Last month our phriends Babehoven — comprised of partners Maya Bon and Ryan Albert — released I See Them, I See Me (whose “Monster” you may have caught on the October/Halloween edition of Philthy Radio), their fourteen-track third full-length, courtesy of longtime home Double Double Whammy. However, it’s certainly not the first we’ve heard from the Hudson, New York duo in 2026. This March they appeared on “Wheels,” a standalone single by their friend and ours Squirrel Flower, which I find out during our most recent chat was originally demoed at Babehoven’s house. And this June they opened The Foundry for Brooklyn duo Ray Bull and locally premiered a handful of I See Them, I See Me songs live, in addition to a number of favorites. Well, on November 5th Babehoven kick off their 7-date headlining jaunt behind the album right here at Johnny Brenda’s, and last month I got to chat with both Maya and Ryan via Zoom about all of this and more…
*Interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Izzy Cihak: You’ve played Philadelphia a lot over the years, and I feel like I’ve been to about half of them… including this summer back at The Foundry with Ray Bull… What are some of your thoughts on or memories of the city?
Maya Bon: I’m sorry you were at the show [laughs].
Izzy: No, it was great!
Maya: They didn’t have a sound person at the venue, so we had to like figure out sound, so it was a whole thing, so we were all really stressed-out [laughs], but it was fine in the end.
Ryan Albert: I have a random one! Maya and I lived on McKean Street in South Philly right at the beginning of 2020, before the pandemic. And I remember we had just moved there, and we had one night out, and we went to The Dolphin. We had the best time, and it was so sweet and wonderful, and then two days later our housemate god COVID, but it was before we knew it was COVID… We were like, “Oh my god! This is so sweet!” There was that bar that had the big cowboy boot…
Izzy: Boot & Saddle!
Ryan: Boot & Saddle!
Izzy: Which was a major venue before it closed during COVID!
Ryan: Exactly! So, we went there on that same night that! We went to Boot & Saddle, we went to The Dolphin, it was awesome! Then our housemate got sneezed on by one of his students, then the next day he had 103-degree fever and we were like, “Okay! Something’s happening…” But, that one night was awesome!
Izzy: In addition to the Philly show and not having a proper soundcheck, how was the Ray Bull tour? I was talking with them and talking about you before the tour, which was a pretty major tour, despite the fact that it was prior to the official announcement of the new album.
Maya: It was really fun! We had a really, really good time. It was sweet to play to the Ray Bull fans, who are kind of the TikTok listener who doesn’t go to a show very much, so they were so excited and sweet and weird [laughs]. It was just a sweet tour, and we love those guys.
Ryan: Yeah, they’re very sweet. We had a lot of time to explore odd random places, because the tour was mapped out pretty well. We had quite a bit of days off on long drives. We went to Stonehenge II [air quotes], somewhere in Texas… There’s actually another Stonehenge in Texas, but we went to Stonehenge II. And we went to a bunch of other random places, like Dinosaur Utah, we saw some petroglyphs. We just took it as a classic road trip when we were also playing 25 shows. It was really cool.
Izzy: You’re about to drop your third full-length, I See Them, I See Me, which you’ve discussed as being a bit of a departure for you, at least behind the scenes, in terms of working with collaborators and tracking it live, and all that. How did that whole process go? You’ve made it sound like it was a blast.
Maya: It was really fun. Ryan and I have kind of tortured ourselves with other records, where we really go deeply into recording, just the two of us, three months at a time, in the winter, and we really focused in this way that’s amazing and I hope we do again at some point, and I’m sure we will, but after doing that for so many years, and also being partners, we kind of needed a break. We wanted to explore other things. We had always wanted to work with Sam Evian, and he was local at the time, so that was cool. Then working with Kevin Copeland, we love his production, we love his music, and are big fans of Allegra Krieger, too, and that’s obviously his wife.
Izzy: Oh, I don’t think I knew that!
Maya: They just got married, yeah! And then Phil Weinrobe is one of our production dream goal people to work with…
Ryan: That guy’s amazing. That guy’s a genius.
Maya: He is a genius, so that was really, really, really cool. We respect him so much. He fills a studio with people and you try to track it all live: there’s no headphones, there’s no playback…
Ryan: No rehearsal…
Maya: We’ve never done anything like that before and it was so fun. So, in a way, this album’s like a mixtape of us trying different things, which we were a little worried wouldn’t be cohesive, but I think it’s cohesive enough.
Ryan: It’s definitely still us, it’s just us working with different people. We still tracked a lot of it at our house. A lot of it was like, “I don’t wanna think about engineering anymore, I don’t wanna think about quantizing my shitty drum playing anymore. Let’s have our drummer that we love play drums!” It’s like a win-win all around.
Izzy: On a similar note, and you talked about this a little bit, because you were working with such amazing people, but what did each of them sort of bring to the table individually?
Ryan: Sam brought a very, very chill vibe. It was the first time we ever worked with someone as an engineer. He set up some microphones in a beautiful space, he has a wonderful dog, we were able to bring our dog, and it was very chill. And then Kevin, it was in his house, it felt like home recording plus. He has such a great engineering ear and he’s such a good vibe.
Maya: With Phil, it was very different from anything we’ve ever done. It was extremely expensive, so we were already kind of like, “Is this worth it?” Which is was [laughs].
Ryan: This was the first time that someone was producing our music. The other two, we just had an engineer. Phil was actively producing Babehoven. He’s the only one that we’ve invited into the circle of two people. That was really intense, but beautiful.
Maya: Ryan didn’t have a lot to do in these sessions…
Ryan: Yeah, I just played guitar and this weird banjo thing [laughs].
Maya: Which was really interesting, because Ryan is the do-er in our band. I’m the thinker, coming up with things, and he’s the do-er.
Ryan: I told Phil, “I’m gonna have a hard time, because normally I think about guitar parts and really put a lot of time and effort into that,” and Phil was like, “Well, this time you’re just not gonna do that, you’re just gonna be there.” He kind of dommed me in this way that I was just like, “Fuck, Dude… Well, this is what we’re paying for.” We’re paying for someone to tell me to shut the fuck up [laughs].
Maya: And he’s good at that! He’s really funny and weird…
Ryan: Him and Maya, those are the only people that have the power to do that to me… But we had to pay Phil to do it [laughs].
Izzy: Well, that’s part of the dom-sub thing [laughs]!
Maya: Yeah!
Izzy: Is that something you’d consider doing again in the future, working with collaborators?
Maya: Definitely!
Ryan: For sure!
Maya: I don’t know who, but we would definitely be open to working with more people. We don’t really know what the next shape of Babehoven will be. Every time we’re kind of figuring it out in this way that feels really good. We’re kind of letting it figure itself out. But for eight years it was just me and Ryan. We’re just taking a new form in this way. Like he said, it’s still us, it’s still our music, it’s still my songwriting that feels really personal to me. But with this album, I’m honestly really curious how people will receive it! I just don’t know!
Izzy: On that note of songwriting, how do you feel like the songs themselves compare to previous collections? Did you know how you were going to handle them in the studio when you first began writing, or did the studio process kind of give the initial bones of the songs a new kind of form entirely?
Maya: The studio process gave the songs new bones. Ryan and I go pretty hard demoing the songs, but we didn’t use the demoes… When we were working with Phil, we totally worked from scratch.
Ryan: We kept the songs, scrapped the demos.
Maya: But with Kevin and Sam, we used a lot of what we had demoed. Our songwriting process is often either just me alone, and then I bring it to Ryan, or Ryan coming up with a guitar part, me writing lyrics, us figuring out a chorus together. We’re not thinking about the production side while we’re songwriting. I don’t know how to classify this album. “Blue Around You” is a country song. “Lasagna” is a pop song. But then there’s songs on this record that are classic Babehoven sad, indie, piano-focused emotional songs. And then there’s Ryan creating interesting soundscapes in the back of things, or that one song with his music student, Jack, who’s eight, playing on it. It’s many different things.
Izzy: Have you had any favorite reactions to the new songs so far?
Ryan: Someone that I went to high school with, that I worked on a farm with, sent me a message on Facebook, like, “Oh my god, I’ve been rocking ‘Blue Around You’ so much! If you’re ever in Montana, these are the places to play! It would be great to see you guys out here!”
Maya: Awww!
Ryan: That was really sweet! I wasn’t even friends with her in high school, but it was nice. She just had a baby, so I’m like imagining her and her baby listening to Babehoven!
Maya: We had a really hard year last year, with my vocal cord injury the year before, and the business side of band dynamics changed… We had industry turmoil, Ryan works fulltime as a woodworker, I’m considering going to law school next year to like fully reframe my life, because it felt like things were really falling apart in a way that was not functional. But right now I feel really proud of what we’ve done, considering how hard last year was. Some of my favorite messages have been friends reaching out, being like, “Those people are idiots. You’re killing it!” and sending screenshots of our monthly listeners, or being like, “The people who doubted you are so stupid.” And that feels good!
Izzy: Not to detract from your own music, and some artists hate this question [laughs], so I apologize if that’s the case for you, but considering that this is your third LP, I’m curious if you have any favorite third LPs of music history?
Ryan: Oh, wow! Interesting… Born to Run by Bruce Springsteen is a perfect example of a great third album!
Maya: MY WOMAN by Angel Olsen, she kind of totally rebranded… I’m looking through my music… Ryan is more of the category brain where he can remember things…
Ryan: Dinosaur Jr.’s Bug. That’s an excellent third record! Maya’s gonna hate this, but Vitalogy by Pearl Jam.
Izzy: I think I was in fourth grade when that came out, and I dug that…
Ryan: Either/Or, Elliott Smith’s third record!
Izzy: Earlier this year you appeared on the Squirrel Flower song “Wheels,” which I was actually just chatting with Ella about, and I was talking about it with Billie [Marten, who appears on “Wheels” and had Squirrel Flower providing support on her recent North American tour] earlier this year, back before the tour started, so I’m curious to hear your thoughts on that song and collaboration, which is so amazing… and you were totally missed when Billie and Ella did it on tour earlier this year!
Maya: Yeah! I love that song. A demo version of “Wheels” was recorded at our house with me and Ryan like a year and a half ago. We love Ella, we love recording with Ella. There may be more Squirrel Flower/Babehoven music ahead… I love her voice so much. Obviously “Ella’s From Somewhere Else” is about Ella, and she’s amazing, so it was a real honor to be asked to work on that song. They invited me to that show, and I wanted, so badly, to come sing with them, but Philly’s so far for me… I’m also kind of an introvert…
Izzy: I never leave the city, so I get that…
Maya: Yeah [laughs].
Izzy: That was such an amazing show. And, in advance, I was talking to Billie about it, and I don’t know if she understood the magnitude of what I was trying to say, ‘cause I felt a little bit bad for the show, because that was the same night that the Waxahatchee/MJ Lenderman tour was in town…
Maya: Ooooo…
Ryan: [laughs]
Izzy: You have a handful of upcoming shows, although not a ton, but you will be returning to Johnny Brenda’s. What can be expected of the live show on this headlining run?
Ryan: Babehoven rocks live! That’s what’s to be expected, rockin’! No [laughs], we’re full-band, we might have a couple background singers. We’re kind of just figuring out what the hell we’re gonna do…
Izzy: It’s funny, because I always talk to people about this, and I was talking to Ray Bull about this, you have the unique distinction of having played maybe the two most drastically different sets that I’ve seen in the same year, between opening for Naima Bock solo/acoustic Upstairs at World Café Live, a dinner theatre venue where everyone’s sitting, and then opening The Foundry, a LiveNation club, for Slow Pulp on Halloween when they’re dressed as Scooby Doo [laughs]. That’s a wide spectrum…
Ryan: It’ll probably be somewhere in-between there…
Maya: I think it’ll probably lean more intimate, because we can do that headlining. When we’re opening, we tend not to bring the deep sentiment, because people don’t care and they just want a show. When you’re headlining, you can interact with people who are there to see you, so you can play the more deep, heartfelt songs.
Ryan: We’ll definitely play more intimate songs, which will then, in turn, make our louder songs feel louder, so you’ll have the best of both worlds!
Izzy: Like I said, you don’t have a ton of upcoming dates behind the release of the new album, so I’m curious how you’re hoping to spend the last part of 2026, and maybe the first part of 2027? I’m assuming there will be more playing and promoting the new music in some form.
Maya: Yeah! We’d love to have some more opening sets. We’re a really good opener. We have a wide array of genres that we can pull from. And I would love to keep growing. I’m removed in a way from the industry like, “This band’s gotta blow up! We’ve gotta get bigger and bigger and bigger!” I feel like I kind of gave up on that sentiment last year in this way that feels really healthy. I don’t feel like I need to push in the same way, which is part of why this headlining tour is not very big. We don’t need to play random shows. Let’s do the shows we know we’re gonna love and that’s that.
Ryan: And we can do more next year.
Maya: Yeah! If people wanna take us on tour, and we’ll be the opener, sure, we’ll play cities where people won’t know who we are. We’re in a distinct stage of a band size where we’re big enough that people do know us, but we’re not like MJ Lenderman/Waxahatchee, where when we come to town that’s the show that people are going to. And I’m okay with that. I kind of like that. But we have to carve our niche and know what to play and what not to play, because Ryan works full-time, we have a life outside of this that’s important to us.
Ryan: Ummm, I have a life [laughs].
Maya: We also have like four pets and a house, we have lives that we have to tend to! So, it’s like, do we play a ton of shows, do we not play a ton of shows? There’s kind of benefits to both. So, we’re figuring it out, basically. But I think we’ll definitely have more shows to announce. We’ll have more tours coming up and probably another Europe tour, we’re still figuring out when… And, probably another album soon, honestly… That’s what it’s lookin’ like!
*Get your tickets here.
