The successful alt-rocker to great producer/engineer pipeline might not be something the casual music consumer notices, but the track record is incredibly strong.
Before becoming the go-to pop producer for Taylor Swift, Lorde and pretty much every other modern pop queen, Jack Antonoff was playing in the indie rock bands Steel Train and Fun. Brian Eno was an art rock standout with Roxy Music before producing classic U2 and Talking Heads albums. The National's Aaron Dessner started off producing a stellar Sharon Van Etten album (Tramp) before getting behind the boards for multiple Taylor Swift and Gracie Abrams albums. The Clash's Mick Jones ushered in a new era of rabble-rousing British punks when he produced the early albums for The Libertines. Mark Hoppus of Blink-182 has helped fellow pop punkers by producing great albums by Motion City Soundtrack, The Matches, and PAWS. Before setting a sonic alt-rock template as a recording engineer for Nirvana, Pixies, PJ Harvey and more, Steve Albini was creating dissonance in noise punk bands like Big Black.
The list goes on and on, but the list of those who started behind the mixing board and then became alt-rock standouts? That list is all but nonexistent.
And that makes Sarah Tudzin stand out even more from the pack. While she started on the production side of things and has become a rising star and Grammy winner on the technical side of recording, she's also an absolute ripper with her band Illuminati Hotties.
After her schooling days at Berklee College of Music wrapped up in the mid-2010s, Tudzin dove into the world of recording engineering in her hometown of Los Angeles. While she had the itch to make music of her own, being a member of the studio team seemed like a more realistic music career at the time.
"I really wanted to be creatively involved in music. And for a long time, I didn't know that production existed, and I just didn't feel like I was a good enough musician to be a session player," Tudzin says. "I felt like a pretty great writer, but for a long time, I didn't really feel like a great singer and didn't see myself as like a front person. But I think that being behind the board, you get a lot of the rewards of being an artist."
And while she got early gigs assisting as an engineer and mixer on albums from acts like Macklemore, Logic, Slowdive, Porches, and the Hamilton original cast recording, studio time when you're a beginning hired hand doesn't exactly allow for a lot of the experimentation that growth in the field requires.
But producing one's own music? That allows for a lot more freedom and creative control.
So it's not surprising that around this time Tudzin formed the band Illuminati Hotties, not to try make it as a rock star, but essentially to create a sonic resume all of her own.
"My goal is not only to be able to express myself, play shows and have the opportunity to bring my own music to the world," says Tudzin. "I obviously also am always trying to sort of produce that at my highest level as a way of hopefully convincing other bands to let me make their records too."
Funny thing though — it turns out Tudzin is also pretty sick at this front person business.
Like a sonic splash of cold water on one's half-awake face, Illuminati Hotties' Kiss Yr Frenemies was a jolting, refreshing and reinvigorating debut album when it dropped in 2018.
Tudzin aptly coined the genre phrase "tenderpunk" to describe her band's sound, which used an instrumental base of pop punk and indie rock to showcase both Tudzin's super-energetic bratty side on frenetic tunes and her soft emotional core when things slowed down. Super catchy songs like "Pressed 2 Death," "Paying Off the Happiness" and "(You're Better) Than Ever" captured the lovesick and world-weary brain of a twentysomething trying to navigate being a broke creative romantic, all of which translated wonderfully live thanks to Tudzin's caring but manic on-stage charisma. With a wave of critical praise and great reception in the indie music scene, it became clear that Tudzin's music career wasn't going to be just sitting behind a mixing board anymore.
After Tudzin had a falling out with her label, Tiny Engines, over their dubious financials, her friends Lucy Dacus, Speedy Ortiz's Sadie Dupuis, and the band PUP cryptically leaked music from an unknown group called "Occult Classics" in July 2020. After generating a ton of buzz, it was revealed the Occult Classics tunes were actually part of Illuminanti Hotties' new mixtape called FREE I.H: This Is Not the One You've Been Waiting For. The collection was a mixtape in the truest sense, offering a playground for Tudzin to play around with wildly different production styles that might clash a bit too much on a "proper" studio album and one that pretty instantly became influential (to say that Olivia Rodrigo's Sour liberally borrowed from FREE I.H.'s sound and the visual aesthetic of the Tudzin-produced Pom Pom Squad album Death of a Cheerleader would be a generous understatement).
Continuing the momentum, the second official IH studio album, Let Me Do One More, arrived the following year with even more urchin energy with infectious singles like "Pool Hopping" and "MMMOOOAAAAAYAYA" leading the way. It garnered even more praise for Tudzin, ending up on Pitchfork's "The 50 Best Albums of 2021" list.
All the while, Tudzin kept building her reputation on the production and engineering side, helping craft standout albums like Pom Pom Squad's aforementioned debut, multiple Weyes Blood LPs and Speedy Ortiz's Rabbit Rabbit. But the biggest feather in her proverbial cap on that side of the musical equation came as one of the engineers and producers on Boygenius' 2023 breakout album, The Record. The LP quickly became a sensation, eventually earning Tudzin five Grammy nominations — including Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical — and taking home the trophy for Best Alternative Music Album.
"I'm really proud of [The Record]," Tudzin says. "I was so happy to be a part of that team, and I think that it's such a beautiful stepping stone on the path of what I hope my production and engineering career ultimately is."
That all leads to the latest chapter in Tudzin's story: Illuminati Hotties' latest album, Power. In terms of the tenderpunk aesthetic, the third IH studio album leans into the tender. The overly caffeinated frenzy found on the prior records gives way to a much chiller (but still catchy) vibe from the open salvo that is "Can't Be Still." It's clearly an album written by someone finding a sense of loving, thirtysomething comfort in settling into their own skin and finding their person (Tudzin married fellow singer-songwriter Maddie Ross in 2023). With songs like "I Would Like, Still Love You" expressing unwavering smitteness and "Sleeping In" reveling in blissfully caving to your partner's lifestyle, Power might not rip as much as past IH albums, but it's hardly devoid of attitude.
"I think that there is a brattiness to it, but it's not immature," Tudzin says. "It's not snotty like some of the older stuff. Where I'm at in life is obviously completely different."
Of course, it's not long before the production elements become the focus when chatting about Power with Tudzin. This time around she strove to be more decisive in terms of sticking to the core guitar sounds rather than trying to add five or six layers of sound on top of everything. The keep-it-simple-stupid attitude leads to a record that sounds streamlined without narrowing its scope.
"Sonically, I wanted really loud drums and loud vocals. I wanted it to sort of feel like everything was pushed to the limit in like a 2000s kind of way," Tudzin says. "Even on the softer songs on the album, I sort of had this goal of making it feel like this festival feeling of indie rock of yore. Where it feels like it could be on the radio, but also could be played in front of like 45,000 people at a festival. I was looking at a lot of old Yeah Yeah Yeahs and The Shins and The Flaming Lips and sort of like bands who span a lot of genre and a lot of perceived volume based on the instruments they're using, but are kind of smashing it to the limit no matter what."
Illuminati Hotties will continue smashing the limit as the band tours as opening support for Cavetown, which includes a sold-out Feb. 16 stop at the Knitting Factory.
If Sarah Tudzin can't produce your favorite band's newest record, she'll settle for being your new favorite band. ♦
Cavetown, Illuminati Hotties • Sun, Feb. 16 at 8 pm • Sold out • All ages • Knitting Factory • 919 W. Sprague Ave. • sp.knittingfactory.com
