Tegan and Sara reflect on music, fans, and spending 90% of the time with your sister. Photo by Pamela Littky.
Don’t call them a family band — unless you plan on incorporating their fans into the equation, that is. Alternately reflective and raucous, sweet and sardonic, Calgary-born twin sisters, Tegan and Sara Quin — better to known to rockdom at large as Tegan and Sara — have spent the past decade cultivating an outrageously dedicated following that knows every lyric the duo has ever penned, blogs about their stage banter and even reads up on their dream diaries. But to hear Tegan tell it, it’s all been one big happy accident.
“I know fans want to know about all bands, but it’s in a more intense way [for us] than anything I’ve ever seen,” said Tegan from the road, headed for a sold-out show in Edmonton. “We’ve been out with bands ten times the size of us and they’re just like, ‘Your fans are crazy…They have this intense bond with you, like they know you.’”
Which is not to say that they haven’t had plenty to study up on. After recording a string of demos and winning a local battle of the bands at the age of 17, the sisters were signed to a major label fresh out of high school and, since 1999, have released six full-length LPs — each more successful than the last. Their latest, Sainthood, may signal the end of their first decade of as indie rock tastemakers, but has also spurred them to reinvent the way they write and record.
Though the sisters say the spend 90 percent of their time together, they’ve always written songs independently. For Sainthood, however, they not only co-wrote all of the tracks, but also brought along their live band to add some extra vigor to their latest collection of New Wave-inflected power pop.
“With each record, we map out exactly what we’re trying to do…and we wanted to have [an album] that reflected a little bit more of what we do live. We wanted to record as a live band, set up with all five of us and play together to get the most real feeling backing up the beats. We wanted the bass and drums to be seamless — no overdubs, no punching in, no punching out,” said Tegan.
Lending a hand towards that stripped down approach was one half of fellow indie crossover act Death Cab for Cutie, whose guitarist, Chris Walla, once again returned to produce and play as he had for 2007’s The Con, along with drummer Jason McGerr. Additionally, Tegan and Sara received outside input from Hunter Burgan — bassist for the markedly different goth punk band AFI — who helped pen three of Sainthood’s standout tracks, including its first single, “Hell.”
Come experience the music of Tegan and Sara this month at the Warner Theatre in DC. Photo by Pamela Littky.
“Hunter is funny because he e-mailed us and told us we were his favorite band. He said, you know, ‘I’m in a band. You probably don’t know about us, but if you do, let me know. It would be cool to hang out, I’m really into you guys,’” said Tegan.
“[We’ve] been writing together now for a couple years. A lot of the songs that we wrote…were very emotionally powerful and mature. I just really loved the vibe of them and thought it was so neat to collaborate with someone else.”
With both sisters set to turn thirty in the coming year, the band remains genuinely surprised at the inroads they’ve made with both fans and fellow musicians. Reflecting on where she thought she’d find herself a decade ago, Tegan says she never expected to Tegan and Sara to become critical darlings, let alone a Billboard charting band that would wind up being covered by The White Stripes or touring with the likes of Neil Young, The Pretenders and The Killers.
“I think on some level I wanted that, but I never actually sat down and said, ‘Here is what I want and I’m going to be a musician. I’ve never been into that,” she said.
“We’ve always had a very open, easy going attitude and I think it was in the past couple years that I realized this is what I really want to do. We’ve had this incredible success and achieved all these amazing milestones and had all these great experiences. I would be extremely devastated if it was over tomorrow. As a teenager, I never would have fathomed this.”
Tegan and Sara will perform at the Warner Theatre on Wednesday, Feb. 17 at 8 p.m. Steel Train and Holly Miranda open. Tickets are $35 in advance and $38 at the door. For more information, visit www.teganandsara.com.
Warner Theatre: 513 13th St NW, Washington, DC; (202) 783-4000; www.warnertheatre.com
[googleMap name="Warner Theatre" width="590" height="235" mousewheel="false"]513 13th St, NW, Washington, DC[/googleMap]
