Sharon Van Etten has a band. Not just some folks who are backing her up, not some hired guns, but an honest-to-goodness band. And boy howdy have they elevated the New Jersey native and onetime Murfreesboro coffee-slinger’s work to another level. While we at the Scene have been fans of Van Etten’s since those late nights at the Red Rose Cafe, we are gotdamn gobsmacked by the evolution of this woman’s artistry and the magnitude of musicality and craftsmanship she has achieved on her latest album Sharon Van Etten & The Attachment Theory.
“It started when we were getting ready to rehearse to go on tour for the last record, We’ve Been Going About This All Wrong, in 2022,” says Van Etten, speaking in advance of a Nashville tour stop at Brooklyn Bowl. “We hadn’t run the songs from that record together in a room before, because we recorded that all from afar. Coming out of COVID, I thought a great way to reconnect — not just as musicians, but as human beings — would be to rent a place outside of a rehearsal space, and get more of a studio and house where we could have a literal band camp.”
While we expect big things from Van Etten — she’s carved out new artistic ground on each of her six previous albums — The Attachment Theory feels like something altogether different. Her performance has all the easy confidence of a woman who knows she’s playing with a brilliant ensemble. Her lyrics are still steeped in mood and mystery, still raw and deeply personal, but more taut, streamlined and focused as the band blurs around her. As a vocalist, she sits deeper in the pocket; it seems almost like the notes feel better in her throat, creating a different sort of catharsis than expected. Having ceded some control, she has found a sound that feels preternaturally focused, a record whose pop appeal comes without commercial pop intent.
“We had some extra time at the end of the week,” she says. “The joke is the first time ever in my life, the words came out of my mouth: ‘We could just jam.’ I was so tired of hearing myself and my songs. And I really just wanted to cleanse the palate, and just not think about me, and just have some time to reflect on the sonic palette that we had been developing that week. And in that sitting, we wrote two songs in an hour, and those songs became ‘I Can’t Imagine’ and ‘Southern Life.’”
While The Attachment Theory is certainly not a jam band — no noodles here, thanks — each song exhibits a group of folks dialed in and deeply aware of the sounds they are creating as an ensemble. In its most Jersey moments, the group manages to invoke The Feelies, Yo La Tengo and, believe it or not, Bruce Springsteen’s E Street-less Tunnel of Love. In other moments, the crew channels Cocteau Twins, Tubeway Army and Kate Bush, all without it feeling like hypercitational pastiche. While clearly of a lineage, the members of The Attachment Theory — bassist Devra Hoff, drummer Jorge Balbi and keyboardist Teeny Lieberson — sound like themselves more than anything.
Sharon Van Etten & The Attachment Theory
“I feel like it can only benefit a writer, any creative, to collaborate with other people and open up their writing process to let other ideas in,” Van Etten explains. “As I’ve gotten older, just to learn to let people in has been major — just an overall message and methodology. Before I started writing with my band, I was learning how to write with other people for a different project: that practice of letting go of the ego, that this isn’t about me anymore.
“What parallels that thought is when I’m becoming a parent, it’s kind of like, ‘Well, my life is also no longer just me — now I’m responsible for all these people,’” she continues. “It’s similar to having a band now. I feel like so many people have given up their time and have left their families to pursue this project. I also felt like I owed it to them to give them more, to feel more invested and trusted. It’s a constant letting go.”
That letting go is the sonic and philosophical thread that ties the album together. It feels like release — a never-ending free fall, or levitation that never strays too far from gravity’s pull. “Something Ain’t Right,” “Southern Life (What It Must Be Like)” and “Idiot Box” all point to a bright future for artist and listener alike. There is something magical in the way Van Etten has leveled up, finding energy and excitement in the process — finding hope and purpose in the future.
“We’re just getting started. We’ve only done two weeks overseas and a few warm-up shows out on the East Coast, but I feel like we’re just scratching the surface of how we’re going to translate these songs live.”
