Haim has ‘Something to Tell You’ about love
Sisters don’t regret taking it slow to craft their second album
From their ’70s fashions to their ’80s pop riffs, the three sisters of Haim are walking mood boards of vintage inspiration. That’s largely thanks to the band’s 2013 breakout debut, Days Are
Gone, an expertly made album that earned comparisons to music greats from Kate Bush to Whitney Houston.
But according to Alana Haim, 25, the band’s youngest sister, the proverbial mood board of their new album, Something to Tell You (out Friday), “honestly would probably be food.” “Tacos,” chimes in Danielle, 28. “That freaks me out, whenever me and Danielle and Este say the same word,” Alana says. “I think it would honestly be food, because when we’re in the studio ... we’ll work for seven hours and be like, “We’re hungry.’
Munchies aside, the vintage Top 40 pop of Something to Tell
You is just as strong as its predecessor, showing the band’s three members — Alana and Danielle are joined by their sister Este, 31 — digging deeper into heartbreak in their meticulously styled soft rock.
Before their new album lands on Friday, Alana guided USA TODAY through everything listeners can expect from their music, merch and more.
THE ALBUM TOOK FOUR YEARS, FOR GOOD REASON Fans and critics alike were impatient for the release of Haim’s new album, but to Alana, the nearly four years in between
Days Are Gone and Something to Tell You, when the band exploded from indie darlings into Saturday
Night Live- headlining stars, were essential to their growth as musicians.
“We’re older than we were when we wrote Days Are Gone, we’ve traveled the world, came home and sifted through the thoughts we had when we were on the road,” she says. “And that’s when the record took off.”
Plus, considering the sisters’ heavy involvement in the making of Something to Tell You, the album wasn’t going to write itself overnight.
“We write all our own songs, we produce, we play the instruments — Danielle played all the drums, which I think is mindblowing,” she says. “We had to get the sonics and the tones of every instrument right. We ran around L.A., going into our friends’ houses and studios, testing out different rooms, because when you put an instrument in there, every room sounds different, and there’s millions of possibilities.
To everyone “yelling at (the band) online” about why the album took so long, Alana isn’t sorry.
“No! No, not at all,” she says. “I’m always stoked when people are impatient or are like ‘Where’s the record?’ because that means they want a record. ... That’s so rad! I can’t believe you want to listen to our music, let alone you’re mad that our record isn’t out.”
A MODERN LOOK AT HEARTBREAK The sisters spend the majority of
Something to Tell You battling matters of the heart. “There’s a lyric on the song
Nothing’s Wrong that’s ‘Sleeping back to back, and you’re turning away’ — I remember when we were throwing around ideas and that lyric really hit me in a weird way. It’s like the minute you know something ’s wrong, when you’re in an intimate place with someone and you’re not in their nook, to use a Sex and the City quote,” Alana says.
As she explains, the sisters engage in a “mystical kind of writing process” where their songs come from three women at three different ages going through the same experiences.
“We’re three years apart,” Alana says. “So we’re all going through the same things but with different maturity levels, and every song has a different spice, or a lick of wisdom, from each one of us.”
THE SISTERS ARE IN CHARGE AND COMMITTED At the core of Something to Tell
You’s songwriting is the sisters’ self-sufficiency, an album less concerned with finding or losing love than with their fierce independence. The band’s commitment to running things their way, and staying true to their vision of power, extends far beyond their music, Alana says.
“We started our band in 2007, and really until 2011, when we went to SXSW and got ‘discovered,’ for those five years so many different people said, ‘Well maybe it’s not working for you because you don’t dress the right way, or maybe you should change your hair or change your name,’ ” she says. “We didn’t let them steer us down a path we didn’t want to go down, and we stayed very strong.”
In a wink to the naysayers, a T-shirt in the band’s merch cheekily reads “WTF is a HAIM.”
“A million people told us to change our name,” Alana says. “I love our name, and I’m proud of it.”
“I can’t believe you want to listen to our music, let alone you’re mad that our record isn’t out.” Alana Haim