Danielle Haim is in the middle of explaining her songwriting process when she’s interrupted by a call on her hotel phone. “One second,” she says.
Luckily, her siblings Alana and Este, who round out the band Haim, are there to fill the void, performing a rapid-fire riff—a sister act, if you will.
“You have a caller! Who is it?” Alana asks.
“Is it mom?” Este wonders.
“It’s probably mom,” Alana concludes.
Photo: Heidi Stanton
The trio have always been close, but their synchronicity has never been more apparent than on their fourth studio album, I Quit, out today. On its face, the record—coproduced by Danielle and Rostam Batmanglij, formerly of Vampire Weekend—is a breakup album. Over its 15 tracks, the record travels from the lusty beginnings of a romance to the grief of its dissolution and the catharsis of finding closure. But present throughout is a sense of ecstasy: in album opener “Gone”—with its sample from George Michael’s “Freedom! ’90”—and the jubilant, Alana-led “Spinning,” all the way through to the percussive closer, “Now It’s Time.”
“I wish I could tell you there was some huge blowup with my past relationship. The real story is just two people that lost each other,” Danielle says of her split from Ariel Rechtshaid, who produced the band’s three previous albums. “There’s a lot of love there. I think we made really great music with my ex, and he’s such a genius producer, but I think I really found so much strength in producing this with Rostam. I really feel like it’s our best work.”
