A Saturday afternoon highlight of last spring’s Shaky Knees Festival was the set by Los Angeles-based singer-songwriter Sabrina Teitelbaum, who performs under the name Blondshell. It was a highlight for her, as well.
“That was one of my favorite festivals I played last year,” said the indie rock musician on a recent call from her home, one day before kicking off a lengthy tour. “I thought it was really good energy.” Teitelbaum’s appearance came hot on the heels of the release of her collaboration with Bully, the catchy single “Docket.”
Now, a little more than a year after that Central Park set, Teitelbaum and her band will return to Atlanta in support of her new sophomore record with a Friday performance at Variety Playhouse.
Credit: Courtesy of Partisan Records
Credit: Courtesy of Partisan Records
Getting back on the road has come not a moment too soon for Teitelbaum. “I have my bag packed. I’m just sort of ready to get back out there,” she said. “It’s been a minute since I did an actual headline tour, because last year was all festivals, pretty much. So I’m excited.”
The singer will be everywhere in the second half of 2025. With a few short breaks built in, Teitelbaum is spending it touring across the U.S., Canada, the UK and continental Europe, before returning for more stateside shows.
While some artists tolerate the endless travel for the one or two hours of being onstage each night, Teitelbaum appreciates the journey. “I love being in the car for six hours,” she said. “I think it’s really relaxing to look out the window and see landscape that I never see. There’s places in Europe I’m going that I’ve never been, like Scotland and Ireland, so I feel really excited to go see that. I’m going back to Vienna — I’ve been there once before.”
Adding to her enthusiasm is finally having two Blondshell albums — both released on Partisan Records — from which to draw for set lists. “I’m so excited to have three songs from the old one, three songs from the new one, mix it up,” said the singer. “I just feel like it adds more color to the set. And it makes me feel like more of a real artist, that I have multiple albums out.”
“If You Asked for a Picture” sounds ready for the stage. Each of its self-assured tracks originated with Teitelbaum writing at home, accompanying herself on a Fender Telecaster guitar. Although some songs have cowriting credits, those are based on chord changes that happened later in the demo process. “I can’t really write with other people because it’s such a personal thing that I just feel like I’d have a hard time doing it,” Teitelbaum said.
Expanding on the sounds of ’90s alternative rock (such as Belly and the higher-fi of Liz Phair’s recordings) that inspired much of the self-titled Blondshell debut, the new material ranges from the acoustic-driven “Two Times” and “Thumbtack” to the bombastic “What’s Fair.” Maybe the catchiest is “23’s a Baby,” with lyrics (such as “but you deserve some hell from me/ while I figure out if you’re the enemy”) that contrast with the soaring pop chorus. And standing out live so far, according to the artist, is “He Wants Me.”
One of the record’s centerpieces is also Blondshell’s favorite. “Arms” is a mid-tempo burner chock-full of emotion. Teitelbaum knew she wanted lots of stacked vocals on the track, so that was a big focus of the demo she made ahead of her collaboration with producer Yves Rothman. “I feel like it’s the closest to where we wanted it to go,” she said. “Songs always end up somewhere else, and you’re usually happy with where they end up, but it’s so different from what you imagined. That song ended up really close to where we imagined it would go.”
“Arms” is one of many album tracks with impressive harmonies, and each features the artist harmonizing with herself. “It’s just (going by) ear,” said Teitelbaum. “We’ll basically be in there tracking the lead vocals, and then I’ll be like, ‘Let’s just layer this and this and this.’ And you just keep building.”
Credit: Photo courtesy of Daniel Topete
Credit: Photo courtesy of Daniel Topete
Teitelbaum and her collaborators whittled down more than 20 demos to the 12 songs that ended up on the album, but that pruning exercise was not a difficult one. “It just becomes clear through the process which songs are gonna work and which ones aren’t,” she said. “There were some that I liked but didn’t make sense with this album.”
One connecting point from her first record to this one turned out to be the primary recording studio for each, the legendary Sunset Sound in Los Angeles. “Everything sounds so good because it’s so lived in, and they have all of this amazing gear,” said Teitelbaum. “It was important to me to not have these two albums feel really disjointed, and recording them in the same place with the same people was sort of how I knew they were going to be bridged together even if the writing was really different.”
Songs come in batches for the singer-songwriter, and at times, she enjoys constructing them on the road. “I think it’s kind of inspiring also to be in a million different places. You’re inevitably going to be uncomfortable at a lot of different times … so stuff comes up, and I think that a tour can be a really fruitful place to write from.”
So, while Blondshell fans will enjoy the chance to hear “If You Asked for a Picture” songs at Variety Playhouse, it’s possible that a song destined for a third album might have its genesis in Little Five Points earlier that day.
CONCERT PREVIEW
Blondshell
8 p.m. Friday at Variety Playhouse (doors open at 7 p.m.). With special guest Daffo. All ages. $34.50. 1099 Euclid Ave. NE, Atlanta. variety-playhouse.com.
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