Claire Molek and Jason Savsani didn’t intend to record Desire!, their latest album as Friend of a Friend, in a haunted house. In fact, they didn’t know that the Illinois abode, once a home for spiritualists and said to be a site of demonic possession, had that reputation until a few days into their stay.
“I think when we share this tale, people might assume that we’re obsessed with this sort of stuff and we watch Ghost Hunters and we’re all about that lifestyle,” says Savsani. “We are not. We are not seeking that out.”
In fact, he adds, “We weren’t thrilled about it.”
They may not have known about the house’s history until later, but the vibes were off from the start. “Jordan [Lawlor, producer] immediately was like I’m not sleeping upstairs, guys. There was a room that was really off to all of us,” Molek says.
Savsani had trouble sleeping. Then he received a call from the homeowner. “He’s like, hey, look, you’re going to go into the town right— and he called them townspeople. Who says that anymore?— the townspeople will be telling you that the house will be really haunted,” he recalls. “That’s the scariest thing I’ve ever heard in my life.”
Formed in Chicago during the COVID-19 pandemic, Friend of a Friend first took shape during writing sessions at their local beaches, in mall stairwells and at sand dunes across the state border in Michigan. “I think in some way it was really cool that’s how a lot of our songs came about was from hanging around, being absorbed by environments,” says Savsani.
While it may not be a conscious action, Friend of a Friend does soak up their surroundings when they record. Their 2022 debut full-length, In Arms, came together during a stop in Nashville while the duo were on a road trip to Pensacola. You can hear the influence of Americana throughout the album. “You can tell that it was done in Nashville,” says Molek, “even the level of engineering and of the acoustics, it’s so hardcore Nashville.”
They followed up the album with Facilities, released in 2024, which leans a little more psychedelic. It was recorded in Joshua Tree. “People have referenced the place without knowing that we’ve been there,” says Molek of the response to the album.
Although the recording sessions for Desire! began like more horror movies than there is time and space to list here, Molek and Savsani decided to make the best of the situation. “We were so focused on creating the record despite the weird vibes,” says Molek. “There’s almost that tension in the sound of it, but it’s only that we can see that in retrospect. There is a tension of that battle against that eerieness and just being able to stay focused, stay on task, keep your vibes high.”
There’s an urgency in the sound on Desire! that stands out from previous Friend of a Friend albums. You can hear it in “HH2,” a heavy psychedelic number that’s a reimagining of the previously released single, “HH.”
“We played it live a lot and I think that really helped,” says Molek of the song. “That’s really been a big process for the record, bringing the live into the feeling of the record.”
She also notes that the beginning of “HH2” is essentially the original single sped up. Savsani adds that might have been influenced by the house where they recorded the album. “It was almost like fitting the environment of what we were doing in this particular recording process,” he says, “tweaking the vocals or speeding things up or recording through a guitar amp, getting trippy with it in a psychedelic way.”
Another example of that, Savsani says, is “FTV,” where Molek’s vocals are downright creepy as the pitch shifts and the song builds to a big, drum ’n’ bass climax. “That came out of the process of where we recorded,” he says.
As Savsani says, they could either perceive the energy in the house as bad or “something beautiful and a guiding force.” They chose the latter. “In hindsight, we’re glad that it happened exactly how it was supposed to happen and that’s beautiful,” he says.
With the album now ready for release, Friend of a Friend has been on the road. They had only recently returned from a European tour when we met on a video call for this interview. Copenhagen, Cologne and Vienna were amongst the highlights. As they met with folks in these cities, they heard about local sites with unusual histories, but Molek had one request. “Please don’t tell us if it’s haunted,” she says. “We don’t want to know.”
Desire! is out now. Friend of a Friend tours the eastern U.S. and Midwest in May, keep tabs on Instagram for future live dates.
Liz O. is an L.A.-based writer and DJ. Read her recently published work and check out her upcoming gigs or listen to the latest Beatique Mix. Follow on Instagram or Bluesky for more updates.
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