Sleater-Kinney talk new single ‘Untidy Creature’ and grief-driven new album: “This is not a somber record”

Sleater-Kinney have spoken to NME about their latest single ‘Untidy Creature’ from their newest LP ‘Little Rope’ – along with the grief and tragedy that shaped it. Check it out below, along with our interview with Corin Tucker and Carrie Brownstein

Back in October, the Washington alt-rock icons announced their 11th studio LP ‘Little Rope’, which is set for release on January 19, and shared the lead single ‘Hell‘ followed by ‘Say It Like You Mean It’. Now, they’ve kicked off 2024 with ‘Untidy Creature’ – featuring that signature blend big riffs alongside Tucker’s wailing vocals.

“And it feels like we were broken / And I’m holding the pieces so tight / And you can try to tell me I’m nothing / And I don’t have the wings to fly,” Tucker howls during the chorus, describing a relationship in turmoil.

“The song is meant to be like a personal story about feeling trapped and are unable to move forward,” explained Tucker. “It’s about a relationship that sometimes feels like that so, it’s meant to be the very core personal moment where you are feeling that constriction.”

Back in June 2022, the US Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade – a five-decade-old decision that guaranteed a woman’s right to obtain an abortion. Tucker explained how the duo were inspired by the move as it marked “a real blow to women feeling like they’re in control of their own bodies, health and their own safety”.

“One of the things we want to do as songwriters is to try and tell a personal story and use that story to kind of reflect what’s going on in the larger world,” she said. “That bit of heartbreak is reflected in the song and the way that I think women are being viewed as not good enough to make those decisions for ourselves. I was trying to mirror that personal and that larger political story at once in the song.”

‘Untidy Creature’ is the final track on ‘Little Rope’, chosen for its balance of anguish and liberation. “There’s a lot of meaning without words, a lot that’s being evoked and conveyed without the lyrics, and it just felt like, at the end of these 10 tracks that deal with themes of loss and rage and urgency and we just wanted it to break into something that transcended just the every day there,” said Brownstein.

Due to the track’s essential and fundamentally Sleater-Kinney sound big riffs and Tucker’s vivacious singing, it almost didn’t make it onto the album.

“The things that were familiar about it made us doubt whether we were pushing the narrative pushing our songwriting forward enough, but because the other songs ended up differentiating themselves and being distinct from this, it ended up having a rightful place on the album,” explained Brownstein.

She added: “Sometimes things that come easy we can be doubtful of or skeptical of, at this stage in our careers, because we think, ‘Oh, maybe it was easy because we’ve done this before’. I think despite ‘Untidy Creature’ conjuring some very essential Sleater-Kinney ingredients, it also sounds unlike other songs we’ve done.”

In autumn of 2022, Brownstein received a call from Tucker, who had been contacted by American embassy in Italy – desperately trying to inform her that her mother and stepfather had been killed in a car crash while on holiday in the country. Centred around grief, personal loss and the state of the world, ‘Little Rope’ provided a vessel for the two to mourn and meditate.

Whether it be how America has “acquiesced to a culture of violence for our children” (which loosely influenced the lead single ‘Hell’) or calling for a ceasefire in the Israel/Gaza conflict along with peace and Palestinian liberation during their live show in November, devastating world events continue to impact the politics of the duo’s work.

Sleater-Kinney describe their music as a place of escapism, a creation of their own special space with its own language and key. “It is a job and it is work but it’s our world under our domain,” said Tucker. “It’s a place that we can go to where we feel like we’re in charge and that feels like a relief when we go there.”

The band used the creation of the album during these turbulent times as a means to wrestle with both the light and dark aspects of their lives. They were able to transform their emotions into a collection of 10 tracks that were “catchy and had melodies that you could sing along to,” transporting them into something that is “not necessarily joy, but it has something that glimmers within it.”

Brownstein added: “This is not a somber record, there is a lot of life in this record. There’s a vibrancy to it. Because the stakes felt very high, we wanted to be careful with each moment. Being able to work on music during personal or more sort of globally trying times, is a way of asking questions.”

She continued: “Music is wonderful in the way that it doesn’t necessarily provide a definitive answer, but lets you sit in that mystery and uncertainty. That’s a really special place to be. It’s ultimately the thing we have to come to terms with, all of that not knowing.

“We just try to embrace all of that liminal space and not take it for granted. I felt very fortunate to have the shape of Sleater-Kinney to posit me in time and place during a moment where I was very confounded and disoriented, very lost.”

‘Little Rope’ saw Tucker and Brownstein work alongside Grammy-Award winning producer John Congleton [The Killers, Eddie Vedder, David Byrne, Bono, Jamie T, Lucy Dacus, St. Vincent], having long admired his “taste” and “approach to the studio”.

“He works quickly, kind of a mad professor,” said Brownstein. “He just knows how to elicit really strong performances and how to elevate songs and give a sonic through line in an immersive world. There’s something a little strange about Sleater-Kinney, like the way we play guitar and the places where the band is dissonant or sour, John wants to embrace that and he doesn’t want to clean that up in any way. We felt a real kinship with him.”

The LP marked the first time since 2005’s ‘The Woods’ that Brownstein stepped back from singing and focused on the guitar while Tucker stepped up to the plate, providing lush and powerful vocal tones throughout the album.

Brownstein explained: “The ritual of playing [guitar] became very important. Just knowing what to do with my hands when I couldn’t believe I was even walking, it was very crucial. It gave shape and meaning to my days almost like meditation or prayer. I felt like I was having this love affair with the instrument again, feeling and seeing it in a new way.”

Speaking about the emotional range that Tucker provided, which has been dubbed as “one of Sleater-Kinney’s most potent weapons”, she said: “During the writing process when Carrie lost her mom she sometimes didn’t feel like singing. She would ask me to sing and I was happy to do it.”

She continued: “There was a sense of purposefulness and a sense of heightened emotion, because of the tragedy. Also with the past few years that we’ve all been through, its not been easy. Part of me was looking for a place to put all those feelings and the songs were the perfect place.”

With a career spanning roughly 30 years and with their 11th album, the band note that they “take nothing for granted”.

“We we still really need the band as it has been such a constant,” said Brownstein. “It has been a way for us to make sense of our lives in the world. We feel very lucky to be able to return to it and for it to be an extension of who we are in the moment.

“We’re always trying to find a way of reflecting who we are in the present and also it’s a way for us to connect with other people, which has gotten more difficult and more atomised. It really is just a way of assessing the world for me and being in it. Not being passive but being present and open.”

‘Little Rope’ is set for release on January 19 via Loma Vista Recordings. Pre-order the LP here and see Sleater-Kinney’s upcoming 2024 tour dates here.