Guitarist Helena Straight and bassist Mikaela Oppenheimer have been jamming together since they were 14, so it’s understandable that, now in their early 20s and three albums deep, their tastes have changed.
Drummer Stella Wave joined them in Hello Mary two years into the project, and a symbiosis has slowly formed, skewing their songwriting. Hints of their Nirvana-tinted garage rock remain, but, on new LP Emita OX, there’s an extra angularity to Helena’s buzzsaw riffs and psych-rock cleans.
“I got really into Black Midi for a while,” she says. “We put each other onto music all the time so our tastes are melding which helps us write more cohesive songs. We didn’t realise some songs were in funny time signatures!”
Typically, Helena writes on an acoustic before electrifying her ideas in their basement practice space. Together, they’ll “feel the song out and find the section that naturally feels like it should be huge.”
She splits her signal – her father’s old Ampeg VT-40 and a Leyland Pedals Hum Along distortion growling alongside an Orange Rockerverb 50, while an MXR Phase 90 and a “wonky and insane” Death By Audio Space Bender pedal supply the spice. The final piece of the puzzle is a Reverend Spacehawk guitar – a 16th birthday present from her ever-supportive father. “I’m totally in love with it,” she says.
This is the signature guitar of The Cure’s Reeves Gabrels, who inadvertently helped Helena become an endorsement artist when he shared a clip of Hello Mary to chief luthier, Ken Haas.
“It blows my mind,” Helena beams. “This is the only guitar I need for our shows. It has a Bigsby whammy and it feels thick and sturdy. I don’t like when it feels like the guitar I’m playing is gonna break. Vintage guitars scare me!”
Helena toyed with “becoming a shredder,” but quickly realised that wasn’t who she was. “I feel like my guitar playing has always been based in songwriting,” she says. “Those lessons helped with my ability to move quickly around the neck, but when I would sit down to practise I found myself wanting to write instead.”
Emita Ox sees her focusing on her own identity, with sharper edges and an experimental sheen. “Courtney Barnett and Kurt Vile are a huge inspiration,” she concludes. “It’s more impressive to me when a guitarist writes something I’ve never heard before, rather than their technical ability.”
- Emita Ox is out now via French Kiss.
