Crutchfield leads Waxahatchee, a project with a deep catalogue of memorable albums dating back to 2012’s “American Weekend.” But this September 2021 show at LA’s First Congregational Church just wasn’t right. Crutchfield came ready for a rollicking, country-influenced party. The crowd wanted to sit and cry. It’s tough to blame either side.
I thought of that moment, and the enticing contradictions in Crutchfield’s songwriting, when she dropped her latest single “Right Back To It” this week. Crutchfield can masterfully break you down with searing looks at pain and loneliness, like she does on 2015’s “Breathless”:
You strike a chord with all my friends
Saying that stuff that will transcend
A sad story with an end
But if I just cloy myself in light
And stare at your picture late at night
Then I could just close my eyes
You take what you want
You call me back
I'm not trying to be yours
You indulge me
I indulge you
But I'm not trying to have it all
But the thing she does better than anyone else is write about love. Crutchfield’s love songs are grounded in reality. They capture the ebbs and flows, the joys and anxieties, the passion and dispassion of adult relationships. The third song of her set at that LA show was “Can’t Do Much,” a standout track off 2020’s “St. Cloud.” It’s undeniably a jam, something you want to dance to as soon as the first guitar riff hits. But the lyrics bounce between all aspects of a complex romance:
In my loneliness, I'm locked in a room
When you see me, I'm honey on a spoon
Do you think that you were reading my mind?
My uneasiness materialized
I'm waiting
All the time
Sanity
Nullified
I hold my breath, I don't make a sound
I love you that much any—
Love you that much any—
Love you that much any—
Love you that much anyhow
Can't do much about it now
Here’s what Crutchfield said about the song around the time of the release:
“It’s meant to be an extremely unsentimental love song, a love song with a strong dose of reality. It was written early on in a relationship, where the feelings were super intense, but also fear or apprehension were sort of keeping me from totally relaxing in it yet. Sort of like ‘it’s annoying that I love you so much’—totally unromantic, which sort of makes it really romantic to me.”
She’s done it again with “Right Back To It,” on which she sings:
Your love written on a blank check
Wear it around your neck
I was at a loss
But you come to me on a fault line
Deep inside a goldmine
Hovering like a moth
I lose a bit of myself
Laying out eggshells
I've been yours for so long
We come right back to it
I let my mind run wild
Don't know why I do it
But you just settle in
Like a song with no end
If I can keep up
We'll get right back to it
In a release about the song’s gritty approach to romance, she said that, “It might feel untraditional but a little more in alignment with my experience to write about feeling insecure or foiled in some way internally, but always finding your way back to a newness or an intimacy with the same person.”
There are versions of songs like this that are not really about being in love. They’re about the gaps. Crutchfield has written them. They’re great. You can hear pain over stringing someone along on “Bathtub” or catch her on the other end of it during “Recite Remorse.” But what she’s doing now is special.
“St. Cloud” was Crutchfield’s first record after getting sober. It also represented a leveling up. “Being more settled, you have to go way below the surface to find inspiration,” Crutchfield told New York Mag about writing the album in the Kansas City home she shares with Morby. “And I have personally found that to be really fruitful.”
That shines through the most on “Ruby Falls,” a personal favorite that includes this line:
I tell this story every time
Real love don't follow a straight line
It breaks your neck, it builds you a delicate shrine
She followed up on those lyrics with Pitchfork, saying:
“I’ve entered this phase of trying to accept people and meet them where they are. I think that’s what love is about. It’s not a straight line. You’re never going to find people that are exactly the perfect fit to you in the way that you think you need.”
There’s beauty in ecstatic love songs. “Let’s Stay Together” by Al Green and “Tennessee Whiskey” by Chris Stapleton are bangers. But songs like that don’t capture real life or a real relationship. They capture brief moments when you realize someone is perfect for you. Crutchfield pushes further, because she knows that isn’t the whole story. In four minutes, she can conjure something closer to a season of Sharon Horgan and Rob Delaney in “Catastrophe.”
The new album drops in March. In the meantime, here’s a short playlist capturing how her love songs have grown and evolved up to this point, plus this week’s list of bangers and jams.
Bangers
Dhamaka (NYC): I’ve written about it before, but it still hits.
Danielle Rosati’s Katonah yoga classes.
- , live in Houston, playing, “Michigan message board or Jan. 6 defendant?”
Chocolate shakes and patty melts at Whataburger. Texas forever.
Another reason to appreciate Katie Crutchfield: Her open recognition that HAIM is the best band in the world right now:
Jams
The Iron Claw: Liked it, didn’t love it, but the performances were great.
Juiceland (Texas): Have yet to find any chain that makes smoothies as reliably good as theirs.
The Talented Mr. Ripley: For the Saltburn heads.
Anyone But You: Team Glen Powell. Okay movie. Charming ending.