“Yeah, I’m checking out different cultural things,” she says in her soft-spoken voice. “I’m also still working on music and on getting some more songs together with my current live set-up, and re-working them for the next set of touring that I’ll be doing in a few weeks.”
Alpers’ third album as Bachelorette is a self-titled affair; a fascinating aural journey into a world defined by the blurred space that exists between humanity, computers, and emotion. Described by Q Magazine as “a lo-fi, one woman version of Animal Collective,” Alpers’ musical vision remains utterly uninfluenced by anybody else; she writes, records, and produces her music all on her lonesome. It will also be her last album recorded under the Bachelorette moniker.
“Computers really allow people like myself to see through ideas that wouldn’t have been able to be implemented in the past,” she explains. “It’s interesting to see what you can come up with, with that technology available. It can be a fun way to work; it has its benefits, but at the same time it can be boring, ’cause if you don’t have anybody else to feed off and it’s just yourself, then sometimes it’s hard to stay excited about something when you’ve got no one to be excited about it with!”
When asked if this is why she’s abandoning the Bachelorette name, she reveals that it’s not so much the loneliness – it’s more to do with a general fear that her music will begin to sound too much the same. “I don’t know if I’d join a band,” she says. “I don’t really like the touring lifestyle a lot. I like seeing shows, but I don’t like everything that comes with traveling year after year and not having a place to be stable for a while.” She pauses for a second as what sounds like a FDNY truck goes screaming past wherever she happens to be at that moment. “There’s that,” she continues, “and I think also I have the feeling that if Bachelorette continues, then I’ll probably end up making music that’s not much of a departure from the stuff I’ve already made [as Bachelorette]. So I just want to put myself in different situations where I have to think different musically, and also [work with] other people, and have a bit more fun.”
Recorded in America, England, New Zealand, and freaking Libya (What was it like there? I ask. “It was hot,” she replied), Bachelorette‘s songs unfold with a lovely balance between ethereal, dreamy loops and wistful, nearly whispered vocals. How do the songs come together, I ask, and what does the writing process entail?
“I generally start off with a melody, or a vocal melody, and then everything else sort of follows from that,” she reveals. “I try to listen to what I think the material needs. I definitely don’t have a clear idea of the exact style or what instruments I’m going to be using or anything like that; I make those decisions as I go while I’m recording. Some songs I just work on a little bit over a period of months, and other songs I might just work on over a couple of days. It just depends on the song, really.”
But surely recording in different locales influenced the overall dynamics of the songs that make up Bachelorette? “It’s not really a conscious decision on my part – I think your environment always has some influence on what you come up with, I’m sure,” she says. “I wanted to see if I could work on music in any environment, rather than just hiding away in a cottage, which is what I’ve done when I’ve been working on previous albums. But it was kind of hard to get into the swing of working when I was traveling a lot. It wasn’t until I went to Virginia and had a couple of months staying in a cottage in the country there that I managed to really get the album finished.”
Something about cottages, then? Alpers laughs gently. “Yeah, something about cottages, and something about being in the country. It just – I need a lot of space to myself and as few distractions as possible, and I can focus on the music.” I mention to her that it reminds me a bit of the transcendentalist Henry David Thoreau, and his stay in a little cabin whilst he was working on his seminal masterpiece Walden, Or Life In The Woods. She agrees. “I’m sure it depends on the person, but I’ve come to accept the fact that if I work on some stuff all alone, I need a lot of space to do it in; it’s pretty hard, and it can be challenging to just stay motivated, and stay excited about working on stuff when you’re just answering to yourself and no one else.”
So what can one expect from her upcoming shows? “Well, [the shows] have changed a lot over the years,” she says. “I started performing more stuff live, and harmonizing with myself using different effects – it’s more of a challenge for me to juggle everything, and certainly more exciting because there’s a bit more variation when I play, and it’s not the same every time. I use Ableton Live mainly for looping and sampling, and I have a bunch of different peddles. I also have visuals happening, that a friend of mine in Wellington did for me.”
Sounds like she’s been busy in New York. Working holiday, then?
“Haha, yeah, kind of,” she laughs. “I think so. I think my whole life feels like a working holiday.” She pauses for a second. “You know,” she says thoughtfully, “touring’s kind of like that, too.”
