A Thursday Night with Love? Said the Commander: On their latest EP, playing live, and being in the moment
On September 29th, 2022, the town of Swarthmore held one of its Thursday Night Live concerts, a monthly concert series on the last Thursday of every month featuring various local artists. Just outside of the Park Avenue Community (PAC) Center, local vendors like Of Aspen and the Swarthmorean set up their tents, while artists set up on stage, preparing to entertain the town. One of the bands performing that night happened to be the duo Love? Said the Commander, consisting of New Jersey-native Kate Hall on vocals, guitar, violin, and percussion and Philadelphia-native Chris Bishop on guitar and bass, together making the slow and emotional indie folk of the band. I got the opportunity to see them in New Jersey this past summer, so, when I heard that they would be performing in the Ville, I reached out to interview them before their performance at the PAC Center. Thus, sitting on the grass outside the borough hall, as the sky turned orange with the setting sun and the air was cool with the fall wind, we discussed various topics, such as their recent release, the four-track EP Bones, the history of the duo, and more. Here was what they had to say.
An image of the 9/29 Thursday Night Live setup outside the PAC center, taken by Aryan Ashraf.
Aryan Ashraf: I’ll just start with the most pressing question. What’s the story and inspiration behind the name “Love? Said the Commander?” I understand it’s a quote from The Handmaid’s Tale. What made you two feel like that would be your performance name?
Kate Hall: We were looking for names forever. We had a list of so many, and Chris was actually reading it at the time and snapped a pic of just that one phrase. It just seemed, for our sound and everything, like it would really fit. And it looked cool!
Chris Bishop: It looked really cool, and, when you searched it, nothing else comes up, which is important with a band name, y’know?
KH: And we like to confuse everyone with the question mark! ‘Cause sometimes people will actually be like “Whaaa, question mark?” And we’re like “Yeah!” But it ended up just being, I mean, we had [been looking for a name] probably for months, right?
CB: Yeah, it’s hard because band names, like they can be real cheesy, they can be real pretentious.
KH: And we had a lot of cheesy ones.
CB: Yeah! Oh, yeah! They’re easy to come up with!
KH: Just ‘cause we’re a couple of nerds, so, like, it was mostly just silly things.
CB: Mostly cheesy, some were very pretentious, and we didn’t want any of that.
KH: But because of our serious tone at first, we were like, “Okay, maybe a silly name could fit?” It would just be the opposite of what we sound like. But it was hard, too, to find something that wasn’t already all over the internet already. Like Chris said, if you Google it, I think even we come up before the book or the show, which is kinda cool. And we both really love the book! It’s a double whammy! We’re trying to reach Margaret Atwood!
CB: One day!
AA: One day! SEO is very important, and the question mark makes it unique. It’s the perfect name. Alright so, of course, the last time I saw you guys, you were at Small World Coffee in Princeton. Now, you’re here at the PAC Center, and you’ve performed various shows in between. You have a Sofar show in Philly coming up. How has the performing life been for you guys as a “Philajersey” duo? How has life on the road been?
KH: It’s been fun! And we’ve been playing all kinds of different types of shows this year. Coming out of COVID, I guess, we really didn’t ever have a chance to play because we were just kinda gaining momentum, and then COVID happened, and everything was just canceled. So, this year, we wanna see what’s out there and try all kinds of different things. We don’t fit in a lot of the Philly scene: loud rock bands and stuff, loud bars, etc. So it’s been interesting! We’ve been playing wineries and private events. We’re just trying to think outside the box with that.
CB: Yeah, and we're just trying to build an audience organically. It takes a little bit of time, since we don’t want to go the ad route or any of that stuff. Hopefully, people like us and start coming out to see us, and we’re starting to get something like that, which is really nice. We’re actually getting close to, like, 100 shows.
KH: This year?
CB: Not this year, haha! Like over the course of the years. We’ve just really dialed into our sound, and we’ve played all of our music so many times now. It’s just really tight now, so it’s been great! It’s nice to get some momentum going.
KH: This year especially! We’ve finally found what we want to be as a band and what we want to do. Like, people are always saying, “Don’t you want to add drums or bass?” But I like that we’re still forever gonna stick to our guns, which is keeping it a simple duo. And I feel like we have that ability to make our sound bigger than it is just with the two of us.
CB: Exactly, and it’s fun to do as much as we can with the constraints of the two-piece, with what we can play and everything. Y’know, it’s fun!
KH: It’s creative, too, I think, ‘cause we’re sort of figuring out how to fill in those gaps.
AA: It’s also impressive to see live, to see you two switch between instruments between songs or within songs. I thought that was cool! So you guys are doing great!
KH: Aww, thank you!
Photograph of Love? Said the Commander, taken by Aryan Ashraf.
AA: So, you say you guys met through a Craigslist ad. Can you tell me the story behind that? How was the artistic process like at first when you guys first met? ‘Cause I’m assuming you guys hadn’t known each other before then.
CB: Correct.
KH: Yeah, no.
AA: Yeah, so how was it at first, and how has it changed now?
KH: Yeah, I mean, I put the ad out there. I was completely heartbroken out of a pretty serious band and took a couple years off. Then, I was like, “I need to do that again.” It was funny because, we were just talking about it, I was actually looking for chicks! Like I was trying to put an all-girl band together. But the universe was obviously, “No, no more girl bands for you!” Yeah, Chris just reached out, and [to Chris] you were actually messing around with one of my songs. Was that before or after?
CB: We were talking a little bit, and I think I sent you “Solace,” and I added some guitar to “Solace,” to the Soundcloud version.
KH: And I was like, “Oh my gosh, this is incredible!” Then, we met for a beer, and it was just an instant friendship.
CB: We got along pretty well, and then we met and started playing, and it was just—
KH: It just clicked! It was the most organic thing I’ve ever been a part of, really. We joke all the time that, sometimes, we’ll finish something, and we’re like, “It just seems too easy. Are you sure that this is the one? Should we do it again?” It just always feels that way.
CB: Yeah, and the process has kind of stayed the same. One of us will send an idea to the other, and, the next day or two, the other will send an idea back, and it’s pretty much the final version of the song for the most part. It’s been amazing.
KH: And now that we have more time, we’ve had the chance to write together, too, in real time, which is my favorite way to do it.
CB: Yeah, that’s way more fun.
KH: That’s been really cool, just having more time now to do that.
AA: Yeah, a lot of your songs do have that sort of vibe. It sort of builds a lot throughout the song, so that vibe does get through, that you guys are working with each other to build the moment. Speaking of going through time and evolution, your recent EP Bones is much more stripped back, one-take with one microphone in the Wayne County Courthouse. I went back and listened to your first EP, and it sounded much more produced and layered. What was the influence to go in a more stripped back, one-take direction for Bones?
Cover of Love? Said the Commander’s Bones EP, image sourced from https://lovesaidthecommander.bandcamp.com/album/bones
KH: That’s our favorite way to do it. I also feel like having the experience with the first two EPs, where we both went into a studio together and added vocal harmonies, violin, guitar, and whatever… Personally, I can’t even listen to those two because I’m like “Noooo!” We joke that we want to go back and re-record all of that stuff now with what we’ve learned in the past four years, but Bones was like a game-changer for us. It’s what really made us figure out that that’s sort of what we want our sound to be. We just want to keep it simple and honest, and the last thing we’d ever want is for somebody to come see us live and expect to hear this big, layered sound, and then it’s just the two of us up here. Obviously, we can’t make that happen live, so I love the fact that, when you see us and listen to Bones, it sounds exactly like it did in that room.
CB: I think that’s the beauty of it, just like the two of us are making this music together, and, when you listen to it, hopefully you feel like you’re there, and I think that’s so cool. You can keep adding stuff, produce the hell out of everything. It’ll sound amazing, but it’s just different.
KH: And it’s not really us!
CB: It’s not us! We want to hopefully give people a little different experience.
KH: And hopefully now, we’ll get less and less of the “You guys need drums” or “You need bass.” We keep it just straight-up as simple as we can. I think it’ll let go of that urge for people to be like “This needs drums!” or “This needs to be loud!” And [recording Bones] was a really cool experience. That was the best day.
AA: It’s just a courthouse that’s really empty all the time, it’s not abandoned, right?
KH: It’s not abandoned, that would’ve been awesome.
CB: It’s like a church, it looks like it, too. It has the pews and everything in there, and they barely use it for anything, so it sounded great with the natural reverb and everything.
KH: I just kept looking for Judge Judy like “Where is she?! I know she’s here!” Haha, but it was really cool because it was from Chris’s hometown. He grew up not too far from there, and his dad worked there at some point, so it just had all these cool layers… Lots of love, there’s love in there.
AA: Bones felt very much down-to-Earth, and hearing you guys perform it and going back to listen to the EP and having it sound the same, I think that is very special. I feel like the type of songs you create, it would be very awkward to rely on a backing track and all that. It creates a very in-the-moment feel that is good.
CB: People seem to like our live stuff, so good on that! Getting that feeling!
KH: That’s a good thing! We’re the live band. There have definitely been bands where I went and saw them live, and it was just disappointing. They just don’t sound anything like their recorded stuff!
AA: On YouTube, you guys are currently doing a “Year of Covers” series, a cover every month of a song from an artist that inspired you, released on their birthdays: Bruce Springsteen, Led Zeppelin, Arcade Fire. I love your guys’ cover of “Sledgehammer,” I have put it on loop so many times. You transformed the synth weirdness of Peter Gabriel in such a cool way. What brought you to start doing the “Year of Covers” series?
Screenshot of Love? Said the Commander’s “Sledgehammer” cover video, image sourced from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LHrpfbBiVGQ&list=PL4w_FuUf_FUc7EpxNP9BLuMAUreIUln7t&index=2
CB: What was the original idea?
KH: Oh, I think it was because we did that really cool cover of Moonage [Daydream] by Bowie. That’s what started it, and just the fact that it was so fun to put our own spin on it because I actually played for a cover band to pay for my rent in college and I hated it. ‘Cause it was just note-for-note, it made my ears bleed, so thinking about covers now, I’m like “oh no,” but when we started jamming and putting our own spin on it, it’s almost like a brand new song. I feel like that’s what started it, and we were looking for something to build our YouTube.
CB: To consistently release stuff.
KH: I’m glad that it’s almost done for the year, haha. It’s not like it’s time-consuming or anything, but it does take up a little bit of my brain. Then, to record it live, film it, y’know… but we learned a lot doing all that.
CB: That’s exactly it, and it’s been a fun challenge, really paying homage to these folks. Very DIY, and, if you didn’t really know the song, it could sound like we wrote it, too.
KH: Until the chorus comes or something.
AA: Alright! The final question, very open-ended: what are your guys’ future plans with Love? Said the Commander? Are you planning a debut album? Are there any concepts that you would like to work with, considering Bones was pretty conceptual?
KH: We definitely have lots of things coming up. We think 2023 is gonna be our year.
CB: For real this time!
KH: Our hands are in so many different pots right now… I mean, anything can happen. We’re definitely releasing something very soon, before the end of the year. It’s already recorded, and we’re definitely gonna work with another concept. That’s why we keep doing EPs because we keep writing songs that fit together in these little stories. We contemplated putting out a full album, but it just didn’t feel right to incorporate other songs into that body of work. Same with Bones.
CB: Like those four songs go together, we don’t need anything else.
KH: We joked that our first album will just be a “Greatest Hits” from our EPs. But we have always talked about a possible tour in the spring.
CB: And there are a few outside of the box things that are still in the planning stages, but we are really excited about them.
KH: So everyday, we just wait with bated breath, looking at our email. But we definitely have some really cool stuff in the works. Very exciting, just different from playing venue after venue.
CB: We’ll keep doing that and playing live all the time, but there is other stuff, too. You’ll definitely find out about that stuff soon!