LA Witch have been casting their sonic spells into the cosmos for many moons. Led by the Sade Sanchez, whose voice floats somewhere between seduction and séance – scaling a frequency parallel to the likes of Hope Sandoval, Tess Parks and Stevie Nicks – add her relentless slay on guitar, the thundering undercurrent of Irita Pai’s basslines, and Ellie English’s precision-pounce on drums, and the result is a mesmerising and menacing sound that shoots straight to the soul.

For their latest offering, DOGGOD, LA Witch crossed the Atlantic and set up camp in Paris, channelling the city’s gothic haze and medieval undertow. Tracked at the legendary Motorbass Studios, the record finds the band expanding their sonic palette; Americana psych filtered through European shadows. The bones of their sound remain: swampy surf riffs, dusk-in-the-desert atmosphere, but this time, the spell hits deeper and more transcendental, opening up new musical dimensions.

Back in the US on a five-week tour, we joined them on the road from Nashville to Atlanta to witness a rad set, take some photos and catch up with the band. Then back on the road, just us and the truckers carving that magical Tennessee air on the 24. Home so apropos at 3am: the Witching Hour.

Billy Henry: You’re out touring on the metaphysical highway. Two figures are walking slowly on the shoulder in the distance. It’s Charles Baudelaire and Edgar Allan Poe. They’re hitchhiking. You only have room for one more in the van. Who do you let in?
Sade Sanchez: Woah. That’s a tough one. I’m gonna go with Baudelaire because I was reading his work last winter while I was in Paris. It was my first real winter outside of Los Angeles and it was brutal. I had Flowers of Evil and Paris Spleen to read during that time, and they were the perfect companions. I really understand the meaning of Paris Spleen now.

BH: There’s a powerful relationship between person and place. Paris, and Motorbass Studio spoke to you on DOGGOD. The post-punk and synth textures, the spacing, I think it’s your most haunted album – it rips. What did you learn about yourselves, your music, and your artistic process by staying in Paris to make the record?
SS: Yes, I agree. I don’t know exactly what I learned but I know that I felt good. Even when I felt bad, I felt good. I was excited. I was inspired. Just the walk alone to the studio every day was exciting for me. All the new exotic faces on the streets, the smells, the sounds and all of the other obvious beauties of a city like Paris. It’s romantic. I think it’s funny how beauty doesn’t necessarily serve us any real purpose in terms of survival. At the same time, most want to be surrounded by it and be it. I think it’s a sign we want to be here. So we should continue to fight for it.
Irita Pai: Being so far away from home, you aren’t really afforded the opportunity or luxury to be distracted by a mundane life. Paris and LA are so different from each other visually, it feels like you’re living a different life in a different world – you can be another version of yourself, and I think that comes out in the record as well.

BH: Which city has more ghosts, LA or Paris?
SS: Paris is one of the oldest cities in the world, so I guess they do? I mean, the city is literally built over Catacombs full of skeletons. They seem more poetic. LA is more zombie – they’re spooky and they wanna get you! [laughs]

BH: Plans to continue bouncing between the two cities?
SS: Definitely. If not Paris, somewhere else. I’ve been thinking a lot about Mexico City. I don’t want to stay in one place right now. LA will always be my home and I can come back, but right now, I want to keep exploring. I realise how important that is for the development of an artist. Or any human, actually. We’re meant to explore.

BH: Let’s talk about DOGGOD. What was the guiding force for the dog to be such a significant, symbolic character on the new album?
SS: When I was writing for this album, I was going through a dark time. I felt abandoned by some. But my dogs always stayed close to me. I always felt loved by them. I felt like they were my angels. That’s when I made the connection to God, and that’s how the idea of DOGGOD came. I’m forever grateful to them. 

BH: Dogs are the greatest creatures. 777 is a complex track. This song seems like a battle cry.
SS: Definitely like a battle cry. 777 is considered to be an angel number. It’s about the willingness to die for love and loyalty . It’s about sacrifice. Also, myself, Ellie and Lauren [Andino, touring guitarist] are all born on 7’s. And the setting I had on my pedal for the guitar effect part when I was writing was 77.
Ellie English: This was definitely a battle to record. We took almost a whole day to get this track down to our liking. But it was worth every take.

BH: Do you have any rituals – for songwriting, pre-studio, pre-show, pre-tour, on tour?
SS: For songwriting, I just try to have my space organised so I can make a mess. Nothing for the studio, I just have all my notes and lyrics with me. I keep a journal on me at all times as I write every day. We like to pray before shows. It’s not a real prayer, it’s kind of a joke that you can’t really tell is a joke. If you heard our prayer, it would either make you laugh or think we were in a cult. It’s really serious and really funny at the same time. 

BH: Does your relationship with the music change throughout the process? Maybe you grow to love a song more or see it differently over time?
SS: Sometimes, yeah. Sometimes after playing a song live so much, it can slightly evolve even after it’s been written or recorded. Sometimes you don’t connect with your own music anymore. Sometimes the songs you thought you hated become your favourite ones. But for the most part, you can usually channel the same feelings you had when you wrote that song, which is kind of weird. It’s like a scent, sometimes you smell something and it brings you back to a particular memory. It can feel very real. 

BH: After five weeks on the road for a US tour, you recently played a sold-out homecoming show at The Lodge Room. Which place on tour was the most haunted?
SS: Well, I always feel like the New England area has some spooky vibes. I tell myself that it’s probably because of the civil war, or something. But blood has been shed all over this country. I love New Orleans, but it doesn’t feel that spooky. New Mexico can feel spooky. I don’t know, Ellie feels ghosts more than I do. I want to see a ghost so badly that I don’t think I’ll ever see one. Ellie doesn’t want to see a ghost, so that’s why they pick her all the time.
EE: She’s right, I always get haunted, I’m also scared of everything. [laughs]
IP: New Mexico is definitely haunted. There was a hotel we stayed at in Santa Fe where we all woke up at the same time – 3am – and felt a presence fly through the room. I was wearing a heavy sterling silver bracelet my mom had given me, engraved with Buddhist scripture, and it had been bent and ripped off my arm and landed on the floor between the two beds. Really bizarre experience.

BH: Dang, that’s wild. Being on the road is its own frequency – a mindset. How easy is it to get home and shift back into the day-to-day, and is there anything in particular that helps with that?
SS: The first two, three days are always rough, but the sooner you give in and accept and adapt, the easier it is. Staying busy and productive always helps.
EE: I usually hide out from anything social for at least a week, just to have some time to myself. The road is very social and there are people around everywhere you go. I used to put on the same record every time I got home from a tour as a kind of transition ritual back into my home life. 

BH: I lived in Los Angeles for years and it’s a complex, fascinating place. You’re originally from there. Has your relationship with it changed at all?
SS: I grew up in North Hollywood, Van Nuys, but I lived mostly in East LA. Well, the city changes pretty quick, so your relationship with it changes too. There are pros and cons like any other city. But one thing we always have is the ocean. We don’t have seasons as much as other places. I never knew I was missing that until I went to Paris and suffered in their winter. Then one day, spring came. The down of that winter made the high of spring feel so intense. We’re very lucky to have such beautiful weather in LA. I think we need to spend more time outside the way they do in Paris with all their terraces and stuff. LA is my home and I will always love it.
IP: My family was in Echo Park in the 80s, across from the Pioneer Chicken on Echo Park Blvd (now the Little Caesar’s). I moved back to Angelino Heights in my twenties – it was that time when everyone who lived there was a musician or some type of creative. There were free residency shows every Monday. Our first show ever was at the old Little Joy, they had to move the pool table so we could play. I opened a pizza spot there called Slasher Pizza, over on Glendale Blvd and Scott Ave – I love the neighbourhood and the community. Echo Park has changed so much over the years, where it almost feels like Abbot Kinney in Venice now. I still go back to some of my favourite spots, like Taix, Los Burritos or Kien Gang Bakery. 

BH: The weed store next to Slasher was my go-to dispensary. And yeah, the creative community in Echo Park is legit. Who is the one band, the one musician, you never got to see play that you wish you could have seen?
SS: I would’ve loved to see The Birthday Party or Roland S. Howard.
EE: Fela Kuti with Ginger Baker.
IP: Black Sabbath with all the original members. 

BH: Rad choices. I’ve been friends with the paranormal my entire life – ghost stories galore – so back to spirit talk. If you could be haunted by the ghost of anyone in history, who would it be?
SS: [laughs] I don’t want to be haunted! Unless it’s like a sexy ghost?! Too many sexy dead people to think about.
EE: I’d prefer someone funny, like Richard Pryor or Chris Farley. I wouldn’t mind John Bonham haunting me either.
IP: David Lynch, so he could continue giving me the weather report every morning.