We speak to Chastity Belt’s Julia Shapiro and Gretchen Grimm about growing up, letting go, and making room for whatever comes next
On the cover of Chastity Belt’s sixth album, ‘All My Friends,‘ the band are out on the water in a rowboat, with drummer Gretchen Grimm trailing behind in an inflatable ring. It is a photograph taken at a property belonging to guitarist Lydia Lund’s family, on Washington’s Puget Sound, where the band have been returning to write since 2012.
Friendship wasn’t something the band set out to explore on the record, Shapiro tells me. It was their longtime collaborator and mixer, Samur Khouja, who noticed during the mixing process how many of the songs returned to the subject. That observation went on to inform both the album’s title and its artwork.
Chastity Belt have been making music together for around 15 years, long enough for their sound to change alongside them. In the beginning, Shapiro remembers, their audience was made up of “drunk college students”. The band were nervous performers themselves, often drinking before shows, and their music reflected that: faster, messier and more overtly punk. Grimm jokes that she “barely knew how to play the drums”.
Now, Shapiro describes ‘All My Friends‘ as “a little more raw”, while Grimm adds that it feels “intimate”. The band have become more comfortable with their own instincts, less concerned with getting every detail exactly right. “It doesn’t have to be perfect. It’s fine the way it is,” Grimm says. Shapiro agrees, pointing out that imperfections can be what make another artist’s music feel special. That’s harder to remember with your own.
The album was recorded across different studios, with some songs dating back several years and others written more recently. One session took place on the Greek island of Hydra, where the band found themselves with a gap between festival appearances on a European tour. They decided to use it to record, treating themselves to what Shapiro calls “a little bit of a special recording experience, like, kind of vacation”.
The reality was not quite the quiet retreat one might imagine. They were there in August, during peak tourist season, and the heat was intense. Rather than putting pressure on themselves to make the most of every hour, they relaxed into the experience and took swimming breaks in the middle of the day. Shapiro recalls the attitude going in: “We’ll see what comes out.” The band have always felt that they make better music if they’re having more fun.
A few years ago, Shapiro says, things started to shift. “It felt like the band all of a sudden was becoming a business, which I guess it is, but it just felt like, wow, we’re doing way more of logistics and emailing and all this stuff, rather than focusing on making music.”
They made a conscious decision to protect the fun, even if that meant making less money. For Shapiro, avoiding burnout is a large part of why the band are still together after 15 years. “I think we even prioritise friendship over music and the band,” she says. Grimm puts it simply: “Because we were friends first, and through the band have become even closer friends, we try to protect that.”
That sense of perspective comes up again when they talk about getting older. Grimm, who is approaching 40, still doesn’t feel she has everything figured out. Looking back, though, she has no regrets about where she has put her energy. “The best parts have always come from my friends,” she says. “It’s a good life.”
Shapiro questions the expectation to settle down, build a career and follow a prescribed version of success. Being in a band has given them experiences they might not have had otherwise. “I actually think maybe we have figured things out, and everyone else is kinda out of the loop,” she says. “And if you did figure it all out, that might be really boring.”
There will be no tour to accompany ‘All My Friends,‘ a first for the band. It’s partly a practical decision: the members now live in different cities, and touring means taking substantial time away from their other lives. But it’s also about where they’d rather put their energy. Shapiro says they want to use that time to write and record, rather than relearn old songs and prepare for live shows. With no immediate tour to plan around, they can also experiment without worrying about how new material will translate to a stage.
Grimm admits she’ll miss the way touring allows songs to settle in, but she’s excited by the prospect of moving straight on to the next batch. There are already new songs taking shape, including some stranger ideas that might eventually find their way onto a record. Shapiro has been listening to ambient and Japanese experimental music, and is even considering writing on piano rather than guitar for the next album.
After six records, Chastity Belt are not especially interested in repeating themselves. They have spent 15 years learning how to play together, how to give each other space and when to stop taking the whole thing so seriously. The next chapter might sound different. The point is that they still want to write it together.
‘All My Friends’ is out on Friday 6th November via Suicide Squeeze Records.