Alicia Bognanno is the front-woman of the Nashville-based band Bully. Their most recent album, Losing, was released in 2017 via Sub Pop.
(Photo Credit: Alysse Gafkjen)
I was on tour somewhere in Washington when we first listened to “Fire” in the van. It was just really upbeat, and I think that was the most memorable part of it — it’s just a very appropriate song to turn on first thing in the morning, it’s very feel-good. That’s not easy to come across, and I think it’s really needed now especially. But that was my initial pull to the record.
As I kept listening through, it’s just such an easy listen. It’s well-rounded, it’s dynamic, it’s versatile. One of my favorite things in music in general is listening to a song and realizing there’s only three things going on in it, but it’s that good of a song that it doesn’t need any more. The first song on the record, “Oxbow,” is probably my favorite song, and it’s kind of a perfect example of that. It’s really stripped down, but it’s so solid.
Another huge thing is Katie is a fantastic lyricist. I’ve thought that forever — she and her sister Allison [Crutchfield] are just really, really good writers. You can tell that there’s a lot of consideration that goes into the lyric process and it’s very admirable.
Waxahatchee’s Saint Cloud is out now, as is Bully’s SUGAREGG.
As told to Annie Fell.
