Model/Actriz’s breakout year is only the beginning

Model/Actriz appear in our Winter 2023 Issue with cover stars Green Day, 070 Shake, Militarie Gun, and Arlo Parks. Head to the AP Shop to grab a copy. 

Noise-rock act Model/Actriz got their moniker from a list of potential names guitarist Jack Wetmore’s friend had come up with and stored in the Notes app on his phone. Though the band members picked it mainly because of the way it sounds, vocalist Cole Haden has found some significance to it. “The art of wearing someone else’s clothes,” he says. “It’s what a model and an actress do. And the art of wearing someone else’s clothes, seeing themselves in it, and making you see yourself in them.”

It’s especially relevant because when Alternative Press speaks to Haden, Model/Actriz are between tours, and in preparation for the U.K. and Europe dates, Haden is quite literally trying on different clothes. “I’m just running around my house in various capes seeing which cape is the best to bring,” he says.

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His friends are the biggest factor when it comes to fashion. “I like wearing things onstage that reflect the people around me,” he explains. “If something’s made for me, I like to have a personal relationship with that person. So really, it’s about the feeling in the clothes more than the style.” 

Model/Actriz released their debut album, Dogsbody, last February to widespread critical acclaim, quickly landing on listeners’ radars and being hailed as one of indie’s most exciting new acts. Since then, they’ve been touring relentlessly. The band have completed two headlining runs of the U.S. in 2023, played SXSW, and are now gearing up for shows supporting Interpol and the Armed. 

The live environment seems like a natural fit for Haden, who’s been interested in theater since he was young and is still influenced by his love of Cats. It was discovering Lady Gaga that set him on the path to becoming a musician. “Watching the ‘Bad Romance’ music video broke me, I guess,” Haden says. “I was listening to a lot of mostly show tunes up until that point. Obviously, Lady Gaga and I are kindred spirits with one foot in the theater world. But I just realized then that I could write my own script.” He even references her on the pulsing “Crossing Guard”: “Like Germanotta, Stefani/Pull the weight from under me.”

“Pop stars are the new gods,” Haden says. “So I worship at that altar.” His own live performance style was shaped by icons like Liza Minnelli. “When I’m watching a pop performance, I’m focusing on the movements, and when I’m onstage, it’s all very improvisational, but it’s very intentional. Part of Madonna’s show is how well rehearsed the whole thing is and how, down to the last detail, it is perfect every time. I like to have one foot in that mindset, and the other foot in the flying by the seat of my pants mindset,” he explains.

Model/Actriz formed in 2016 when Haden met Wetmore and drummer Ruben Radlauer in Boston while they were all attending Berklee College of Music. Wetmore and Radlauer had known each other since childhood. “I heard that there was a Voice Memo of Jack being the original vocalist in the band for one rehearsal, and I think after that rehearsal, they said, ‘We need to find someone else,’” Haden says. “Then they saw me in a basement, doing a Laurie Anderson-type electronic opera with just whatever I cobbled together in 2016.” Bassist Aaron Shapiro joined later, after the band had relocated to New York.

They recorded Dogsbody, in the summer of 2021, at Machines with Magnets in Pawtucket, Rhode Island. “Every time we recorded a song, it was like we were hearing it for the first time. The songs only really existed when we played them to each other, live in the room, so we never really experienced [them] as listeners,” he says.

The process was surprising. “We didn’t really know what we were making until we were making it, and that felt uncomfortable. By the end of the week, it was a relief, honestly. It was a relief also that we liked what we made, but we didn’t really know until the end,” he explains.

Model/Actriz’s sound doesn’t slot neatly into one category. “It’s church music,” Haden says. “But it’s the sound of a church being built, at a construction site.” Dogsbody blends together elements of art rock, indie, industrial, dance, and noise rock to produce a record that is meticulously calibrated in its textures, layers, and delivery yet feels raw and urgent, and filled with moments of fevered release. “It is heavy, but that’s not the point of it,” he explains. The focus is on catharsis. “There’s heaviness in catharsis because you feel maybe a little bit winded after it, but you feel adrenaline and dopamine, I hope,” he says.

Haden’s lyrics are vivid and visceral, with tactile detail. “And there has never been a sharper object/Than the dawn when it’s unraveling over my skin/And the waiting when I’m tracing the shadow of his arm on me,” Haden sings on “Maria,” a song that moves from raucous explosiveness to bare vulnerability. 

When asked about his writing process, he compares it to The Shining, posing with his hand against his forehead. “It’s always me sitting at my desk, pushing up, and my roommate’s walking in with a baseball bat scared of me,” he adds.

Like Haden, Dogsbody employs a wide range of references, particularly Greek mythology. “Louise Glück is one of my favorite writers of all time, and her book Faithful and Virtuous Night, maybe in its way, feels like it mythologizes the life of an artist,” he says. Poet Anne Carson was also an influence. “She is the queen of modern mythology, I feel,” he adds. “So Cats, Louise, Anne — those are my girls.”

In September, Model/Actriz followed up the release with the haunting “Winnipesaukee.” Originally recorded during the Dogsbody sessions, Haden refers to it as “a B-side and a live staple,” since they’d been playing the track at shows. “It just felt like the right time to do it, and you can place it wherever you want into the sequence of the album,” he says. “But it is the last bit of Dogsbody we had floating around.”

The live show is also a factor when it comes to future releases. “As we start working on our next album, the way that I think about our music is, ‘Where does it fit in the show?’ The kinds of songs that I want to write for the next album are, in some ways, where, after playing so many shows this year, I’ve discovered I really want a moment like this in the show that doesn’t exist yet,” Haden explains.

He’s already looking ahead to Model/Actriz’s second album. “It’s a shame that everyone is so greedy and wants more music,” he jokes. “These songs have existed for a long time for us. So we are eager to work on something new. It’s in its infancy. Maybe it’s more of a zygote, I’m not sure. But we’re figuring it out. It’s early in the process.”