JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
It's been five years since Snail Mail put out an album.
LINDSEY JORDAN: My inner world has changed a lot but, also, my outer world is completely different.
SUMMERS: That's Lindsey Jordan, the guitarist and singer who performs as Snail Mail. She'd spent years living in New York but needed a change after touring her last album.
JORDAN: I was definitely realizing, as I was coming home from tour, time and time again, it just didn't feel, like, conducive to me to, like, actually relaxing. And I also felt weirdly paranoid about trying to, like, write music with people so close to me, like, through the walls.
SUMMERS: That paranoia affected her.
JORDAN: I feel like it was really inhibiting me. I was just, like - I felt really uninspired, and I was not able to make anything of my time at home.
SUMMERS: So she moved to North Carolina.
JORDAN: I feel like I have a lot of creative energy, and it's nice to be able to just, like, hide away. And I've been there for two years now, and it's been amazing, really great for my creativity.
SUMMERS: That creativity fueled Snail Mail's new album. It's called "Ricochet."
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "RICOCHET")
SNAIL MAIL: (Singing) My renegade, can't stand the way I just bounce right off ya (ph), ricochet. Can't let you go.
SUMMERS: I caught up with Lindsey Jordan to talk about it.
Do you remember the first lyric that you wrote for "Ricochet"?
JORDAN: Yes. OK, so I came up with the lyric, above us, it's just sky, for "My Maker."
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "MY MAKER")
SNAIL MAIL: (Singing) Above us, it's just sky. Tonight I'm gonna (ph) meet my maker.
JORDAN: And it sat there alone for a really long time without other lyrics around it. I was having, like, a really hard time filling it in. But I ended up, like, anchoring what ended up being kind of, like, the entire, like, lyrical message of the record around that line that I started with. I was like, OK, cool. I'm going to have this afterlife conversation. I just became really obsessed with death and terrified of it and losing everyone around me. And it kind of, like, took over my life for years. And I was like, I know I want to write about this. I just am not exactly sure what my stance is going to be.
SUMMERS: What helped you break it open? What helped you kind of find your way through it, through the music?
JORDAN: I honestly think, like, "My Maker" was such, like, an anchor point. As I was putting together the lyrics of that one, I was like, the thing that I think I'm worried about that's keeping me from doing this is I don't want to, like, pass on the nihilism. That's not the tone I want to be taking. I was just kind of telling myself the whole time - I was like, if I'm going to be, like, talking about this really heavy stuff, what I need to do to balance the rest out is, like, also bring in the good.
"My Maker" is, like, there's so much freedom in feeling small in the universe, and it's like - you know what I mean? So it was, like, with all the heaviness, bringing in a positive aspect felt like how I was able to sort of, like, calm down that voice in me that was, like, don't speak on any of this.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "MY MAKER")
SNAIL MAIL: (Singing) Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah.
SUMMERS: I think, for those of us who are fans of your first two albums, when we listen to you, your voice is unmistakably different. And I know that you had surgery for vocal polyps a few years back. Can you talk a little bit about how your voice has evolved, how you use your voice, the sound of this album?
JORDAN: I was always losing my voice. I was always, like, at the whim of my voice - being like, OK, you know, just 'cause maybe I didn't get enough sleep last night...
SUMMERS: Yeah.
JORDAN: ...I'm going to barely be able to, like, get through the show. And I thought it was just something that happens to people with, like, naturally raspy voices.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "GOLDEN DREAM")
SNAIL MAIL: (Singing) Know when I mean it. I'm not wasted anymore.
JORDAN: My voice kind of had been like that for a while before that, even. And then I learned, basically that, yeah, that was all just, like, vocal damage, and I have this really high range that's been hiding, which is an incredible thing to learn, like, mid-career.
SUMMERS: Yeah.
JORDAN: And it's so freeing, and it makes singing so much more fun. And so I was like, yeah, I think there's more vocal confidence on the record, for sure. And I think that comes across, but I also was definitely playing around in the falsetto range 'cause I can.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "LIGHT ON OUR FEET")
SNAIL MAIL: (Singing) We'll be so light on our feet up on the moon, up on the moon.
SUMMERS: Do you have a favorite song on this album?
JORDAN: Yes. For me, I think, "Reverie."
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "REVERIE")
SNAIL MAIL: (Singing) VIP coming through. Look alive.
JORDAN: I'm just, like, proud of those lyrics. I think it's kind of, like, funny and, like, quippy in a way that really, like - I don't know - I feel like I haven't, like, used that kind of tone, lyrically. Like, it's playful in a way that I think is, like, something I haven't done before. But I also, like, think - I don't know. I feel really connected to the message of it. And I kind of think, like, if you wanted to - if you wanted to listen to the record backwards, it, like, really sums it all up, I think, in a way that's, like, really satisfying to me.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "REVERIE")
SNAIL MAIL: (Singing) I gotta (ph) laugh to keep from crying. But I could do it all the time with you. Life is so worth living now, and from our castle in the clouds, the planet looks so small. Big shot, who cares?
SUMMERS: I want to ask you about another song on the album. It's "Dead End," and the lyrics, to me, feel just so nostalgic, ruminating on someone that's not in your life anymore. Talk about that song.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "DEAD END")
SNAIL MAIL: (Singing) Couldn't ever be the same. To be loved is to be changed.
JORDAN: As I was writing it, I really felt like I was talking to someone else, speaking outside of myself. And as I started, like, putting together all of the stuff for, like, you know, the press and, like, talking about this record with journalists and, you know, all this stuff, I was realizing a lot of what I was writing on this record, I was just talking to myself as a teenager and being like, d***, I miss you. I wish I could get this back.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "DEAD END")
SNAIL MAIL: (Singing) You're burned in my heart, old friend. Tell me, can't you even look me in my eyes?
JORDAN: There's, like, exploitation of the innocent. And I didn't even think this was, like, an inward endeavor, but a lot of it - especially that one, it feels like I'm, like, yearning for this thing that's gone or, like, this lost thing. And it's - I feel like I'm, like, talking to a past self in that one, the longer I spend with it.
SUMMERS: We've been speaking with Lindsey Jordan. She performs as Snail Mail, and her new album "Ricochet" is out now. Thank you.
JORDAN: Thank you so much.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "DEAD END")
SNAIL MAIL: (Singing) Nobody's gonna stop me now. And I think I should be blunt. You can do whatever you want. Hope you get the life you want. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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