The world of Kelsey Lu’s sophomore album, So Help Me God, is rich—not only sonically, threaded as it is with their characteristic lyricism (from the opening track, “Reaper”: “Can’t take a sin from a sinning man / It’s not my burden, it’s in your hands / You are the reaper left to decide / What you want, baby? I’m not your guide”), but also visually, using film and visual art to build out its storytelling.
To mark its release, the 35-year old spoke to Vogue this week about collaborating with Kim Gordon, “Liza Minnelli wigs,” and taking musical inspiration from Céline Sciamma’s Portrait of a Lady on Fire.
Vogue: What’s been the biggest difference for you between releasing Blood seven years ago and putting So Help Me God out now?
Kelsey Lu: I feel like I’ve grown so much into myself in terms of knowing what I want and don’t want, and building my intuition, and also probably [having] less toxic relationships than I had at that time—as well as less of a toxic relationship with myself.
There are some amazing featured artists on this album. What was it like working with Kamasi Washington and Kim Gordon?
Yeah, it was great. I met Kim Gordon back in 2017 when she saw me perform in LA. She came up to me afterwards, and then years later, when I was recording the album in LA with Eve Rossman, I went to see her play at Zebulon and I went up to her being like, “Do you remember me?” And she did! I asked her to come in the studio, and she did. She connected to this cello composition that I made that is not on the album fully; it’s in the film, and it’s in some of the visuals that I’ve been putting out, but it was a cello composition that I made one day when I was really frustrated in the studio. I was not happy with the day, and then I just made this really nicely boisterous cello track, and when she came through, I was playing her songs in my album. Each artist featured, Kamasi and Kim and Sampha, I have such a history with them. I also have Miguel Atwood-Ferguson, who does the strings on “Better Than That,” and my sister playing violin. They’re all tethered to memory, in a way. I met Sampha when I was recording Blood; he was my gateway into London. One of my first shows in London was on a split bill with Kamasi and Sampha, and it’s so nice to have it all come together.
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