaborator, my love, my best friend. He supports me and understands me. We grow more and more together every year. He teaches me how to love and trust. I teach him the same. He adds so much to our music. What started as my project has grown to be firmly a collaboration between the two of us. I am endlessly grateful for that growth and trust!