Last fall, Chicago’s Chicken Happen released their fourth full-length, the aptly-titled Chicken Happen IV. We recently spoke with singer/keyboardist Lilly Choi and talked about the album’s writing process, which led to a significant stylistic shift for the band. For the first time ever, they opted to write on piano, as opposed to guitar, resulting in a record that blends a variety of genres into an especially cohesive effort. The band’s lineup is rounded out by bassist Zack Hjelmstad and drummer Mark Gianforte, and the album also features guest vocal and guitar contributions from longtime friend Chris Sutter, (Meat Wave, Truman & His Trophy). Additionally, we conversed with Choi about what enabled her to embrace this change in style, the lyrical journey of the record, their plans for 2024 and more.
Bill – With your last album, Maybe I’m the Problem, being released in March of 2020, at what point did you start writing songs for this record?
Lilly – So the way that this album came about was kind of in a patchwork manner. What’s really cool about it is some of these songs are ancient demos of mine that I never thought would see the light of day. During the pandemic, we didn’t do anything besides work and then I just poured everything else into the band. It was really cool to be able to flex a creative muscle in that way without any pressure. We dug those up and kind of thought that the songs wouldn’t be that great as guitar songs. So, we thought if I played piano on them that it maybe could be something else. That’s how it started, with just trying a few of those old songs on piano. Then after we arranged a couple of songs that way, Zack and Mark kind of challenged me. They were like, “Well, what if we wrote an entire album on piano, not just guitar, and have you on the keys and see if we can do that?” I was a little apprehensive about the idea. I don’t know why. I grew up playing classical piano and I never really felt comfortable playing piano in more of a rock kind of situation. It is different. It’s way different and I never felt like I was very good at it. Eventually I was like, “Well, we’re not doing shit anyways. Sure. Let’s give it a try. I’ll go for it.” Then I just focused on writing piano songs and kind of formed the rest of the album.
Bill – Got it. It is interesting to hear that some of these songs were demos from long ago, because just listening to the album without knowing that, it really seemed like a group of songs that was written around the same time or written together.
Lilly – I think the common theme in them is that it was me really allowing myself to write in more of a pop fashion. I think before I was too scared. I don’t know why, like I was trying to maybe prove that I was punk enough or something. I thought the songs needed to be more aggressive and I was kind of really ignoring the fact that truly in my core, I write great pop songs. I think that is the common theme with all of them, whether I wrote them ten years ago or I wrote them three years ago, it was just really allowing myself to write music from my heart. It wasn’t like, “Oh, it should sound like this or it should sound like that.” This is just what came out.
Bill – Do you think there was a particular turning point that allowed you to just kind of go for it like that with your songwriting or maybe stop listening to those outside voices?
Lilly – Yeah, I think it honestly had a lot more to do with self-confidence. Before I didn’t really trust my own voice and instead of trying to be authentically me, I think I was maybe trying too hard to do something else or trying to fit a certain mold that maybe wasn’t necessarily me. And there was a moment where I was like, “Why am I doing this?” No matter what comes out, whether people like it or not, you should just feel comfortable writing whatever comes out, whatever you have to show. And it was definitely this kind of “fuck it” moment. You don’t have to write these more aggressive or harder songs. I don’t know why I felt like I had to do that. I think just getting older helped me to embrace being myself more. Just be yourself, write what you want to write, even if no one likes it, whatever. That’s what you’re going to write.
Bill – I feel like that approach doesn’t just apply to the music, but to the lyrics too. I think with some of the songs you don’t even have to get all the way through to recognize that the lyrics aren’t just personal, but very honest and reflective. What do you think are some of the reasons for this?
Lilly – Definitely. I will say I’m just naturally a very introspective person. Maybe for better or worse, I’m always overanalyzing things. Also, to me, the goal of life is to become the most authentic version of you that’s possible. Why else are we here? We only have this one life to live, so we might as well be as much authentically ourselves as possible. That’s always been the goal that I’ve been striving for in everything I do in life. I am just kind of a person who’s constantly overanalyzing who I am, what I do, why I’m doing the things that I’m doing, who I want to be, and what my goals in life are. No matter what, I always want them to be authentic. I’m probably constantly analyzing everything that I do and even everything around me. Also, it’s really hard to live in this world and not see all this shitty stuff happening all the time. And seeing how complacent we all are, myself included, and just not getting frustrated with the way that things are.
Bill – It’s definitely hard to maintain positivity sometimes when you think of all the awful things that are happening in the world. You don’t want to be consumed by it and be negative all the time, but it’s almost like it’s always just there in the back of your mind. For some people at least.
Lilly – Right. I think that’s true.
Bill – Well, I was going to ask about this later in the interview, but since we’re talking about the lyrics, I do feel like this is an album where the songs are sequenced in a way that they kind of take the listener on a journey. Can you tell me how you guys went about sequencing the album?
Lilly – A lot of thought went into the sequencing. Not necessarily the lyrical component of each song, but more so thematically with how the songs make you feel. We did want to take you on a journey. That was the goal. I couldn’t tell you 100% what that means even, like what is the goal of the journey, I don’t even know. I just knew that I was on a journey while writing it and maybe other people would also experience their own personal journey while they listened to it. Every song, to me, is kind of like a challenge in a certain way when it comes to lyrics. Like challenging you to look deeper, challenging you to look beyond what’s actually there and even look deeper inside yourself for the answers. I think every song in a certain way kind of touches on that, on really trying to find your own truth.
Bill – It definitely feels like a complete work in that sense. The songs all feel related in their own way and I think that’s the hallmark of a good album.
Lilly – Cool. Thank you. I think a lot of the cohesive nature of it has to do with a feeling of this existential crisis that I think a lot of people are going through. Whether that’s because of the times that we’re in or the age that we’re at, there’s a lot of self-contemplation and just contemplation in general.
Bill – For sure. On a different note, I wanted to ask about Chris Sutter, as he provides guest vocals and guitar on the album. What led to his involvement with the record?
Lilly – We’ve been a band for 12 years now and we’ve always done everything in a very personal way. What usually happens is that I write the base of a song and then I bring it to the other members and we kind of produce and suss it out together to really make the full song. And we’ve been doing it like that this whole time. Then we were like, “We kind of want someone else’s opinion. We’d love get someone else’s ear on how we can make these songs something new.” Obviously, we’ve always admired Chirs’s songwriting and his musicality and everything that he does. So, we asked Chris to produce the album. We didn’t know what exactly that would mean, how much involvement he would want or not in it, but we just wanted to see if he’d be into it and he was. I will say he really went above and beyond what we even hoped for or expected. He really listened to the songs and he recognized that they were our songs, but he really brought out these little things in them that I think just make them so special. Things that maybe we wouldn’t have thought of, which is exactly what we wanted. We wanted that outside opinion and it just naturally happened.
We asked him to write some guitar parts because I wasn’t playing guitar on the album and he was just so game to add value to every song. Whether it was through guitar or harmonies, he was there for whatever was needed. There’s one song called “Wait for It” that he wrote for us and then we wrote it more, and then kind of went back and forth. That’s the song I would say that he had the most input with. It was such a fun and collaborative experience, more than we could’ve asked for. We had so much fun and it felt so nice to write music with a friend and to share this common goal. And he understood exactly what we were going for from the beginning. He has such a good ear for music and also a great pop sensibility. He brought so much to the album and we’re so happy with every step of it.
Bill – It’s really cool to hear that the first time you had an outside collaborator, even though he’s a friend and everything, just the fact that things worked out so seamlessly…
Lilly – Right, because we didn’t know. We weren’t sure if he was just going to listen to the songs and go, “Yeah…I don’t know.” We weren’t sure how involved he was going to get or wanted to even. It was just awesome how hands-on he was, but also, he was so very adamant about making sure that it was our voice that was coming through.
Bill – That’s awesome. I wanted to ask if you have a favorite song off the album in terms of how it maybe evolved from a demo to the finished version?
Lilly – I’ll say “Nothing is What it Seems.” I used to play that song just solo on acoustic guitar. I never thought it would be a song that we would play as a band. Bringing that keyboard element to it really changed things. That song is like a lullaby to me. I used to just kind of play the chords on the guitar and to hear what that song turned into, to me, is creatively one of the most satisfying songs from demo to actual song. I have demos of that song from maybe 2011 or 2012 and I never thought it would be anything.
Bill – That is really cool. What were some of the highlights from your record release show at Subterranean last month?
Lilly – I was so excited about the bill that we put together. I always try to put together shows that are not what you’d normally expect. I feel like oftentimes every little scene just kind of sticks together and you see a lot of the same bands playing together. I really wanted to expand and include different music that I love, whether it made sense or not. We had a hip-hop act named Bob Rok, who I’ve admired for a long time. And we had Kate Wakefield from Ohio. She’s in a band called Lung and I asked her to do a solo set. It was just her and the cello, and she has this beautiful voice. Last year, for the first time ever, I saw this band Hobbyist and they blew me away. They were so cool and I felt like they were doing something that you don’t see that often. I was like, “I don’t know how well this will all work, but this is the show that I want to put together. Whether people are into it or not, this is the show that feels right to me.” And it was really great. Before we even played, I just felt like the happiest spectator. And I think it’s awesome to be able to see a show where you’re so interested in every single band or act that’s playing. Usually you’re like, “Oh, I’m here to see whoever.” I really wanted to put this different, awesome lineup together. I was really proud of that.
Bill – And I think that’s fun for most people to hopefully be surprised by someone’s set or maybe check out a genre they wouldn’t usually gravitate towards.
Lilly – Exactly. Whenever I put together a show that’s always my hope. I really want to bring together different genres. I think that’s more fun.
Bill – Absolutely. What sort of plans does the band have for 2024?
Lilly – We kind of suck about that sort of stuff. We always take things as they come, which maybe as a band who wants to get people to listen to them, isn’t always the best idea. So far, we don’t really have any big plans. We worked on this album for over three years, so it’s nice to take a little bit of a breather right now. I’ve been writing a little bit recently, but we haven’t gotten together and written together as a band in a while. I’m really excited to do that and to figure out what we’re going to do for our next album.
