It’s been over five years since Purity Ring last toured, even though they've made a few live appearances since supporting their 2015 LP Another Eternity. Thankfully, the Canadian duo is on the road once again, promoting their latest release graves, an experimental EP marking the end of their relationship with former label 4AD. “The album was not unified in any way,” singer/songwriter Megan James tells me of graves. “We made a thing, we liked it, and it went on the EP.”
I’m speaking with James and instrumentalist/producer Corin Roddick over Zoom during their recent downtime while stopping through Washington, DC on tour. Both are very friendly and quick-witted, tending to finish each other's sentences—which is what you might expect from two people who’ve been making music together for over a decade. “We didn’t spend, like, a month focusing on the track listing or all the things we usually do,” adds Roddick. “It was a very nice relief, I think.”
Purity Ring’s latest project is a hodgepodge of their past, present, and future. The end of their 4AD contract allowed them to do away with typical routines and break free from label oversight. The result is a free-flowing record which allows them to reflect on the present and figure out what’s next. For the time being, though, Purity Ring wants to stay independent, releasing music through the new label they created called The Fellowship. Focused solely on music, the band hasn’t given much thought to building it out into a full-functioning label. For now, they confirm that The Fellowship is solely an avenue to experiment with their own music. “It was a good reminder to strip back all the rules and get together and make something,” says James. “Usually, we end up with something we like because, duh, we’re good at what we do.”
“The themes and the things I feel when I sing [the songs from WOMB] are maybe stronger now. Like the day Roe v. Wade [was overturned], we were in New Haven, and singing ‘rubyinsides’ felt like it's never felt before.”
— Megan James
The duo’s disposition to push boundaries and mutate their sound has also seeped into their merch. While experimenting with Ableton, Roddick taught himself how to make an infinite song loop using an unused B-side from their 2020 LP WOMB. The duo decided to give parts of this song out in a USB to fans lucky enough to score a meet and greet during their tour, and they expect to give out 1,000 USBs by the end of their current run of US dates. “It’s essentially an infinitely long piece we’ve broken into two- to seven-minute chunks, so everyone gets a chunk of this infinite piece. But there is no definitive version. I’m not sure if we’ll ever release one. I like the idea that the song exists in many different forms.”
Speaking of WOMB, that album has become oddly prophetic over the past two years, with tracks like “rubyinsides” and “i like the devil” describing anxieties that have become stark realities in 2022. Since the album was written, current events have altered James’ feelings about these songs when she performs them live. “The themes and the things I feel when I sing those songs are maybe stronger now,” she explains. “Like the day Roe v. Wade [was overturned], we were in New Haven, and singing ‘rubyinsides’ felt like it's never felt before. So many of those songs were about these things I care about—like equality, trans rights, abortion rights—and that’s obviously seeping through all the music we ever put out. It’s interesting because even songs from Shrines, when I sing them, take on a new meaning given whatever is going on. But that’s poetry. That’s why poetry is beautiful.”
Being on tour didn’t stop James from protesting after she heard the Roe v. Wade news. While in New Haven, she and Roddick jumped at the opportunity to join a protest which was taking place in front of New Haven’s city hall, which was only a block away from the venue they were performing in. “The venue staff was like, ‘There’s a protest, we’re gonna go down the street if you wanna come,’’’ recalls James. “I spray-painted some signs, and we all just went and held them up. I think it was a good protest. I didn’t look into it or do the things I usually do before I go to a protest. It was kind of spontaneous.”
“What happens next is a blank slate. The EP was more playing around in the in-between zones, a little bit of experimenting. Maybe there will be another trilogy—or maybe a quadrilogy.”
— Corin Roddick
While speaking about WOMB, I couldn’t help but ask if “i like the devil,” the most cryptic track off that LP, was influenced by “Running Up That Hill” by Kate Bush, a song that was repopularized by Netflix’s Stranger Things earlier this year. A few die-hard Purity Ring fans have been trying to decode the mysterious bridge of “i like the devil” on Reddit since its release in 2020, and some think the lyrics might be a reference to Bush’s hit song. “Running up the hill, taken from a wish inside me,” go the lyrics—at least as listed by Genius, which notes that the band intentionally released the inscrutable single on April Fools’ Day. “Those are the lyrics now,” teases Roddick.
“That’s probably better than what the lyrics actually are,” adds James. “Um, but no. I mean, we’ve been loving Kate Bush with everyone else—always have, always will. It was kind of the first time in a song we released where I don’t want these lyrics to be audible. They don’t matter—we made them fucked up so [people] don’t understand them.” Since releasing the song sans lyrics, a small band of Purity Ring fans have become hellbent on deciphering the mysterious distorted vocals from the song’s bridge. It’s become a detective game where die-hard listeners try different audio engineering techniques to clean up the audio to hear what James is singing. So what are the missing lyrics? “They are bad, so it doesn’t matter,” says James, opting to maintain this ambiguity as a permanent Rorschach test for us to puzzle over for years to come.
Purity Ring / photo by Andy Sawyer
WOMB marks the end of the duo’s three-album run with 4AD, making graves the proper introduction to their future oeuvre. The two half-jokingly admit that WOMB is the last of their album trilogy only because their contract with 4AD ended after its release. However, Roddick notes a desire to shift production style as another reason for moving on conceptually from past projects. “Shrines was very much the way that it is, and in Another Eternity we went in different directions. WOMB was really embracing both of those and also adding some new things in. I felt like it was half looking back and half bringing them back to a new area. So it felt like it completed the three. I see that as a complete arc in a way. What happens next is a blank slate. The EP was more playing around in the in-between zones, a little bit of experimenting. Maybe there will be another trilogy—or maybe a quadrilogy.”
What’s next for Purity Ring? They might release some Shrines-era B-sides and potentially do a run of shows to celebrate that debut’s 10th anniversary, but it largely depends on how the future looks. “I don’t want to go on tour ever again if I have to beg people to wear masks,” says James. “There are a few things we would like to do, though. More on that when we figure it out.” FL
