It’s been five years since the Ophelias’ last album, Crocus, but its follow-up, Spring Grove, is by no means a post-pandemic document. Spencer Peppet’s lyrics burrow much deeper into past wounds, burdened by dreams that recur without end or explanation, blurring the line between the present moment and what’s clearly come to pass. When the titular Spring Grove cemetery comes up, it is in reference to the summer of 2014, yet as if neither person would now be the first to speak. “The feeling of you haunts me and I/ Know that I can recognize that,” she confesses on new single ‘Cicada’, and the whole record gives it shape even when the ghosts cease to follow. After collaborating with the band – Peppet, violinist Andrea Gutmann Fuentes, bassist Jo Shaffer, and drummer Mic Adams – on Crocus, Julien Baker took on the role of producer for the first time, helping to translate a collection of archival material into their most fully-realized and urgent collection yet. Spring Grove is no less turbulent or cathartic for how ornate and evocative it sounds, buzzing through each dug-up memory like only this specific group of people could do it justice. They may be stories now, but, rising to the surface, ring truer than ever.
We caught up with the Ophelias’ Spencer Peppet to talk about moth music, the recording process behind Spring Grove, her OCD diagnosis, and more.
The Ophelias’ website used to say your music is “inspired by nostalgia, nature, the Midwest, horror movies, and the moon.” Now, I’m sure a lot of people looking at it for the first time are asking you what “moth music” means.
Andrea came up with the term “moth music,” which stuck. We thought it was great and have used it since – that was when we were like 18. Now, I feel like I’ve finally come up with what it means – it only took me, like, 10 years. To me, “moth music” means cathartic, orchestral indie rock. That’s my definition now, but my bandmates would probably have other definitions as well. I just love the image of the moth – it’s something we’ve been returning to over and over. It’s so evocative. She plucked that out when we were teenagers, and it still feels applicable, which is crazy.
Spring Grove record began as a collection of demos you revisited in 2020 and recorded the following year. I wouldn’t call it nostalgic, but it’s definitely haunted by past relationships and experiences. Do they feel even more distant now, as you release these songs?
Yeah, sometimes it gets a little meta. It’ll be like, “Oh, now it’s me three years in the future, reflecting on a relationship I was reflecting on when I wrote the songs.” Doing interviews like this is always interesting because part of why I wrote them was to process those things and find some internal resolution around those conflicts or relationships. In the case of something like ‘Open Sky’, ‘Cumulonimbus’, ‘Parade’, – or ‘Forcefed’, even though that’s more about my relationship with myself – they acted as pretty effective processing tools.
I’m a journaler – I’ve journaled since first grade, and I have all of them. It’s a crazy thing to be able to be like, “I wonder what I was thinking in fifth grade,” and then open up the journal and be like, “That’s what I was thinking when I was in fifth grade.” That’s a big part of my life. It’s something I think about a lot: I have too many thoughts going on up here all the time; I get overwhelmed easily because there’s a lot of stuff happening. One way that I combat that is by putting it all on paper. And it’s almost like once it exists there, it no longer has to take up space in my brain anymore.
Writing these songs is kind of another form of that, where it’s like: Once you put it on the page, once you set it to music, once you record it at the recording studio, once you mix it, you master it, and you put artwork onto it… It no longer has to take up all of that space in my brain, and it’s very effective that way. It’s definitely interesting to be now, a couple years later, kind of coming back to those – they feel like stories now – coming back to those stories, those relationships, those conflicts, and being like, “Wow, you know, a lot of things have changed even in the past three years since we made this record.”
How does it feel different now compared to revisiting a journal entry?
I mean, I feel like the lyrics are prettier than what I write in my journals. [laughs] I think having songs like this, when I write them, they feel like they’re still mine, or like “about me” or my experiences, but then, almost immediately, they become something different because I get to invite my bandmates in. Step one of the communal thing is getting to work with my bandmates. They write all of their parts, and it becomes a group effort to even become a full song. And then, when you invite Julien and Cal [Lauber] – obviously, Julien produced, and then Calvin engineered and mixed, and JB also helped mix it – then we’ve got five people who are paying really close attention to these songs, who are writing parts, who are making suggestions. It becomes its own little entity or organism. And then you invite the label team in, your publicist, your booking agent, and they’re all working to make the record feel like a little world. They’re all included in the community, in the group. And then it comes out, and it goes to however many people hear it, and more and more people get included in the communal experience of a record.
Writing a journal stays for me, right? I try really hard not to journal like someone is gonna read it after I die. We were trying to get everything down to a science, make sure we knew what we were doing, make sure we knew what versions we were doing. And then the day before we left, we practiced with Andrea. That was fun because we had been practicing without her, so it was nice to have her back in the mix. And then we went to Memphis, which was great. We got to stay in this lovely Airbnb, and it was really fun to be there with everybody. I think we were all just so excited to be recording because it had been a long time since we had done a record, and we had so much material that we were excited about. So it was just like, “Okay, let’s get in there and do it.”
And then after, we were there for a couple of days after we finished tracking. I remember we went to Graceland, which was really fun. And we went to Sun Studio, which is a total dream – I highly recommend it. We went to this great diner that was really fun. It was just nice to be in Memphis. We were on a high because we had just finished tracking, and I was like, “I’m so proud of this record, I can’t wait for people to hear it.” So it was just a really fun time. And then we drove back, and it was sad to leave, but we were excited to get back to Cincinnati and start mixing and working on everything. It was a great experience all around.
You have to be willing to share your truth and your experiences, knowing that it may resonate with others but also understanding that not everyone will see things the same way. It’s a delicate balance, but ultimately, being true to yourself and your art is what matters most. But ‘Shapes’ was definitely one of the later ones. That one was really fun to write because it’s so different from anything else I’ve done. I was like, “I want to write a song that’s just a fun, little pop song.” It’s a bit of a palate cleanser at the end. I wanted it to be this sweet, succinct little thing before you go back to whatever you were doing. I think it does a good job of that. It’s just a little two-minute pop song that’s like, “Bye, see you later.” I like that.
Looking back on the album now that it’s out in the world, what are you most proud of with this project?
I’m most proud of how honest it is. I’m proud that I didn’t back down, I didn’t censor myself. I’m proud of how much I’ve grown, not just in terms of songwriting or musicianship, but in terms of being a person. I’m proud of the people I’ve surrounded myself with and the people I’ve helped make this record with. It’s a really beautiful thing to have a community of people that you trust and love, who are there to support you through all the ups and downs of making an album. It’s a lot of work, it’s a lot of growth, it’s a lot of pain, it’s a lot of joy. I’m just proud of the whole thing, really. It’s like a little time capsule of who I was and where I was at that point in my life. And I’m excited to see where I go from here.
Es curioso, siento un poco de paralelismo temático entre la apertura y el cierre, donde es como, puedes interpretarlo como quieras, tal vez algún día todo esto será bueno. Y luego al final, es como, “Dejaré que las cosas pasen.” ‘Open Sky’ quizás sea un poco menos relajado al respecto, pero siento que tiene ese trasfondo de: realmente te deseo lo mejor. Ojalá ‘Shapes’ hubiera sido la última canción, habría sido genial si todo encajara perfectamente.
¿Te sientes mejor preparada ahora para dejar que las cosas pasen?
Ves, tal vez mi maldición es que no es mi punto fuerte. Aunque creo que eso me hace una buena escritora. Siempre bromeo diciendo que hacemos música para personas que nunca pueden dejar ir nada. Estoy mejorando en eso, pero creo que quizás mi destino en la vida es ser una persona que rememora constantemente.
Música para polillas y personas que no pueden…
¡Dejar ir nada!
Esta entrevista ha sido editada y condensada para mayor claridad y longitud.
Spring Grove de The Ophelias sale el 4 de abril a través de Get Better Records.