Artist Interview: Bad Self Portraits

Story and Cover Photo: Spencer Fleming

I recently had the chance to sit down with Ingrid Howell, lead singer and bass player for the Omaha band Bad Self Portraits. I was able to catch the band at Maha Festival a few years ago. Since then they've released a couple EPs, done a small tour that brought them to the Treefort Music Festival in Boise, and have a brand-new album on the way titled I Think I'm Going To Hell. Ingrid and I discuss the new album, the band's formation, the band's writing process and more. Let's get into it!

Photos courtesy of Bad Self Portraits

Stories: Thanks so much for sitting down with me. So did you grow up in Omaha?

Ingrid: Yeah. I actually grew up like where Louis' grocery store was, a five minute walk from here, and then I’ve never left. Which, I want to, but I also really like Omaha.

Stories: I feel that. So who are the folks that make up Bad Self Portraits?

Ingrid: So three of us are in Omaha. I’m here and I play bass and I’m the lead vocalist. Connor is here in Omaha and he plays rhythm guitar, and keys. Cole writes and plays lead guitar as well. Jesse, our drummer, is in Kansas City. He plays drums, writes harmonies, and sings lead on some songs too.

Stories: So there’s a lot of moving parts, nice! Is there a lot of commuting for practice and writing?

Ingrid: Yea Jesse commutes a lot. He works in Kansas City but he has a lot of ties here. He and his partner’s families are in Omaha. We try to get together a couple times before a show for practice or if we’re in a writing phase.

Stories: So my first memory of your band was from Maha Festival. At the time I was unfamiliar with your music but I’ve learned more about you guys and I’m excited for your next chapter.

Ingrid: Yea that show was like three years ago now.

Stories: Wow, time flies! I think that was the year with PUP on it. Maha is one of those festivals where every year they have at least one band that pulls me in. It’s a great way to learn about new bands such as yourselves. When the lineup drops I typically find myself saying “who?” to a lot of the acts, but then there’s that one band that I’m like “ooooohhhh! I gotta go”. The first year it was The Faint, later on it was PUP and then Turnstile. I had a conflict this year but the year that Turnstile played, Maha closed with Big Thief. No offense to Big Thief at all, but I found it strange that the first night Turnstile blew the roof off and then Big Thief was really mellow, slow, and sad.

Ingrid: For sure. Like Maha, as a band we have to be careful about how we build out a bill. Like, what bands fit with their different styles. And when we play a festival we have to think about what songs will work with the crowd. We have a lot of sad songs lyrically but they come across happier because of the upbeat tempo. It can be tricky sometimes.

Stories: So jumping back to the band formation, how did you guys all meet?

Ingrid: Connor, Jesse and I all met at Central High School. Then the guys went to college. Connor and Jesse went to UNO. I stayed in town and did a gap year, or more like five gap years until I figured things out, haha. I was like, I know I wanna do music, so I went straight into work. And then at college Connor and Jesse met Cole. He came from Lincoln to UNO and ended up being roommates with Connor. It worked out well because we wanted to spice things up a bit. There were a lot of things we could do on records that we couldn’t do live. At the time we just had drums, rhythm guitar, and bass. By adding Cole we were able to bring in a lead guitar and Connor was able to add keys.

Stories: Very cool. So this new album is about your youth and your church experience. Let’s talk about that. What church did you go to growing up? I know there’s so many different faiths. Full disclosure, I’m active LDS. Any time someone mentions religious trauma I’m like “Please don’t be LDS, haha”. I know there are people that have had some bad experiences with the LDS faith out there, but as a convert, I’ve been a member for 20 years now and it’s been awesome. But I'm also not a 14-year-old girl who maybe had to have some awkward conversations growing up.

Ingrid: Yea, we definitely had different conversations. But to put you at ease, I did not grow up LDS. My dad was the youth pastor of our church for 28 years or something close to that, and my uncle's a pastor. There’s a whole lot of religious stuff in my family. But, I think there's a lot of different kinds of religious trauma.

Some of mine was from being a girl and then being a woman while being neurodivergent undiagnosed. It’s funny because our new album is titled I Think I’m Going To Hell. We got a lot of bible verses posted on our like announcement, and I was like, oh, well I wasn't really asking for spiritual advice. I grew up Christian. I know what Christianity's view of what heaven and hell is, you know?

Since I was like five, I prayed every single night that I would be saved from my sins and I didn't feel like it ever worked, you know? So because I had a little undiagnosed OCD and not knowing that, I took everything very literally.

So there was nobody to really explain to me, like, that's not what we mean. But there's also the religious trauma of always thinking that this higher being loves you so much, but you should fear them. It really led to a lot of the abuse that was going on in my life getting a pass.

It's like, oh, well, if God is basically gonna do X, Y, and Z to me because he loves me, but it's negative, then humans can do that too, you know?

But, at some point I just had to leave. I really like the idea of the community aspect, and that made leaving really hard.

Stories: So the album and title track, I Think I’m Going To Hell…

Ingrid: Yea, I Think I'm Going To Hell. It’s all about how I thought I couldn't do anything right. I just thought everything I did was wrong because oh, I'm doing it to get into heaven. So now my motivations are not pure and God's gonna see it as, well, you just want to get into heaven, don't you?

So you can't come into heaven. You know? So it was just kind of like this backwards way of looking at everything. But, I was taught things and then whether or not that's how the church meant it, that's what happened in my brain.

Stories: Yeah that sounds pretty heavy. My experience with the LDS church so far has been a lot less “rule by fear”. Of course we believe in sin and the repentance process, but the words “You’re going to hell if…” don’t get thrown around. But I get how as a child hearing that could be pretty traumatizing.

Ingrid: That sounds like a much better experience. But, you know, for people who partake in Christianity and feel good about it that’s great. Because, I think there were times where I did feel comforted and then honestly there were times the clergy let me down. Because we’re all human and we’re all flawed, but sometimes people end up in power and pastoral spaces who shouldn’t be there. You shouldn't automatically accept everything that they say.

Stories: Yea I feel that. It’s an interesting thing because in my church it’s all volunteer, there’s no paid positions, and the overwhelming majority of people are not going to theology school. So occasionally maybe someone is in a position of power who shouldn’t be, but so far I haven’t experienced anything hurtful or scandalous.

Stories: Thanks for sharing some of your background and some of the inspiration for the new album. Let’s jump to something fun. What was your first concert experience?

Ingrid: Oh my God. Okay. My first concert was Hannah Montana, at the Qwest Center (now CHI Health Center).

Stories: The Best Of Both Worlds Tour!

Ingrid: Oh yeah, exactly, and I was in the third grade. Miley had the Jonas Brothers open for her. But I didn't know what an opener was, so I was livid because I thought we were at the wrong concert, ha! So I was like, “I did not pay to see these people!”.

Stories: That sounds like a hoot! So what was your first album you bought? Or streamed I guess? As artists get younger I feel like there may be a point where no one buys albums and they just stream everything.

Ingrid: Right? Like, parents just add their kids to their Spotify plan now. They don’t have to save up to buy albums anymore. I can’t really remember, but I think someone bought me the Hannah Montana CD. But the first album I bought with my own money was Taylor Swift’s Fearless. Then from there, I think I bought her other records.

Stories: What was the first band or artist that made you want to start doing music?

Ingrid: Ooh… Band or Artist.

Stories: Yeah. That made you think, like, oh man, I want to do that.

Ingrid: Um, I’m not sure because honestly, I just started singing as soon asI could talk. I honestly grew up thinking everyone wanted to be a singer, and I was so confused when I was like, “Oh, I get to choose that”. Which is a weird neurodivergent thing.

I think since I was so young, probably Hannah Montana and Taylor Swift. From there I liked a lot of Sarah Bareilles' music. I just thought it was so unique and not so over-produced. It was more about the instrumentation and I really enjoyed that.

But I grew up around music. My dad was the youth pastor but he was also the leader of the praise team. I wanted to write songs so he taught me how to play guitar so I would have something to write with. I always wanted to be up on stage like him. Since I was already singing, once I learned how to play guitar, I got to play with the praise team. So really just looking at people I knew, it looked like they were having a fun time, so I wanted to do it too.

Stories: That’s great. So what's your writing process like? Do you write melodies first or lyrics or just whatever comes along?

Ingrid: It can be both. I’ve written lyrics first, and then I've had the guys write to that. I mean, there are some songs from back in the day that I just straight up wrote. Usually I would write guitar and then lyrics on top of it.

For this album Connor and Cole, and sometimes Jesse, will put demos into a folder and then I will write over them. Which is helpful because I really feel like it's all of our projects, you know? Like, it's not just my project, we are all a quarter in it and we all bring our creativity, like the fun stuff where we're like, can we do something with this?

Can I sing over this? Or is this more of an instrumental? Cole has other projects that he can bring stuff to, so we're not his only outlet, but we really like collaborating with him.

Stories: Do you usually play an acoustic to start writing what you're thinking or just all kinds of instruments?

Ingrid: With our main writing process now, they usually put a demo in there that's got guitar, drums, sometimes they even add bass and lead guitar. Because, Cole, he's a menace. He just writes, like, all the time. So we'll get a bunch of demos from him. Conner writes a lot too, and then if Jesse's sending in a song, it's typically almost done.

Stories: Oh wow. Like he's sending it in with everything, including vocals?

Ingrid: Yeah, those are the songs that he's singing on.

Stories: Ok, wow. I know a lot of bands have different processes. One of my top five bands is Deftones and I know they do the lyrics as the very last step. From what I can tell they get everything else done and then Chino the singer drags it out until the last minute to turn in the vocals and lyrics. Do you feel that your lyrics come fairly easy?

Ingrid: Most of the time the lyrics just flow out. They can be very personal so it’s almost like therapy to me. It’s easy to put myself back into situations or timeframes in my life and feel how I was feeling then. Some of the time those can be intense feelings so when I’m playing the songs I’m like “Ok, I’m gonna cry now”. So I have to compartmentalize on stage. Sometimes people will ask, “Do you write about anything happy?” And I’m like “Not really” haha. It’s fine. I write upbeat songs with sad lyrics, you know?

Stories: I get that. There’s a lot of bands I listen to that have upbeat songs but really dark lyrics, if you look beyond the surface. So do you guys have any tour plans coming up?

Ingrid: We're touring in September, I think the 13th is when it starts and I believe it goes until the 20th. The 20th is when we have our release show here and then the album releases the next day.

This will be our second tour. On our first one we had a blast, even though it can be tiring. But you kind of get into a groove, and it's fun because we're all really good friends.

Stories: Oh yeah, for sure. Those are the days, man. Where did you guys go on your first tour?

Ingrid: We went to Wichita, then I think we went straight out to Fort Collins, then Salt Lake City. Then we hit Boise for the Treefort Music Festival. That was really fun. I think we played Denver on the way back. Oh, and we played a Lincoln show on the first night.

Stories: That sounds awesome. So if you were to get a support tour, who would you want to hit the road with?

Ingrid: I think my dream tour would be Bad Bad Hats, they're great. I love the Ophelias. But if we're dreaming real big? Wet Leg. We would also love to tour with a band that we met on our last tour, Horse B$tch. They're really fun.

Stories: While we’re dreaming, let's say you blow up and you start playing arenas. What's something that would be on your tour rider?

Ingrid: I would say I want kittens. Just at the place in the green room so I won’t miss my cats so much when I'm away. We all have a number of cats. Like Jesse's got one, I have three, Connor has four and Cole has three. So when we go on tour, we're leaving 11 cats behind.

Stories: Wow, that’s a lot of cats! That’s cool. I love cats.

Ingrid: Yeah. It's funny because when we were on tour, Connor and I were like, guys, we gotta go to a humane society somewhere and hold some cats, haha.

Stories: So let's talk about your record release. You're doing it kind of unique where it's like you don't stream it until you get the record, or do you get a code to stream it?

Ingrid: So it's called Buy Before You Stream. What they do is release the vinyl before it hits streaming. So you can pre-order it and then we’ll be having a listening party where we’ll play the record and then maybe talk about it a little bit. Then you can buy it, and it doesn't come out on streaming until September 20th. Because bands rarely make any money off of streaming, it's a way to build excitement like, “Yay! We’re putting out a record!”, and it's so fun to have a collectible item that can capture us in time. Plus, hopefully we’ll make a little change before we go on the road.

Stories: And you guys have released three songs from the album, right?

Ingrid: Yes, we have three singles out and their music videos.

Stories: That's cool. What songs are you excited to play live?

Ingrid: I love playing “I Think I'm Going To Hell” live, especially when the crowd is really fun and cool because, um, it's really funny, the lyrics are quite raunchy.

Stories: I was gonna say, I'm like, “Ooh, it's kind of heavy right here”.

Ingrid: It is, and it's funny to watch the reactions of people in the audience. There's a lot of like, whispering, literal whispering, and covering of the face. It's very funny, because I was kind of worried, well not entirely, but like, should we write this song in general?

I didn't know how I felt about it, and I hope what people take away from it is not that I just don't care about religion, you know? It's like, it has much, much, more meaning than that. It's not just to be shocking. It’s literally the lyrics that came out when I wrote it.

The first time that I put pen to paper for this song I thought it was funny. But then I was like, okay, this is actually therapeutic to write about because I know that other people also kind of have strange thoughts about religion and Christianity in general.

So yeah. That one's fun to play live. Another one of my favorite ones to play live is “Windowsill”. I feel really good about that song and I just love it.

Stories: Are there any new artists or albums that you’ve been listening to so far this year?

Ingrid: Ooh, new artists or albums this year?

Stories: Not necessarily new artists I guess, but like, any new releases that you’ve enjoyed. Like, for me, the new Beach Bunny, obviously. It's gotta be in my top 10 of the year. The new Deftones is amazing. Spirit Box’s new album is insane. I picked up the two new Faint re-issues, one from Homer’s and one at their show back in April.

Ingrid: That's cool! I will say the new Wet Leg album is fantastic. I've been listening to some Anna Huas, and then of course Chappell Roan’s “The Subway” came out, and that’s been on repeat. I’ve also been listening to a lot of Jesus Christ Taxi Driver, not new but great!

Stories: Well I have a lot of homework to do so I can catch up on all these cool bands. Thanks so much for chatting with me and we’ll see you at the album release show for I Think I’m Going To Hell on September 20 at The Slowdown!

You can find Bad Self Portraits music on all streaming platforms. You can also get tickets to the album release show HERE.

Thanks for reading and we'll see you at the Slowdown on September 20!