EMILY MCDERMOTT: Can you tell me about “Bonhomie”?

ST. CHARLES: The band writes the bulk of the instrumentation together, and when the song starts coming together that’s when we decide who’s going to write vocals and lyrics. So the song sounded almost like it does now and to me it’s like, “This is a pop song, in a way we don’t always do,” so my inspiration was trying to make it interesting. I liked the thought of a song that’s banal and crass, in a way that’s often off-putting in a relationship song. This is like a bratty love song, but since there are two perspectives it’s not overbearing. They’re both a little immature, juvenile. There’s something that’s endearing when you see both sides of a relationship and both people are acting a little immature.

MCDERMOTT: You said writing this album was diplomatic, but everyone has struggles. What is one that you faced when writing the music together?

ST. CHARLES: It’s often frustrating to try to flesh out what comes next when it’s four people in a room playing music. Brennan and I have known each other since we were four years old and we’ve been playing together since we were in middle school. We’ve only ever played with each other and we have a lot of chemistry. We’re pretty good at sitting down—he’ll play something and I’ll play something—for hours. A lot of times it’s not good but it’s fun. It’s frustrating when we’re doing something like that and Britty’s like, “You have to slow down so I can fit in here somehow.” Understanding that that process is always helpful, learning when collaboration is good, and learning when taking a step back and working individually is good. That’s the biggest thing that we struggle with when we’re writing.

MCDERMOTT: Aside from writing more collaboratively, how else do you think you have grown as a band since Feasts of Love?

ST. CHARLES: I think it’s a matter of approaching the music with more confidence. We’ve all retained a level-headedness when it comes to how we approach music, because we all went to college and heave career paths in mind. Playing music has always been something we’ve done because we like it, not something we do because we’re desperate for a career in it. Over time it becomes second nature, and I think that’s reflected in the songs. They’re more dynamic because it comes together more naturally. That’s true for writing and definitely true for recording. We were so familiar with how to record with Will Yip, who produces our records, that we didn’t have to think about it. We just think about how the songs work.

MCDERMOTT: Having mentioned college and the career path, I read an interview with Britty where she talked about her degree from the University of Michigan. Where did you go and what did you study?