motel void

Babytooth is the full band project of singer/songwriter Isabel Zacharias. 

MOTEL VOID: You’re from Portland, Oregon. How would you describe the current music scene there? Do you feel that you’re a part of it?

ISABEL ZACHARIAS: Portland is the city where I started playing music, and all my closest friends live in Portland and play in bands. I won’t pretend I know everything about the scene, since it’s vast and wonderfully varied and I hear all the time about amazing underground shows I missed — but I can honestly say I’ve never felt more belonging than I feel in my little corner of it. I think singing together and sharing the weird, gooey vulnerability of creating something is one of the highest-quality kinds of time you can spend with other people, and I would describe the Portland scene as a community more than a scene, not without its petty politics and faults but always emphasizing co-creation and mutual support. Also, whatever people say about Portland being a refuge for freaks and out-there experimentalists is, in my experience, totally true. I love it!

MOTEL VOID: Could you recommend your favorite local artists and venues?

ISABEL ZACHARIAS: This will be deeply biased in favor of my friends’ projects, but my favorite Portland acts are Smiling Strange (Annie from Yellow Room, this is her fiancé), also Yellow Room (go figure), Jer, Water Shrews, Canary Room, How Strange It Is, Laith, the now-mostly-defunct Jessica Dennison & Jones, Shady Cove, Pileup, Mini Blinds, Ancient Pools. I’d go on, but that’s already a lot you have to go listen to now. As far as venues, I truly believe Portlanders are spoiled with the widest and deepest selection of dope small venues in the universe. Turn Turn Turn is a staple for a reason — Rainforest Cafe is a backyard venue basically synonymous to “the scene” in my mind — Kenton Club for the perfect patio show, The Fixin’ To for the best small-venue sound system you’ll find anywhere, Alberta Street Pub, Polaris Hall, the Firkin if you’re really feeling divey (which I often am). Also, R.I.P. Valentine’s downtown.

MOTEL VOID: ‘Hometown’ is a single from your upcoming album (a fantastic track by the way), Could you tell us more about the recording and writing process of your new record?

ISABEL ZACHARIAS: Thanks so much for the kind words about the single! I’m sure all musicians feel this way, but it really is so wild for songs to live solely in my head for so long, then solely be known by my bandmates and a few friends who come to our shows, and now for them to be out in the internet air for anyone and everyone to hear. It’s magical and terrifying!

And actually, describing that sequence of events sort of explains my process of writing and recording. It’s always from some very weird, restless, solitary emotional place that I end up writing — so what more productive time could there have been than early Covid? I was living alone at the time, and some friends and I decided to play the 20 Song Game — though “game” is a sort of tongue-in-cheek way to describe it, because really, it’s excruciating. You try to write and record 20 songs in one day, and then you have to share at least a few recordings with the other folks who signed up for this insane experiment. We didn’t make this up, and I’m both grateful for and angry with the person who did. But almost all the songs on this record came from that one day in October 2020. I was also falling in love, which helps endlessly in the having-things-to-write-about department. Still writing about that same person years later.

In general, I write the melody and verse/chorus chords for all the Babytooth songs, but after that, my bandmates really do SO much to flesh out the ideas and finish the structure, not to mention write all their own parts. Then our friend Vin (his band is called Nothings!) records us, partially in the fancy studio he works at, partially in his rad basement home studio, and we mix and tweak things together for many, many (many) hours. Thanks, Vin! I can never say thanks enough to Vin.
MOTEL VOID: You love cooperating with other musicians. Could you introduce your current lineup?

ISABEL ZACHARIAS: There is no art-making I find more fun and meaningful than playing music with others. There is so much that I don’t know (the entirety of music theory, for one) that would prevent me from doing this music thing on my own. Our lead guitarist Annie is one of my best friends, and we’ve gotten to know each other almost exclusively through playing in this band together. We’ve been on such a journey together as people, not just becoming better musicians but really growing up together. Annie Fifer is her full name, and I think her guitar parts are really what defines our band. It’s not Babytooth without her.

Benson Chong is our fearless and soloist bassist, and I’ve never met someone more into playing bass or more excited in general about practicing his craft and constantly evolving. His recording project is called Honeydieu, check it out!! It’s hard to tell when Benson is excited but I’m happy to say I’ve seen it a few times. Love that guy. A legend and a master of comic timing.

Hugh Jepson is our drummer, but equally or more importantly, he is my boyfriend. I try to reference this in every show we play — for one because it always gets a laugh, and for another because he is the best boyfriend and partner and he deserves for a crowd of people to tell him that even though it makes him feel embarrassed. When I play Babytooth “solo” shows, he’s the one moving from lead guitar to bass to drums from song to song seamlessly; he’s the one listening to the mixes on every different speaker in the house; he’s the one feeling and thinking and moving through my life, inspiring everything. He’s everything. He’s the most remarkable musical talent I’ve ever met and a true artist. His band is called Soft Cheese!
MOTEL VOID: Your biggest music influences right now?

ISABEL ZACHARIAS: I can tell you what I’ve been addicted to listening to lately, which usually ends up coming out in what I write, whether I like it or not: the new album by The Clientele, and the new Diners, and the new Stephen Steinbrink, and the new(ish) Jana Horn — plus The American Analog Set for when I’m reading, and this great hooky bedroom pop band called The Reds Pinks and Purples.

MOTEL VOID: Your plans and goals for the rest of 2023? Any live shows ahead?

ISABEL ZACHARIAS: Surprise – I moved to Minneapolis a week ago! I’m a first-year MFA candidate in Poetry at the University of Minnesota, and I’ll be teaching and TAing for some undergraduate classes, too. I haven’t the slightest idea what the music scene is like here, but overall this is definitely one of the coolest and most artistically relevant cities in America, so I can’t wait to find out. Babytooth is not over! Hugh is here! Tell us where to play!