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[title]The last time we spoke to the indie-folk triumvirate known as The Impatient Sisters back in early 2012, Soraya, Nazeera and Irena Taib were still riding the wave of their dazzling ‘The Wknd Sessions’ debut. Fast forward to 2014 and the Kuantan-born, KL-based twentysomethings are now basking in the success of their self-titled maiden LP, which was belatedly released this past June.
Combining whimsical Laura Marling-esque melodies with First Aid Kit’s gorgeous harmonies, the eponymous record – a cavalcade of the band’s most popular tracks like ‘Comets and Stars’, ‘Love’ and ‘Hey There Young Sailor’ – caps off a whirlwind few years for the affable siblings. With Nazeera occupied with university exams, we sit down with Soraya and Irena to talk about the process that went into completing ‘The Impatient Sisters’ album.
Congrats on the release of your debut album. After all the anticipation, is it a relief to finally have a finished product?
Soraya Taib: It feels good. People have been asking for an album for quite a while now. I don’t think two years is a long time to wait for an album – a lot of bands work on albums for years and years. There was a bit of pressure to release it, but I wanted to prove to people, and to myself, that we were worth the hype.
The aforementioned pressure and high expectations arrived as soon as you burst onto the scene way back in late 2011. Do you feel that in the process of making this album, you’ve been raised to too lofty a position for your own creative comfort?
ST: [The pressure] pushed us to write as often as we could. Now we don’t write as often because there’s no reason to do it, but it’s not like we don’t try to write. Back then, it was just the rush – people kept asking about the album, we were having fun...
Irena Taib: And we had loads of performances, so we needed new songs – people might get bored because we only had three songs when we first started. We didn’t have enough songs to last half an hour onstage, so we had to write more songs.
ST: The moment we write a new song we meet our cellist Ershad and work on it. We only needed a full band when we started playing more festivals. In that sense, we started to jam with our four-man band quite late into the process. In terms of recording, most people practise first and then make an album. For us, it was different. We were like, ‘Let’s make an album and then let’s insert drums, let’s have bass.’ It’s not supposed to be like that, but it all worked out in a haphazard kind of way.
So the record was essentially about streamlining your collection of existing singles, instead of the more conventional process of getting together and crafting new songs in a set period of time?
IT: We don’t really sit down and write songs. I’ll come up with something and bring it to my sisters. People jam but we don’t. We’re not the type of band who has a jam session every Monday and write music.
ST: At the same time, we are very possessive and protective of our music. Only when we absolutely own a song do we let the session players hear it – we already know what we want them to add to the song.
IT: It’s like a colouring book. We have the picture but they only do the colouring.
ST: They don’t draw the lines. Why do you want to erase my lines? You’re not my sister. It can be as crazy as ‘Don’t use blue, I only want green.’ That’s just how we work.
Speaking of colours, the vibrant string section on ‘The Ark’ and ‘Red and Blue’ certainly adds another dimension to The Impatient Sisters aesthetic.
ST: It’s Jeremy Larson, who works with Sucré and Eisley. He plays the piano, strings and brass on ‘The Ark’. We emailed him and asked if he wanted to work with us. His first reply actually went to the spam folder! He liked our songs, which was really nice because we look up to him. It was a very humbling experience. We sent him the cello scores and asked him to use it as a guide. I told him, ‘Do your thing because we like your thing.’
And did he?
ST: He did! Because we hired him, I knew that I could ask him to do anything I wanted [laughs]. It was a good splurge.
How long did the entire recording process take?
ST: A year. At first, we went to a studio where they offered us free recording but it didn’t work out. Towards the end, they wanted us to sign with them. They wanted to tinker with our sound. We spent six months just doing that and it didn’t happen. We thought we’d just self-fund the recording. We packed our bags and went to Cheras to record in Kamar Seni Studio with AG Coco [the producer, notable for his work with Yuna]. We took about a month to finish mixing the album at the end of last year. We then sent it to Ari [Renaldi of Bandung’s Aru Studios], the same guy who did Liyana Fizi’s album, for mastering.
Bands usually choose to name an album eponymously because it serves as the best representation of their music. Is that the case for your LP?
ST: Really? I didn’t know people said that! But yeah, I just couldn’t think of anything else to call it.
IT: Nobody asked me [laughs].
ST: There was a breakdown in communication [laughs]. We couldn’t name it ‘Comets and Stars’ because that was the title of our EP last year. We couldn’t call it ‘The Ark’ – each song on the album is equally important to us. We just couldn’t come up with a name like ‘21’.
The sisters are set to perform at Laundry on Aug 7 and The Bee Publika on Aug 26. Email theimpsis@gmail.com to order ‘The Impatient Sisters’ LP (facebook.com/theimpatientsisters).