From the outside of West London’s RAK Studios, it sounds as if the building is collapsing in on itself. Just past the half-open front door, Savages guitarist Gemma Thompson is conjuring a violent squall in Studio 2 as producer Johnny Hostile looks down from the upstairs console. It’s early May, and this is Savages’ third and final week at RAK, where they’ve been recording the follow-up to their ferocious 2013 debut, Silence Yourself.

The band’s initial intention for album two—tentatively due out early next year—was “to write the loudest songs ever,” says frontwoman Jehnny Beth. They convened at a friend’s out-of-the-way studio in north London last year, but quickly realized the space was muzzling their sound. “After two months we had to move because the room was too small and we were writing ballads all the time,” says Beth.

They ended up scrapping most of the material written there (or, “the ones that sounded too happy,” says drummer Fay Milton), with the exception of “Adore”, a grandiose torch song that summons the earth-raising spectre of Savages’ beloved Swans as well as the French-born Beth’s countrywoman Edith Piaf, and even a little Freddie Mercury in the chorus. It was one of the highlights of Savages’ three-week New York residency back in January, where Beth, Thompson, Milton, and bassist Ayşe Hassan workshopped new material in nine shows across several different venues. Every performance was recorded and every audience reaction heeded, with the results influencing what Savages preserved, honed, and ditched.