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Photo by Liam Armstrong

I’ve been a fan of she’s green since I first heard their song “graze” in 2025. The Minneapolis band has been busy since then and has now released their second EP Swallowtail. Environment has always been a big part of the band’s sound so not only did they take the time to break down their new EP track by track, they also assigned each song an element in nature. 

“locket” breakdown: This song began as a demo we had. Some of the tracks from that original demo made it into the final recording. In the studio we rearranged the structure and gave it an intro. We recently shot the music video for it on super 8 which was really fun!

Nature element: sunlight on water 

“dear ivy” breakdown: We started writing this one when jamming in our basement and sat with it for a while. This song was inspired by the book Water Moon by Samantha Sotto & Studio Ghibli’s Howl’s Moving Castle. The ending came together later on and that really seemed to piece it together. 

Nature element: bleeding heart flowers 

“empty house” breakdown: “empty house” came from us writing with an acoustic. Zofia came in with these melodies and the lyrics really fell right into place. We had a demo version that was pretty intense and fully electric and washy. We'd played this song at an outdoor acoustic show on the Mississippi river and that experience inspired us to keep the song more stripped back.

Nature element: a stream

“paper thin” breakdown: “paper thin” also started on acoustic but the chords took us in a dark and gloomy direction. We decided to drench the song and make it as atmospheric as possible. The eerie nature of this song makes me think of a bog in the night time.

Nature element: a bog

“mettle” breakdown: “mettle” started out much slower and laid back, but gradually got faster and grittier. This is the gnarliest track on Swallowtail. We wanted that guitar riff to hit like a truck when it first comes in. We hope that the instrumental captures the pent up frustration in the lyrics.

Nature element: craggy cliffsides

“keeper” breakdown: “keeper” initially sounded very different than the version that’s on the record. We spent a while with the demo experimenting with different rhythms, chord progressions, and structures getting it ready to record. The final version has a cool flowing motion to the groove that we really like. 

Nature element: Tall prairie grass, waving in the wind.

“close your eyes” breakdown: This last track took the longest to finish, the idea first emerged from a live jam in our practice space almost 3 years ago. Since then, there’s been a lot of different iterations and tweaking of fine details, until it finally felt complete - the song always felt special and we wanted to do it justice. It’s our longest song yet at 7 minutes but we’re very happy with how it turned out.

Nature element: Aurora Borealis - The northern lights can require a lot of patience to observe, but they’re an otherworldly and surreal experience. Dancing pillars of light that can linger subtly, ebbing and flowing on the horizon until they suddenly flare across the sky in swirls of energy.