How a Crossroads in Katie Crutchfied’s 30s Helped Shape Waxahatchee’s New Album, ‘Tigers Blood’

The decision to collaborate with MJ Lenderman seems like such a natural fit. How did that happen?

It was a sort of, “We have to collaborate” at first sight with him. I was at SXSW in early 2022, and Brad and Allison [Crutchfield] texted me at the same time, and they were like, “We’re going to go see this guy, MJ Lenderman.” I had never heard his name before, but they were both so excited, and they were like, “You need to come. He’s not playing very many shows here. You would love it.” And so, of course, when anyone says that, you’re just like, How good could this be? I showed up and there were 10 people on stage, and they had a steel player, and they had a bunch of guitars on stage, and I was blown away. I was like, What is this ’90s, loud, indie-rock band that’s also a country band, that’s also this voice that’s the most beautiful, unique, singular kind of sounding voice I’ve ever heard? I met him really briefly that night, and then someone sent me his record right after that—Boat Songs—and I just listened to it over and over. I love sports, and he talks about sports a lot. I was like, This literally was made for me. We had become friendly and hung out a couple of times, and I mentioned it in passing to Brad, “Oh, maybe we could invite Jake.” On my last record, we had the band Bonny Doon play with me, and they were good, old friends of mine. But with MJ, I didn’t know him that well. Brad invited him to the very first session [and] I’m so glad that he did, because, very quickly, it was such a good fit. It helped put us on the path.

What were you listening to when you were making the record?

When Jake entered the picture, a lot of his influences, which are a lot of my foundational influences that I haven’t looked at in a little while, were kind of coming into the picture—a lot of Southern alternative rock from the ’80s and ’90s, like Drive-By Truckers, Sparklehorse, bands like that. Through that, it helped me reconnect with my love of R.E.M., which is one of my favorite bands ever. So I think R.E.M. is a big influence, specifically Michael Stipe’s singing. But then we were talking a lot about Tom Petty, who’s one of my heroes, and talking a lot about Lucinda, who’s another one of my heroes. And Brad was talking a lot about Gillian Welch, who I also really love, and that was when we first did the demo of “Right Back to It.” That’s kind of the reference that Brad made, of, “This feels super, super simple and straightforward and just a good melody, kind of like Gillian.” So those were the main influences.