Montanans take Independance Day seriously. The mountainous northwest doesn’t get many warm weather days each year — even fewer that align with national holidays — so its frontier cities go all-out at the opportunity: festivals, backyard barbecues, massive fireworks displays that light up the state’s vast grasslands. As a kid, Alaska Reid would sing the National Anthem at her hometown’s Fourth of July rodeo. The rest of the story practically writes itself. Young girl with preternatural musical talent decamps to Los Angeles and starts gigging around with her acoustic six-string and Patsy Cline dresses. She puts out vinyl-only releases with her indie rock band, then forms a creative and romantic partnership with A.G. Cook, the producer who arguably invented hyperpop. Together, they art-damage her hypnotic guitar work with synthesizers and glitchy drums.

Reid’s songs are full of details that contain whole worlds unto themselves but pass by as quickly as mile markers. On her debut album, Disenchanter, out this Friday via Luminelle, a division of Fat Possum Records, their origins are varied and often indeterminate. Any given lyric might pull from Reid’s own life, come from a close friend or family member, or be entirely fabricated. “Palomino” channels her mother’s journey west, while allusions to “apples and ice” on “Leftover” reconstruct a scene of sisterly bonding via DIY pierced ears. Reid leans hard into the “writer” side of songwriter, understanding that sometimes you have to make up your way to the truth. Often, she’ll dip into an almost whispered cadence, transforming her words into a secret for your ears alone.

After signing to Fat Possum’s, Reid was thrilled to learn that her new label had little interest in proof-of-concept EPs or hype-building singles. Her songs work best as parts of a full body of work — and, anyway, she already had plenty of material to display her bona fides. Even Crush, the one streamable album from her former band Alyeska, glimmers with a then-unrealized intuition for sticky pop hooks. On Disenchanter, the guitars are louder and the melodies cut deeper, from a windows-down anthem like “French Fries” to the devastating quietude of “Arctic Heart.”

In the wake of last week’s July 4th festivities, I spoke to Reid about the pains of growing up, the poetry of Ray Young Bear, and pushing beyond her creative safe zone to end up somewhere thrilling and new.

This Q&A is taken from the latest episode of The FADER Interview. To hear this week’s show in full, and to access the podcast’s archive, click here.

The FADER: Your debut album is coming out very soon. How does that feel?

Alaska Reid: I’m pretty excited. I decided to go with [Fat Possum because] they were very enthusiastic about putting out a full body of work immediately. I didn’t have to do an EP. I didn’t have to do a bunch of singles. Everything was going to work towards this album. I think my work really needs the context, the world-building element of the lyrics, for it to be what I want it to be.

I look for that in other artists. I’m really looking to go on the damn road with them in a metaphorical sense, in that I want to know all their different sides. That’s what I tried to do with this album: show some different sides. The singles are each from very different regions of the album, stylistically. I’m excited for it to come out because I think it’ll help people to understand the context. Not like people haven’t before, but it’s such a weird world now, the way we consume music and the way that social media is paired with it — that one thing is gonna represent everything, because everyone needs a tweet; everyone needs a sound bite.

I think people actually like digesting stuff in a different slower way and [they] like to be fans, but it feels like the world works against us. So I like the idea of an album being like, “No, you need to live with this. You need to sit in it. I’m not just one thing.”

There was definitely some proof of concept: the Big Bunny project you put out, and before that, Crush, with your previous band. What would you say has carried through — and what has changed — about the way you engage with your art?

I was so young when I was in Alyeska. I started around 17 and did it until I was 21. Part of the beauty of being younger, for me, is that I weirdly wasn’t judgmental of myself, creatively. I don’t know if it was the environment around me which cultivated that, but I’m grateful for it, because some of my wackiest stuff is from when I was younger. I never worried about song structure in Alyeska; I had no awareness of pop music whatsoever. I’m the same person, but at the same time, I see that I’m more open-minded [now to] different genres of music.

For so long, I thought it was a dirty thing to have a tightly structured song. I’d be like, “Why? I can just jam out on the bridge for forever,” which is something I really like to do. Then I started thinking about the songs I gravitate towards in life and how I wasn’t applying those rules to them. I didn’t wanna hear a Fleetwood Mac song that jammed out forever and didn’t return to a great chorus. I I loved having that structure, so I started applying that mentality to my own songs. It’s just about writing a good song.

In terms of through lines, I’ve always loved the guitar, and I’m constantly building upon the guitar. I recently spoke to Sadie [Dupuis] from Speedy Ortiz, [and] she said something really interesting that I hadn’t heard someone say: “I’m building upon my past work and enriching it.” A lot of the time, we’re trying to do a totally new thing. I’m trying to do that as well, but I’m also trying to enrich all the groundwork and the DNA of my guitar language into my newest album. I’m trying to sing in a more conscious way, too. It’s just getting older and getting in your head more, which is good and bad.

That reminds me of a lyric from “Arctic Heart” on the new album: “I miss when nothing was embarrassing.” It feels like a linchpin for these themes of youth and young adulthood that run through the record. Was it a conscious choice to center the songwriting on that period of life?

I’m an older sister — I have three younger sisters. When you’re close to your siblings, you’re forced to confront their age in a way that I don’t think I necessarily would be if I was in a different position in my family, or if I didn’t have siblings I was close to, or didn’t have siblings. Sometimes I look to them to think about myself, to be a better older sister, or to just understand stuff.

I’m thinking in particular of the song “Leftover,” because I talk about this character I’ve created who I’m seeing again in this phase of going into adulthood. For everyone, it’s very hard to transition into adulthood. I’m 26 now, and I’m still thinking having those “Whoa, my mind’s blown” moments. You’d think I’d be over that by now, but seeing my sisters grow up has made me think about what a weird time in my life that was, how formative it was, how hard it was.

Would it be fair to say that most of your songs are blending true stories — from your own life, from your own emotional experiences — with these fictitious characters you’re creating?

Yes, that’s completely accurate. At the end of the day, writers who I really admire are taking elements of themselves, but also heightening and romanticizing [them] a bit, even if it doesn’t feel romantic. That’s what I was trying to do with [“Leftover”]. Ultimately, it’s a protective measure, and it’s probably more interesting because it’s forcing you as a writer to metabolize the situation and see it more for what it really is instead of just being like, “This is what happened exactly.”

You’ve spoken before about drawing inspiration from authors and prose writers as much as from songwriters. Are there any you specifically pulled from when you were writing Disenchanter?

I wrote part of this during lockdown, and I was spending a lot of time in my bedroom — reading and also doing online school. I was reading a lot of poetry because I was doing a poetry workshop, too. I don’t know why, but my dad — he’s a writer and he reads a ton — gave me this book. It was this guy named Ray Young Bear, and for some reason, because of my lockdown mindset, I was like, “I’m gonna go on Facebook and see if I can find him and message him.” So I did that, and we started to be pen pals.

He’s a poet [who] lives in Tama, Iowa. His stuff is incredible. I remember reading this poem — something about railroad tracks and a tooth — and I was like, “I am sold. That’s all you need to say to me.” We started a dialogue. I was reading a lot of his poetry, and it was really helping with a lot of imagery in my songs because he also writes about the natural world a lot.

Then I was reading what I always read, which is fantasy books. I was reading Graham Greene, and he was really important to me because he’s so good at distilling an emotional scene down to its finest. You get the exact details you need to evoke an image and to get across information. He’s not overly descriptive. To me, that translated exactly to songwriting.

The details that especially stuck with me from this record are on “She Wonders,” when you talk about the “butter sun” and the “halo of the Texas rain.” Where are those coming from?

I was really envisioning an exact thing I saw in my head. I’m not a visual person, but I’m a visual person through language. When I was doing my thing at UCLA, I was an art history major, and I really liked that because I was getting into these pieces through language, through history. In my songs, that’s what I’m trying to do. I want you, when you’re listening to my song, to feel like you’re in a movie.

That cinematic quality comes across so much in the instrumentation of Disenchanter. It feels like perfect “sitting in the back of the car, staring out the window” music. Is that what you were going for when you were working up a sonic palette for the record?

Yes. I love music that gives space for that. The Psychedelic Furs are really good at that, The Waterboys, stuff like that. I approached that sound palette through guitar. The cinematic synth stuff is really from A.G. Cook. I like the drama. I like the romance. I like having dynamics in songs. That’s what keeps me interested. I want a story arc, like a book.

What was the genesis of your creative partnership with A.G.?

It’s funny: We’re obviously dating, but when we met, I didn’t know anything about his music. I hated pop music. I was in the car with someone, and they were like, “This is this person and this is his music.” I was like, “Turn this off. It’s so bad.” Meeting Alex was a wonderful thing, because he and his community are not judgmental about genre. They pay attention to everything. That was such a big thing for my music, because I always secretly liked Shania Twain songs, but when I was in my indie band, I wouldn’t say that to anyone. I wouldn’t sit down and be like, “I’m gonna write a song to emulate the catchiness of ‘That Don’t Impress Me Much.’”

When I met Alex, I realized that he has this classical background. He’s doing computer stuff, but he can listen to anything. That was a really crazy thing for me to learn, because my genesis was doing country Americana music. I dressed in Patsy Cline dresses. I only played an acoustic guitar. Then I started playing electric, but I hated effects pedals. I have no idea why. As a teenager, I just plugged directly into the amp, like, “Everyone has to learn how to play like this.”

Then I went into [loving] effects pedals, like, “I love Dinosaur Junior — how did I not know? They’ve been my favorite band forever, and they’re into effects pedals!” So I dove deep into that, but I was [still] like, “Well, I obviously hate pop music.” And then I met Alex and realized all these people who work in pop are very well versed in every single genre, and they choose to do this because they love it. The bottom line is it’s wonderful to meet your peers in music and see how they approach the world. That’s one of the reasons I love doing music so much: I love learning about the way my friends and people I admire make their art. I’m addicted to that.

You you have a long history with the guitar. What does it represent for you?

I guess it’s like a security blanket. It just feels like a piece of myself, the way I’ve bonded with writing on guitar. I fought the world for a long time and felt really alone with my songs when I was performing when I was younger. When I first started coming to L.A., I had my family who were very supportive and sweet, and I had some people who came to shows who were sweet. But overall, most other things were really fucking challenging. People just didn’t want to see me do that, but it was good. It made me tough.

I think the thing that never made me feel alone is that my guitar never failed me. It was like my own little world — it transported me there — and my tunings were my own and it was something that nobody could touch. I practiced so hard when I was growing up, because I moved from Montana to L.A. when I was a teenager. I definitely didn’t have a typical high school experience. I sat in my room and I read fantasy novels and I played guitar, so I developed a bond with it, and it was so cathartic. So I feel really close to guitar. I know that sounds so dumb — “I feel close to guitar.” But I do.