Almost without fail, the first thing anybody remarks on about Hop Along is singer Frances Quinlan’s voice. It’s one of the most expressive instruments in modern indie-rock: tender but frayed, almost tactile, and it breaks in endless unexpected ways. To spend too much time rhapsodizing that voice, though, is to short the songs themselves. Quinlan’s voice cuts so deep precisely because it works in such concert with everything around it, especially on the Philadelphia band’s new Bark Your Head Off, Dog, which tames the punky edge of the band’s 2015 breakthrough album Painted Shut while expanding their sound, adorning Quinlan’s conflicted prose with rootsy guitars and rustic strings. Ahead of the band’s show at Turner Hall Ballroom on Tuesday, June 12, Quinlan spoke with the Shepherd Express about the band’s process, painting, touring with Built to Spill and life on Saddle Creek.
This record has a very different feel from the last one. Did you know going into the record that you were looking for a different approach to the music or did the sound just kind of come about naturally?
I’d have to say both, really. We knew going into this that experience is such a tremendous benefit to have, and we learned so much while making Painted Shut. And we knew as a band that we do our best when we have a fair amount of time. And also for this record we knew going in that we would want strings, and that we wanted to have the time to just explore possibilities with songs.
How much extra time did you allow yourself?
I think just a couple weeks. It wasn’t anything crazy. In the past I’ve envied bands that take only a week or less to make a record, and even though that’s incredible, I just know that I, and that we as a collective, benefit a lot from having the extra time, because we are all perfectionists with our instruments, and especially myself with the vocals, I just take a long time to flesh that out.
The vocals, are those what you spend the longest time tracking?
Yeah, I take time, and wait until I get the take that I feel comfortable with. It sucks. It’s a strange thing to hear your voice permanently recorded. Even now, after all those times, it’s a little funny to me.
It’s funny, the way you sing doesn’t sound especially rehearsed. It sounds very free.
I try to keep it flexible, because I knew the songs were continuously changing throughout the year. An important thing that I’ve learned is not to be too precious, which you certainly can be with lyrics. I still have difficulty with letting lyrics go, or parts of songs go. But I tried to remain flexible. And I wanted to be a little more subtle, too. I didn’t want the vocals to have as much attack, you know?
For most listeners it seems like the vocals are the thing that really leaps out, which I guess that must be a blessing and a curse. They can easily upstage how much else is going on in the songs.
Well, it’s funny how it can also obscure the words themselves, which I care more about even than… well, I care about them a lot, I guess, both the delivery and the lyrics. So it’s a tough marriage, you know? You want to be able to come across.
The song that leaps out at me is “Not Abel,” just because it takes so many turns. Where do you begin when writing a song like that?
That song is in a way two songs. We came up with the ending first. We were jamming in Dr. Dog’s studio actually for about a week, and we came up with the progression that became the ending. For some reason to me it didn’t fit by self. We all felt that it just needed something else. And then the first half of the song came about, which is really funny. Again, it’s just being able to be flexible.
Are you religious? How much were you playing off the bible story for that song?
I don’t really know how I feel. I was reading the book A Time for Everything, and lot of what I was thinking of stems from that book by Karl Ove Knausgaard. I always mispronounce his name. The book is really striking, I highly recommend it. It talks about the lives of people in the Bible, figures from the Bible such as Cain and Abel and Noah and his family. And it looks at it from a domestic standpoint of people’s lives, which the scripture doesn’t really do at all. The scripture is pretty matter of fact as to what happens, you know? Cain kills Abel and that’s pretty much the story. There’s no examination of their relationship. but the book examines it, even though there’s no evidence to back up his descriptions.
That always put me off. The Bible doesn’t even give you any sense of their personalities.
No you get nothing! You don’t even know how old they are!
Have you ever read East of Eden by John Steinbeck?
Oh yeah! Great book. Man, I haven’t read that book since I was 18. I was obsessed with him for a while.
Which was your favorite?
I’d have say Grapes of Wrath. I mean it’s the classic. I loved Cannery Row. Cannery Row’s a really good one.
Obviously, you share the band with your brother, and you had a song about twins on the last record as well. Are any of those songs about your relationship with him or is that overlap there just a coincidence?
I would say it’s a coincidence. As a sibling maybe I feel more comfortable writing about those relationships. I get nervous whenever I approach something that’s foreign to me, where I have to pretend I know what I’m writing about, which is dangerous territory. But certainly as a sibling I feel more comfortable broaching that subject matter.
You painted the cover for Bark Your Head Off, Dog, right?
I did.
How long have you been painting?
Longer than I’ve been writing songs. I started painting when I was around eight. My mom would take me to these painting lessons in my neighbor’s basement, actually. She’s a truly lovely woman named Marilyn. She used to teach generally a lot of older women. I was the only kid there, but I learned a lot.
That’s such a gorgeous cover. Is painting something you’ve ever considered dedicating more time to?
I wish I painted more. I certainly could if I wanted to, it just requires a level of dedication and focus that I don’t seem to be harnessing so much these days. I did that painting when we were on tour with Built to Spill and Alex G. We had a day off around off around Athens, Ga., and it was from like the back porch of our tour manager’s dad’s house that I was sitting and painting. And I had no plans for it to be the cover, but when I was working on some other crazy idea for it I was looking at it and it just made more sense. But I’m very passionate about painting, I just haven’t… I don’t know. I’ve been thinking about residencies and stuff and going back one day to try to pursue it more seriously again.
Painting always seems like such a tall order to me. Just the act of prepping a canvas, and getting the paint out, and the brushes and the lighting you need. I always enjoy it once I bring myself to do it, but it’s not like doodling, where you can just do it whenever.
Yeah, and once you have that canvas prepped and you’re looking at it, it’s so perfect as it is and you’re about to ruin it, you know! Especially if you built it and the frame and everything, it’s like “damn, I don’t want to ruin this. It’s so nice as it is!”
Were you a Built to Spill fan growing up?
Yeah. Well, not growing up. Growing up I was very much just listening to the radio. I didn’t really find any alternative to the radio, or alternative music. I think I was 15 when I think I heard Sleater-Kinney, that was one of the first not on the radio bands that I heard. So I didn’t really hear Built to Spill until my 20s, but once I did I fell hard for them. It’s cool to have a band where you can go through difference pieces of their catalogue and get obsessed with different parts of their catalogue at different parts in your life. Lately the song “Hindsight” has been my favorite.
That’s an exciting band to me, because they have such an alluring sound, which is kind of what draws you in, but then the songwriting is so rich. That’s a band that explains the world. It explains the universe, and people, and why things are the way they are—they do so much in the span of a song. It’s really remarkable.
It’s really funny, too, because I think I’ve read in interviews that Doug’s not a huge lyrics guy it’s kind of insane hearing that and thinking about it, you know? I guess he’s loose enough to write about whatever the hell he wants, you know?
I asked him about that years ago, because I didn’t believe that. I was talking about how often he writes about feeling alienated and insecure or small or overwhelmed by the world. And his response was, “Doesn’t everybody feel that way?” He didn’t think there was anything special about it.
That’s fair! Maybe that’s the perfect formula then! Really, the looser you are… Well, I guess the less you care the more adventurous it allows you to be. He’s cool, though. He’s such a cool guy.
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Did you get to spent time with him on tour?
He’s a lovely person. We got to hang. Honestly, I don’t know that we’ve opened for a sweeter band. There’s not a bit of arrogance. Not that we’ve opened for anybody who is arrogant, but just considering the legacy they have—or are building, since they’re still playing music—the fact that they’re just so kind and open and generous as people is very encouraging to come across.
The last thing I wanted to ask you about is being on Saddle Creek. When I was in college I was obsessed with the label, so much so that you get to know all the different musicians and producers and personalities. It just felt like the cool kid’s circle.
Oh absolutely!
Was it everything you thought it would be?
It’s a blessing and a curse to have things be demystified for you. That was the first label I ever heard of that was built up by friends and I had never heard of Merge or anybody else that was doing that. That was part of the time I learned you could make something on your own with people you care about, and that’s such a beautiful thing. I got into bright eyes first, but I almost immediately got into the whole catalogue. I got the Saddle Creek 50. I mean I have songs that I’m still obsessed with by bands that aren’t bands on that label. But now we’re friends and the mystery are dead [laughs]. Just kidding! No, it’s great. It’s more than I thought it would be. You can’t really imagine, when you’re fixated with something, you don’t really know it, you enjoy an aspect. But now that we’re friends you know more and I feel a connection with them as people. It’s so cool to graduate to level of connection. We’re very fortunate.
When you think of that label you think of a very specific time and place, Omaha. I’ve heard some of the artists on that label describe it like summer camp, a very close circle of friends together all the time. But like summer camp, it ends and people move on. Is that community still there or did they move on?
I think it has to be different. They’re all adults now. It would be a state of arrested development if it didn’t change, right? I would think? But they’re still friends and they go to each other’s weddings, and as far I can tell it’s all the more enriched in a lot of ways. And yeah, some of them are gone and they move away and go on to other chapters, but as far as I can tell everyone still has a love and respect for each other. I only see it moving and growing and adding great bands.
It definitely feels like they had a renaissance a few years ago. It’s like Discord, where you think of the new bands, but unlike Discord Saddle Creek kind of bounced back and found this really exciting new generation of bands.
Right? You’ve got Land of Talk, Sam Evian, Big Thief, Stef Chura. It’s very cool. And it’s cool to meet those bands, too.
Was there ever a point where you were nervous about the new record, just because the last one was so well received?
I’m always nervous! But honestly, I had the comfort of personally feeling like it was better, just because we’re a better band. Not by virtue of any particular approach. It’s just we toured so much on Painted Shut, I think we all became better musicians and better communicators with each other, and that can only help but make for something strong. I’m proud of everything we’ve made. All our records, they’ve all been incredible experiences, but I’m glad that every record is a change.
Hop Along plays Turner Hall Ballroom on Tuesday, June 12 at 8 p.m. with opener Bat Fangs.
