Stepping into Momma’s world – the blistering Brooklyn quartet composed of singers and guitarist Allegraa Weingarten and Etta Friedman, bassist and producer Aron Kobayashi Ritch and drummer Preston Fulks – you are instantly greeted with lo-fi indie rock and fuzzy guitars. If you’re blasting their last LP ‘Household Name’, that list expands to include lyrics circling pining for a hedonistic rock’n’roll lifestyle or how a lover is their ‘Medicine’.
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Now, the group have reached a metamorphosis – one achieved following an intense two-month-long headline tour in the summer of 2022 in support of their third album while navigating infidelity, loneliness, heavy drinking and the start of new romances. Today (April 4) Momma release their latest and most vulnerable offering yet, ‘Welcome To My Blue Sky’.
What may be the biggest difference with their latest album is the change in sound. The LP sees Weingarten and Friedman lean towards a more pop sound reminiscent of something you’d hear soundtrack the opening scene of an early-noughties rom-com.
“It was a pretty natural thing that happened more in the writing process as opposed to the production process,” Weingarten tells NME over Zoom the day after Momma made their television debut on Jimmy Kimmel Live!. “With ‘Household Name’, we had already used all those old tricks of loud choruses and big muffs, so we just wanted to start relying on new ideas for this record.
“The writing process was mainly us writing acoustically. When you’re doing that, you’re not visualising stepping on an overdrive pedal or getting loud. You’re focusing on melodies and song structure, so that’s how that happened.”
So, working acoustically was what made you guys realise this was the sound for your fourth album?
Etta Friedman: “Yeah, it gave us a lot more room to play around sonically later down the line. Acoustics allowed everything to feel a lot more intimate and led us to have a better connection to the songs, giving us an open mind as to where we could take them.”
A big reference point on this album is the summer of 2022, what was it about that time that led to the genesis of the album?
Allegra Weingarten: “There was a perfect storm of a million different things that happened that were formative for us. It was right after ‘Household Name’ came out, and it was our first proper tour.
“It was overwhelming and exciting, but also lonely and Etta and I both had separate romantic situations that ended in different ways. When you’re on tour and you’re spending time with someone in that way, it becomes so much more poetic. Your feelings become deeper and emotions are heightened.”
EF: “We were experiencing the exact same shit from different perspectives. There was no way not to write about the chaos of that time. It felt like in order to process what happened to us, we had to write about it.”
Were there any other bands/musicians that you guys were listening to while creating the album, and did any of their sounds/musical techniques inspire you?
AW: Yes, Hovvdy. Specifically, their song ‘True Love’. Hovvdy is a good example of a band who make big choruses without relying on guitars getting louder, necessarily. They rely on a lot of vocal layering and atmospheric sounds which inspired us. Alex G put out ‘God Save The Animals’ that summer too. Eiafuawn, Kaki King. That was what I was really into.”
EF: “Also, the bands that we were lucky enough to be touring with, watching how they chose their chord progressions, how they’d play certain chords or what tunings they’re using definitely helped expand my own writing a bit more.”
Are there any artists or bands that you guys have been listening to now or have seen live that you would recommend?
AW: “Narrow Head. They’re also one of the best live bands I’ve ever seen. Villagerrr, Ex Pilots. Graham Hunt.”
EF: “Wishy, Brennan Wedl, This Is Lorelei, Kim Deal.”
“Can I wish it away / I never thought that before” serves as the opening line of ‘Sincerely’, the opening track of the LP. Where did that line come from? What was it about that song that felt like the perfect intro to the album?
EF: “The whole song was a letter to everyone that we’ve left behind and to who we once were. We both left so much behind, and then realised we actually never want to go back. It was really chaotic.”
AW: “I was also in the middle of ending my long-term relationship. That’s what that line refers to specifically. It was an important and conscious decision for us to open the album with something personal because it was a way to lift the veil.
“‘Household Name’ was so character-driven, and a lot of its lyrics were ironic or funny. This record is the complete opposite. It’s autobiographical and it was important for us to introduce the listener and show that everything we were saying in this record is about ourselves and all that has happened.”
A lot of the album’s lyrics see you guys being vulnerable. What was the process like for opening up and tapping into those raw emotions?
AW: “It was really cathartic in a lot of ways and also really scary. Each song said exactly what we needed to say, and I’m very happy with the decisions we made about which ones ended up on the album. I can’t wait for the people that we wrote them for to hear them.”
Is there a fear of highlighting those personal emotions and having everyone hear them?
EF: “I’m honestly really excited. I feel like enough time has passed where I’m pretty secure. There are some songs like ‘My Old Street’, when we showed that one to our parents, that was really scary. I remember being like, ‘I hope you guys understand.’ That one will always be pretty scary to perform.
“In terms of the vulnerability of the rest of the record, I am excited to perform the songs because I hope people are able to understand that making mistakes is fine, and sometimes you have to make them.”
AW: “I completely agree in terms of being scared to play the songs live. I am just a little too removed now, I’m comfortable with the decisions we’ve made. Those feelings don’t feel as tender, but maybe when we play them live, they’ll come up in certain ways.”
What do you guys think makes good songwriting these days?
AW: “It’s melody. I care way less about lyrics now than I probably did when I was a teenager, but sometimes the melody is so good that it adds a new meaning to what is being said. Also, just not overcomplicating it.”
In an interview with Wonderland, you guys shared that you have a mantra: “Sometimes, you just have to make a hurricane.” How was that incorporated while creating the album?
EW: “That kind of plays into what we were talking about earlier where you just kind of have to fuck up. Sometimes you got to fuck shit up to be happy and that’s just the weird fact of the matter.”
AW: “The mantra was about songwriting as well. I agree that sometimes you have to make mistakes, and you can’t overthink if you’re going to make mistakes all the time. If you want to do something, you want to do it for a reason and to me, it’s like ‘Act now and ask for forgiveness later.’
“We had so much material to work with and there were so many times on that tour where we looked at each other like, ’Are we gonna write about this… is this too far… Is this crossing a line?’ but sometimes, you just gotta make a hurricane, and that hurricane turned into this record, which is a beautiful thing that we’ll have forever.”
‘Welcome To My Blue Sky’ was produced by your longtime collaborator and bandmate Aron Kobayashi Ritch. How has your relationship with creating a new body of work evolved?
AW: “With this record, he was getting more of a final product since Etta and I would finish two or three songs a day because we had so much to say. He transformed a lot of the feeling of those songs with his production ideas. For example, the beginning intro sound of ‘I Want You (Fever)’, that’s all Aron, and that’s what made that song. ‘Bottle Blonde’, that’s all his production and programming. We didn’t even think that we could take the song in that direction, and then he did.”
EF: “What made us feel like we could welcome Aron into our writing was that Allegra and I have such a symbiotic language with how we write because we’ve been doing it together forever and Aron somehow already knew how to speak that language.
“Him being able to tap into that was awesome and necessary for us, because it really expanded our minds. He’s taught us a lot too.”
What is the main thing you want listeners to take away from ‘Welcome To My Blue Sky’?
AW: “I hope that people would be excited that we sound different and they accept that and fall in love with these songs in the same way that we have.”
Momma’s new album, ‘Welcome To My Blue Sky’, is out now via Lucky Number.