Buzzy Lee’s New Album ‘Shoulder To Shoulder’ Is A Family Affair — Exclusive

Another week, another album announcement — this time from singer-songwriter, Buzzy Lee. Following the release of her 2023 LP Internal Affairs, the artist has exclusively confirmed to NYLON that her third album, Shoulder To Shoulder, arrives on March 27.

Lee (born Sasha Spielberg) initially began working on the project back in 2021 when the LA native moved out East to be with her NYC-based boyfriend (now husband), Harry McNally. Together, the duo would make music from the comfort of their shared home, filing away each song as soon as it was finished without listening back. A year later, the couple unearthed the rudimentary recordings, uncovering a foundation for the next Buzzy Lee project in the process.

As they started crafting the songs in the studio, however, Lee decided that the best way to maintain the integrity and spirit of the original demos was to move the operation back home. From there, the album was largely recorded and engineered in the couple’s Chelsea loft, with McNally serving as the album’s producer.

From the living room, to the bedroom closet, to McNally’s desk, there wasn’t a single corner of the house that wasn’t untouched by recording equipment. Though in order to get the uniquely intimate final product, they had to bend the rules a little bit. “During the album’s recording, I had a heating pad over my stomach, a blanket on top of that, and then the synth on top of the blanket, a complete fire hazard,” the singer said in a statement. But high risk yields high rewards, and in the end, it was their cozy (albeit unconventional) approach that produced Lee’s most emotionally resonant album to date.

Shoulder To Shoulder Track List

1. “I’ll Wait”
2. “Like That”
3. “Bad Company”
4. “Shoulder To Shoulder”
5. “Youth On Age”
6. “Waffle Knit”
7. “Blame It”
8. “You Should Be Alone”
9. “Hot Nights”
10. “Gingham”

For even more intimate peek into the upcoming project, read our conversation with Buzzy Lee below.

How does it feel to be releasing these songs five years after the initial recordings?

They feel new in that nostalgic sort of way; the way telling a story for the twentieth time can feel like you’ve just lived it! So much has happened in those five years, I feel like they’ve been my silent partners, or rather my “sound partners” through all of it.

How have these songs evolved in those five years, if at all?

We really wanted to stay very close to their inception feel, so close that a few months into recording, we stopped tracking in a proper studio and brought the record back home with us. Maybe it was a zero antibodies situation to a new mutation of demo-itis, but the album felt like it needed to come home with us and not veer too far away from the ease of the demos.

We really built these songs slowly. I am a very anxious, impatient person, it’s a huge downfall of mine. Harry, my husband and producer, is extremely patient. Because he had never produced/engineered an album before, he was really just learning. In not knowing exactly what he was doing, he was able to capture a magic only someone with a beginner mindset could capture. Then of course there would be days I’d be irritable with the learning curve, hence my song “Bad Company” about myself. Hehe. He really helped me slow down and thank goodness because we had time to sit with each song. A year after recording one song, I’d relisten to it and say, “Imagine a trumpet doing this melody.” It occurred to us that could indeed be possible. It was a balance too of putting in the time, because by song ten, Harry was almost too advanced as an engineer, that we were losing the record’s beginner mind, so we capped it there before he got too good.

What was the vibe/atmosphere like when you first recorded these tracks?

It was so free and open, quite literally. I had just moved into Harry’s open living space. In fact, we set up a C-stand with a quilt attached as a partition to the sleeping area. Between the hours of 9 p.m. and 3 a.m., we would write and record. Some nights were hot and sweaty, others cold and dry, each produced a different atmosphere for songwriting, the window always open through every season.

Some nights, I would just come up with melodies over loops as Harry did his visual art on a massive garment factory cutting table that he found for free on Craigslist. In that contained open space, we felt like we were living in another time… until we poked our heads out the window and saw lines around the block for Crumbl.

It sounds like these songs were originally written without any intention of being heard. Does that make releasing them now easier? Harder?

It wasn’t that we didn’t think they’d be heard, we just wanted to write without imagining any reception to the tracks, and really be in it just the two of us. We both find so much inspiration in the “what could be” so we really reveled in that. It’s so easy to think, “My parents are not going to get this one.” Or my parents will love this.” And yes, I realize how old I am and I realize I still and will always care what my parents think of me!

What was it like working with your husband on this record?

It was heavenly. I can’t believe it actually worked. I would record vocals with my hand on his shoulder. I’ve never sung that close to anyone in my life. We had a shared language, and if I had an idea, and it would be much, much too late in the evening (Harry is a true night owl), he’d say, “Great let’s record it,” when normally I would say, “What a pity a great idea is going to be gone by the morning.” I’d drag my feet because of how late it was and I just wanted to watch Larry Sanders or Mad Men with Harry. But he really got me to get out of my comfort zone, (I guess that’s just… staying up a little late? It’s really not that brave.)

There were maybe a handful a times I got testy because I felt comfortable enough to get testy. I also didn’t think about how my fears and second guessing, a natural part of the recording process, would affect him. I had to say to him, “Normally after a day in the studio I come home to you and get to stress about whether the songs are good enough but in this case, you are the husband AND the studio.” That was an adjustment. I really learned about keeping the morale high. Because of my anxiety I can loop about things and I’m not able to hide it. I panic if there’s the slightest change to anything. It takes me a second to warm up to change. I learned to not do that with Harry and really keep a positive mindset and trust the process.

What do you hope people take away from this album?

I think it’s really special to make art at home with people you love. I have spoken ad nauseam about being in relationships that did not feel comforting or nourishing or safe and then meeting Harry I felt this bloom, this safety net, this endless possibility. Some of the record touches on my fears in the beginning which was “How can it be this good, what if the other shoe drops?” I was so used to so much bad. And I can say almost six years later, the relationship is still new in that nostalgic way, like telling a story as though it’s the first time.