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Oct 11, 2024 Web Exclusive By Andy Von Pip Photography by Press Shot

“Please ignore this painting behind me! I’m staying in an Airbnb, and it would not be my choice,” laughs singer-songwriter and actor Sophie Thatcher as we kick off our Zoom chat. The artwork in question is indeed striking: it features a child who looks like a bizarre mashup of one of the Grady twins from The Shining and former UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson. I’m torn between being impressed and terrified. “Oh, it’s definitely fucking scary,” Thatcher chuckles.

Currently, she’s in Vancouver wrapping up filming for Season Three of Yellowjackets. Since the hit series premiered, Thatcher has played the teenage version of Natalie “Nat” Scatorccio, alongside Juliette Lewis, who portrays her as an adult. It’s arguably the role that has showcased Thatcher’s immense acting talent to a much broader audience.

But today, we are here to talk about her music. She’s just released a wonderful debut EP, Pivot and Scrape, which certainly demonstrates that Thatcher possesses a remarkable ability to craft dark, glittering narratives that are nothing short of mesmerizing.

“Well, music and singing were really the things I was most passionate about,” she explains. “Both my parents are huge music lovers. My mom’s a piano teacher, and I was classically trained as a kid and into my teens. But I was always an actor and was forever drawing and writing short stories. I have a twin, and we would make movies together.”

Thatcher recounts how acting took over: “To be honest, I always thought I was a better singer than an actor, but I started doing theater professionally when I was 11. Once I started getting more acting gigs, it became more serious. I was that kid who was never at school because I was working,” she laughs. “So quite early on, I knew I could do this—like as a profession. It can be emotionally draining, but it’s also incredibly satisfying.”

Yet Thatcher always knew that music would eventually come into play again; it was just a matter of finding time in her busy schedule. She grew up as part of the Mormon Church, so music of one form or another was always around. “I think being in that kind of environment kind of pushes you to be musical. I would sing in the choir and take all these voice lessons.” After she left the church and became non-practicing, she began experimenting with her own music around the age of 14. “I started writing my own lyrics, and it would just be like voice memo-type stuff. Then I got an Omnicord and would just mess around with melodies. And then I got a MidiSynth, and then I was like, what is Ableton? That is such a scary program. Oh, my God,” she laughs. After learning the ropes, her own music began to take shape. “I was just making demos for a really long time which were far more experimental and noisy. I would reverse everything and record noises in my house. I was obsessed with organic sounds, like the sound of a door lock, which I’d make into a drum beat. So I think that kind of informed my taste. I was always a huge ‘music head,’ listening to music constantly. I wouldn’t talk to anybody and always had my headphones on. I’m probably still like that now.”

Acting-wise, Thatcher’s star has been in the ascendancy. In 2018, she appeared alongside Pedro Pascal in the cult sci-fi movie Prospect before later reuniting with him in the Disney Star Wars franchise The Book of Boba Fett as Drash. In her two (soon to be three) seasons of Yellowjackets, she’s never been anything less than compelling, and her latest performance in the movie Heretic, alongside Hugh Grant and The Fabelmans’ Chloe East, is receiving rave reviews. With so much going on, it’s impressive that Thatcher has found the time to create such accomplished, powerful, visceral music.

“It kind of happened organically,” she explains. “I just met the right people at the right time. I felt very lucky,” she continues. “I connected with my friend Maral, who’s been my biggest supporter—she makes incredible music. I ran into her at an Avey Tare show, and she said she liked me in Yellowjackets. After that, we started messaging each other, and she invited me to do a DubLab show for her—(a community internet radio station based in Los Angeles.) We talked about music for an hour, I made her a playlist, and over time, I felt confident enough to send her my demos. She eventually passed them along to Adam McDaniel, who ended up producing my EP.”

With the encouragement of her collaborators, Thatcher gained the confidence to bring her music into a studio. “Trusting the producer is crucial,” she emphasizes. “It’s like that with acting too—if you don’t trust the director, you’re fucked.”

Working together, Thatcher and McDaniel quickly discovered they were on the same wavelength, sharing similar tastes. “He understands the chaotic nature of the sounds I’m trying to emulate, although I’d say it’s a very refined chaos. I feel beyond lucky to have worked with him. I mean, he is a synth genius; he knows so much about making experimental music. And he’s so down to try anything. We would spend hours just trying to find the right noisy synth sound.”

Given Thatcher’s apparent inclination toward the darker sort of roles in her acting career so far, it’s no surprise that her music radiates a brooding undercurrent, underscored with a glittering, haunting beauty. Her lyrics can be abstract, almost modernist, adding layers of complexity and atmospheric depth to her work. To use a cinematic term, “chiaroscuro”—the balance between darkness and light—perfectly describes the soundscapes that Thatcher meticulously crafts.

“Often, I find the melody that I like, and then the melody informs the lyrics,” she explains. “But many lyrics start off improvised. If I find one snippet that I like, I can build a song around that. I find myself getting into a very meditative state—present but not overthinking anything. I think that’s been the most important thing with my lyrics. It can start with visuals and is often based on dreams or nightmares.”

Tracks like the beautiful “My Friend” and the gritty, propulsive rush of “Go On” carry a shoegaze-like, almost industrial edge. Still, Thatcher isn’t keen on genre tagging or pigeonholing her music into a specific niche. “It’s always hard to put it into one category,” she admits. “Even when I was categorizing it on Bandcamp, I thought, oh, fuck me, this is difficult. Thinking about the genres was the hardest part. I guess it’s dreamy and atmospheric, but I wouldn’t want to label it as dream pop. I think the safest way to describe it would be experimental pop because it’s very melody-driven. But it also has a bit of an edge, with some noise to it.”

Thatcher is incredibly knowledgeable about music and speaks with genuine passion and enthusiasm about her favorite artists. “The first band that made me say, oh, my God, I want to make a sound like this, was the Icelandic band Múm,” she reflects. “They bring you into this very specific world. It’s so atmospheric. I hadn’t found an artist that did that for me until then. Broadcast, too, has been a big influence. It was Trish’s birthday recently, and everyone’s listening to Broadcast now. She’s a huge influence.”

“I grew up obsessed with Elliott Smith,” she continues. “Obviously, he inspired me, but he’s on another level—such a genius that it feels almost unapproachable. I love lo-fi stuff too. There’s something very personal about it, like bands from Flying Nun, Tall Dwarfs, or Chris Knox.”

Though she’s curated numerous playlists, Thatcher concedes she doesn’t have much input into the music used in the TV shows and movies she’s starred in. “Sometimes I get lucky with the soundtrack, but it’s generally totally out of my control,” she explains. “I feel like the music in Yellowjackets was perhaps a little closer to my taste. In the first season, I remember reading the script, and my character is talking about Dinosaur Jr., which was so nostalgic for me because I grew up on them. They are so fucking good.”

Playing the younger version of Juliette Lewis in Yellowjackets, another actor with experience in the music business, proved to be great casting. “I do think that the casting overall was just pretty fucking spot on” enthuses Thatcher.” Juliette and I have similar voices, so I just kind of had to play it up and lower my voice, find where it sits in my body. She’s very physical; I see her almost like a dancer or performance artist. We bonded over her Suburban Lawns T-shirt and then over PJ Harvey. She’s just a huge music lover and makes her own crazy music, and I think our initial trust came from us connecting over our love for music.”

Acting has helped Thatcher view things from different perspectives and explore new approaches, which has been beneficial for her music. “There’s definitely a crossover between music and acting—in both, I inhabit different worlds,” she agrees. “With acting, you’re not always in control, but there is room for interpretation. For instance, in The Book of Boba Fett, it was decided that my character should have a British accent. They didn’t even specify where in England I was supposed to be from, which was scary because I didn’t have an accent coach, so I thought, Oh right, okay, I’ll have to try something and hope it works—well, that’s my excuse,” she adds, laughing.

She continues, “But yes, I think it’s definitely helped me with the specificity of world-building and character creation. With music, it’s an extension of myself, but I’m also building a character and a world within it. I find that incredibly important. Acting has given me that perspective. However, with acting, there are so many other voices involved. In contrast, with music, I have full control, and that’s exciting.”

Due to her hectic schedule, Thatcher isn’t able to perform live around the time of her EP release, but she aims to rectify that by the end of the year. “I’m trying to do live shows in December because that’s the earliest I can manage, given how busy I’ve been. I’ve been working on new songs and might include a couple of covers. One of my favorite bands growing up was Clinic, and I was working on a cover of ‘Distortions’ in Ableton—but then I accidentally spilt water on my laptop, so I might have lost all my latest demos. That’s not good. But hopefully, thank God for Google Drive.”

Until then, fans will have to make do with the music videos for “Pivot and Scrape” and “Black and Blue.” Reflecting on “Pivot and Scrape,” Thatcher reveals, “I always had this very specific imagery of breaking glass—a recurring theme in my dreams where I would cut myself with it. It was really grotesque. I worked with my friend Ben, who had the idea of using a mirror with me lying on top of it.”

She took a similar approach for “Black and Blue,” collaborating with her twin sister, who contributed animations. “I envisioned a dinner scene, and at the end, everything is painted black and blue. It’s pretty literal, and again, a lot of it comes from nightmares.”

Thatcher isn’t completely new to working on music videos, having appeared in Pavement’s “Harness Your Hopes.” “It was really random, but my God, it changed my life,” she explains. “I was friends with Alex Ross Perry, the filmmaker and actor, whom I initially met through a movie project that fell through. We remained friends, and he knew I was a huge Pavement and Silver Jews fan, so he reached out to ask if I’d like to be in the video. And I was like, ‘Duh, of course! This is iconic.’ It felt surreal—I had a Slanted and Enchanted poster in my room growing up, so it was a very full-circle moment. And, of course, my boyfriend found me through it because he’s a huge Pavement fan, so everything really worked out amazingly well.”

Recently, there’s been a significant conversation surrounding the pressures faced by young artists, particularly concerning social media and online fandom. Having been in the spotlight from an early age, Thatcher has learned how to switch off from the noise. “I’ve discovered that avoiding comments and not becoming too obsessive is crucial. Spending time on that only traps you in your own head, making you start to see yourself through others’ eyes,” she explains. “During the height of COVID, I found myself on Reddit, reading all these Star Wars fans bashing me, and I thought, ‘Okay, well now I really fucking hate myself.’ But then I thought: ‘hang on, I’m the one doing the Star Wars show, while they’re all on Reddit.’”

Thatcher has also learned to trust her instincts, especially in music. “I’m hyper-specific about what I like and want, so I don’t want anything to interfere with that. I’m thrilled to have these songs out there, even though, in some ways, I’m already a bit sick of them because I’ve heard them so many times,” she laughs. “I’m planning to record new music soon, and with the new material, I feel I’m evolving and refining my sound each time.”