OK Cool/Photo: Tracy Conoboy
“I think for a while I was so nervous about making each moment of the song be the most incredible thing you’ve ever heard,” OK Cool’s Bridget Stiebris admits, but she’s beginning to “realize that’s an unrealistic expectation for myself. So I’m just trying to groove a little more with this record.” In the press materials accompanying the release of the Chicago duo’s full-length debut, “Chit Chat,” she relates, “I feel like this whole time I’ve been trying to figure out how to write music at all—and even with ten new songs under our belt, it still feels like a fresh challenge every time I go to write.”
The other half of OK Cool, Haley Blomquist Waller, confirms that challenge, saying she needs “to feel relaxed and have the downtime to have creative energy, so a big part of the struggle for me is getting and using that free time.” Indeed, she cites their busy lives as one factor in the gap between releasing their wonderful “fawn” EP in 2023 and their much-anticipated first album now. Planning a wedding and getting married last year, “plus full-time jobs can make it take a bit longer,” she continues. “We also want to make sure we have songs we feel good about and not rush the process for the sake of releasing.”
Stiebris echoes that sentiment: “It definitely takes me that long to write in general. I try to write somewhat often, but inspiration for a full song only comes to me around every five to eight months.”
And yet, the collaborative approach of these dual “guitar shredders” and singers equals less dueling and more dueting (it’s often hard to tell who is playing or singing what). OK Cool’s partnership seems to come together fairly easily and seamlessly, at least on record. Blomquist Waller says that she and Stiebris “listen to a lot of the same bands and have a similar vision of what we want to sound like. We both like to have unique elements to our songs and [we] try to not be too formulaic.”
Each half of OK Cool grew up in Chicago’s suburbs, with Blomquist Waller at a young age listening to Cake and They Might Be Giants (later getting into All American Rejects and Panic! At the Disco) while Stiebris recounts that she started out on Green Day and Blink-182 in middle and high school (later branching out into bands like Pierce The Veil and A Day To Remember). “I was really into pop-punk and emo for most of that time. I still love listening to emo music,” she freely admits, “but back then I really liked some more angsty stuff I can’t really connect with today.”
“Chit Chat” album cover
You can hear all of that in “Chit Chat,” only insofar as these are ten melodic, catchy songs, capturing both passion and a sense of humor. When playing the record, I’m more reminded of the straight-ahead guitar-rock approach of Chicago forbearers that go back even further, like Veruca Salt (especially on songs like “Ruined”) and Sarge (especially on songs such as “Sledding”).
Blomquist Waller cites “Sledding” in particular as an example of how they incorporate each other’s ideas into something cohesive while still making the music inherently OK Cool. “Sledding” was a partial song they had been sitting on for a few years. “I had the bridge and verse written, but it needed some more pieces to finish. Bridget added lyrics, new guitar, and helped restructure it. Sometimes you can have a good idea but not know how to develop it or finish it—so it really helps to bounce things off each other.”
That dialogue partially inspired the album’s title, “Chit Chat.” Stiebris has said that the record is about communication. “I think it’s kind of a tongue-in-cheek reflection of both how Haley and I write—sending voice memos and song demos to each other via text message—and the actual action of talking person to person. A lot of these lyrics look back on certain interactions I’ve had and how they could have gone better, what I could have done differently, et cetera, and how they ended up affecting me emotionally.”
Stiebris says that it’s “such a fun challenge for my brain to write multiple instrument parts. I love the creative freedom of that process so much.” Their freedom is enhanced by OK Cool being limited to a twosome as opposed to a quartet or quintet. Blomquist Waller says their dynamic is just right: “I think we hold each other accountable as a duo and can help spark inspiration, but we also agree enough that the process is a lot smoother than involving three to five people’s opinions.”
While half of the songs on 2023’s “fawn” EP were less than two minutes, OK Cool consciously tried to exceed that mark this time around (although the ten tracks still add up to under half an hour). In the press release for the album, Stiebris explains that “this was definitely an intentional part of the writing process for the album. I’m into the idea of telling a story, communicating an idea, but not taking up more time than I absolutely need to—this often results in pretty short songs. With ‘Chit Chat,’ I tried to feel more comfortable taking up that space. So many bands I admire find ways to settle into themselves and a song’s groove, and I wanted to see what that would look like in my own writing—that process of taking a breath and settling for a moment within the song.”
Today, she cites the song “Jeans (I Get It Now)” the most complex and longest (over four and a half minutes!) song on “Chit Chat” as the best example of how she’s “trying to groove a little more with this record.” Striebis also “enjoyed introducing piano and more acoustic guitar to our songs this time around. I’m a big Alex G fan and get really obsessed with all the different musical textures he uses in his writing.”
OK Cool/Photo: Tracy Conoboy
When asked if I’m correct, that my interpretation of “Jeans” is about ambivalence, she laughs, welcoming any interpretations, but responds that “’Jeans,’ to me, is a song about trying desperately to help someone you love grow, but ultimately not being able to withstand the amount of hurt that comes along with that process.”
Sonically, it does seem like the songs on “Chit Chat” are less “see how much we rock up front” than their earlier work, and more like they are embracing the complexities of their thoughts, reflected in their arrangements. That underscores Stiebris’ earlier point about cramming in the most “incredible things” as opposed to letting the songs settle, groove, and seeing how they develop.
I tell these two best friends that one of my favorite moments on “Chit Chat” is how the song “Fading Out Forever” ends (another favorite moment is that same song’s fade-in)—the whole time I’m listening to it for the first time, I’m wondering, “OK are they gonna end with a fade out, or end the track abruptly?” And they don’t do either—there’s a jump stop, and then a lovely acoustic coda. I have to know how that part came about. Blomquist Waller says that every OK Cool record “we put out has one [song] we think of as ‘the weird one,’ where we mess around with electronic drums and deviate from our other songs a little more. I think adding the acoustic instrumental at the end really helped ground the song and take us back to the rest of the album.”
And were they tempted to… actually fade out? How do they feel about songs fading out? “Fade outs can be fun,” Blomquist Waller responds. “I don’t hear them in music as often anymore. I like the idea that a song could get exponentially quieter and out of our hearing range but never fully stop.” Stiebris says that “It’s interesting to think about ‘fads’ in songwriting and production and how they would be received today. At the same time, I can’t currently imagine ending one of my own songs with a fade out… but I’m curious to see if that ever changes.”
While I can’t imagine what will come next for OK Cool, I’ll be content with spinning this winner—their simmering guitar work makes the perfect soundtrack to the waning days of this “Chit Chat” summer.
Their live show is just as fun, and highly recommended—one of the times I’ve seen them play, they supplemented their normal rocking catalog with a rollicking (and fun) version of Vampire Weekend’s “A-Punk.” Chicago friends Josh Kayne (drums) and Tommy Kessler (guitar) round out their live band.
OK Cool plays their record release show at Subterranean, 2011 West North, on Thursday, August 14, with Truth Or Consequences New Mexico and Superdime opening. The show is for ages seventeen and over. Doors at 7pm; show at 8pm. Tickets are $15 plus fees, available at subt.net.
