“I love all the food vendors on the street here,” says the bubbly and talkative Hodgson, reached on the phone from a recent stint at CMW in Brooklyn. “We’ve been practicing every day here and part of our ritual is to check out this guy who sells whole fresh coconuts and chops them up with this huge machete. So we walk around drinking out of this huge coconut. And then we go and get dumplings or something. It’s a gastronomical adventure here.”
The band have certainly been on an adventure of sorts recently. After the release of Teeth Lost, Hearts Won founding member and drummer Alana Skyring left the band. For a band that had succeeded as a three-piece, the effects of Skyring’s departure were immediate. Hodgson confesses that the loss of Skyring directly contributed to The Grates’ desire for a change of pace. But even then, she couldn’t have predicted how drastic the change would be.
“We wanted to head into uncharted waters. That’s why we came to America. When we were in Australia, it wasn’t challenging enough. We were just too far into our comfort zone; we couldn’t have anticipated how far out of that zone we would end up getting in New York, after Alana left. At the time she left, I understood why she left. But then when the reality off actually writing the songs with John set in, I was quite surprised.”
Still, the band gained a new lease on life during the recording of the bombastic Secret Rituals. Every hook became more potent, every crescendo more intense and Hodgson’s vocals showed a renewed sense of purpose. Her robust new approach was born out of the band’s new approach: when separated from the routine, the results can be that much more striking.
“The upside of [Skyring leaving the band] was that it threw us in the deep end. I’ve learned things about my voice. Timbres and speeds that I never knew existed. Things that I might have just touched on before.”
The benefits of exposure to unknown territories didn’t just produce great results from Hodgson’s voice. Secret Rituals may be chock full of guitar-oriented pop perfection that bounces through speakers with gusto, but there still remains a seedy underbelly. Hodgson found heft in exploring the darker edges of her psyche. It’s an interesting balance, considering the cheerful sonic nature of The Grates. Yet she understands that it was an honest transition.
“I’ve always considered myself a happy person, but I learned a lot about myself while writing [Secret Rituals]. When you’re writing, you draw so much of who you are out of the people around you. When we got over to [Brooklyn] we had no friends and family. Then when Alana left, there was one less person for me to learn from.”
As a two-piece, The Grates are lean but forceful, poppy yet pertinent; it’s as if Patterson and Hodgson were forced at each other directly in the eye and try to make the kind of music that both of them would feel proud to stand behind. As with any relationship, it wasn’t always easy for the two of them to communicate their visions of how each song should end up.
“When I was writing the lyrics for Crying All Night,” John’s immediate reaction was to write the brattiest guitar parts for it. He wanted the guitars to sound bratty and obnoxious. That’s how he felt he would’ve dealt with a break-up. But that’s the opposite of how I dealt with stuff. It did take a lot for me to find the confidence to be totally honest while writing. It was even harder considering I didn’t have the security blanket of Alana’s drums. The second that I sung everything, John could hear it.”
He must have liked what he heard. Now three albums into the game, The Grates are giving hope to those who consider the divide between pop and rock music to be an astronomical one. Instead, Secret Rituals features tracks that act as an ode to what many consider to be the last great age of rock ‘n’ roll: the mid ’90s, when hearing a rock band on popular radio wasn’t a rarity or a cause for hipster outcry. Hodgson admits that while The Grates might play a brand of music, they still owe a debt of gratitude to their forefathers.
“We’re fans of pop, in the way that Nirvana would write a pop song. I love music that’s driven by guitars and drums, but you can’t deny a cool catchy melody. Again, maybe in the way that Frank Black writes them. They’re catchy but not overly saturated. We never wanted to be too shiny. I guess recording in New York had a lot to do with that. We were influenced by its sophisticated dirtiness. Like well-structured junk.”
Hodgson speaks so passionately about her band that it’s tough to stop her when she gets on a roll.
“It’s a dream we’re chasing: to write a song that’s accessible and catchy but still has a lot of integrity to it. Finding that perfect balance is always a challenge. So while we were writing [Teeth Lost, Hearts Won] it became a matter of doing what we pleased and seeing what happens. And then maybe we can build on what those bands that we love were doing. We didn’t want to be told how to do anything. Whereas with [ Secret Rituals] we definitely wanted to do a little looking back on what we’d done. And maybe that came from the fact that it was just John and I writing the album this time.”
And in the end, The Grates only have each other to thank for their success. It’s been said that New York is the city that never sleeps, and The Grates have adopted this mentality, doing their best to roll with the punches and put forth the kind of effort that they ought to be proud of. Ever the optimist, as our conversation winds down, Hodgson reminds me that they’re still in the Big Apple, and she’s still thinking gastronomy.
“I think tonight we’re going out to get some hot wings. That’s exactly what I need right now.”
