Chastity Belt began as something of a joke when guitarist/singer Julia Shapiro, guitarist Lydia Lund, bassist Annie Truscott and drummer Gretchen Grimm were still undergrads at Walla Walla, Wash.’s Whitman College. After the band relocated to Seattle postgraduation, its first album, 2013’s No Regerts, continued in the in-it-for-yuks vein, with songs inserting a healthy dose of self-deprecating humor into the group’s unschooled, spindly guitar rock. But then a funny thing happened on the way to the punchline: Shapiro found something more than merely “funny” to say, and began writing more sophisticated songs that demanded a closer degree of attention. Which, in turn, pushed the band’s latest LP, Time To Go Home (Hardly Art), toward altogether more fertile creative turf. Chastity Belt will be guest editing magnetmagazine.com all week. Read our new feature on them.
Grimm: We’re really into puzzles right now. I wish there was a way to work on a puzzle while we drive during the day. We completed six or so puzzles in the past few weeks before we left for tour. I even got Julia a custom puzzle with a picture of her on it for her birthday. She had an Italian-themed party. We made lasagna, poured out the 500 pieces of her puzzle onto her living room table, queued up the song “That’s Amore” on repeat and told everyone that we couldn’t go out to the bar until the puzzle was completed.
Video after the jump.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xBOnTJK_ahI
