📼 Jewish Muses: A Conversation with the Band Lawrence  

Gracie: I don't remember when I said [I'm confident that I'm insecure feels very Jewish], but that totally sounds like me! [laughs] I think what I probably meant by that is I definitely have the inclination when writing about something that feels real to me to find the humor in it, or to find the comedy in it and . . . you know, I didn't grow up very religious but I feel like that feels very culturally Jewish to me and that's something I really relate to; to find the the humor in your circumstance and in your story and so I think that that is probably what I meant by that.

Clyde: Have I ever felt the pressure to express my Jewishness? . . .  Um, no, I think that I don't think that I feel any pressure to and in fact I'm not really like a practicing Jew. I'm not like, I wasn't raised in a religious household--I wasn't even Bar Mitzvahed. So to me like Judaism is more present in my life in just like the cultural ways in which it's such a part of who I am. So like you know being raised in New York, the child of a comedy writer, there's just so many Jewish cultural references and touch points for me, like Judaism is Larry David, Judaism is Seinfeld, Judaism is bagels, lox and cream cheese, and like to the extent that I write about family and everyday life. Like those kinds of things seep into my music but I never feel any pressure to represent that I just want it to be authentic to who I am and I both don't want to push it and I also don't want to hide it you know I just let it be a part of who I am in whatever organic way that presents, or doesn't, depending on the moment.

Joseph: While I was primarily interested in asking about the way you feel your Jewish identity makes it into the music, I'd also love to hear about the process behind deciding to do the docu-series; this is just another way you're laying yourself bare for the fans, and I'm wondering what your goals for making it were, what the experience was like, and more.

Clyde: Honestly these guys approached us saying we'd love to come on tour and make a docu-series and we've always known that we have an interesting story. It just kind of worked out and it was not something I was expecting to make but it ended up being a really, really fun project and we've still got some more episodes to release that I'm really excited about.

Joseph: Other than the docu-series, there was one other small thing I was interested in: I’d love to hear the “tea” about “23”! I'm not sure I've heard much talk about this, but was it meant to originally be on Hotel TV (the small call back in “Figure it Out,” my favorite song of yours, leads me to believe it was). Why didn't it make the album? And, why now?

Gracie: We just wanted to wait on that one. We felt like we could still like fine tune it a little bit more before putting it out, but also felt like it just like had the potential to kind of, of be a single for the next album like it just had that singly energy and excitement; so I just felt like I think we all were like oh if we put it on [Hotel TV] like are we are we giving it its moment enough. So that was kind of the rationale behind that.