AILSA CHANG, HOST:
And I'm Ailsa Chang in Los Angeles, where I'm entering a house that greets me with a sign reading, trespassers will be killed and eaten.
ALEXANDRA JAMES: Brendan might have told you, we're Asian household, so no shoes. It's my religion.
CHANG: This is the home of musicians Alexandra and Zachary James. Together, this married couple form the band Twin Temple, which plays what they describe as satanic doo-wop.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "SATAN'S A WOMAN")
TWIN TEMPLE: (Singing) Pleased to meet you, Satan's my name. I can make you sin. I can make you feel pain. I can twist. I can make you seduce me. Want to do the Watusi? You can call me Luci.
CHANG: The vibe of their music matches the vibe of their home. Their Victorian house feels warm and welcoming, even though it's painted all black.
A JAMES: I mean, black is just so cheerful, you know?
CHANG: And everywhere you look, you see the devil, like on the wooden chandelier over the dining table.
A JAMES: There's actually little devil heads around the base.
CHANG: Oh.
A JAMES: Yeah. There was...
CHANG: The guy with goat horns.
ZACHARY JAMES: Yeah.
A JAMES: Yeah. So obviously, we kind of collect all things, you know, diabolical (laughter).
CHANG: Yes.
There's a small herd of goat heads mounted around the living room. And, of course, there are human bones, so many bones.
A JAMES: What did we name him in the end?
Z JAMES: I think we named him...
CHANG: The one on the right?
Z JAMES: ...Chopper because his head is...
A JAMES: Yeah.
Z JAMES: ...Cut. It's got the skull cut. You can use that as a dish, if you want.
CHANG: Oh, nice. Little candy dish.
Z JAMES: Exactly.
A JAMES: Yeah.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "POSSESSED")
TWIN TEMPLE: (Singing) Possessed, obsessed with...
CHANG: Now Twin Temple is out with a new album called "Doomed Lovers." This is their third full-length album.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "POSSESSED")
TWIN TEMPLE: (Singing) You make my head spin round.
CHANG: And over the years, they've gotten a lot of backlash for all the satanic imagery in their lyrics. But Alex and Zach say that satanism gives them a sense of belonging.
A JAMES: To us, Satan is more a metaphor. You know, Lucifer, Satan was the original outlaw, right? He's a fallen angel. So I think that resonates with us in terms of the idea of pushing back against the status quo.
CHANG: So when people come at you and say, you guys worship evil, you put evil on a pedestal - what do you say to that?
A JAMES: I mean, I feel like I've been called evil my whole life (laughter), so it's nothing new. You know what I mean?
CHANG: Tell me more about that. What do you mean?
A JAMES: So I'm first-generation here in America. Both my parents are immigrants. I'm mixed race.
CHANG: Korean British, right?
A JAMES: Korean British. And I distinctly remember, when I was about 5 years old, we had a neighbor next door to us yelling at me, like, racial slurs and that I was wicked and evil through the fence and that he had gone to the Korean War to murder people like me. And so I think it just encoded something in me early on. Like, I'm not the girl next door. You know, I'm not the prom queen. Like, there's something wicked about me.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "NOTHING MATTERS")
TWIN TEMPLE: (Singing) I don't recognize the girl with stars in her eyes.
CHANG: You internalized what that neighbor said to you.
A JAMES: I did. So in a way, it's us taking that back, right? I've been called wicked and evil my whole life, especially as a woman. So it's being like, you know what? I am a witch. I am a satanist. I am going to don the vestments of that which is feared and own it, proud to be evil (laughter).
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "NOTHING MATTERS")
TWIN TEMPLE: (Singing) I've lost my innocence.
CHANG: I know that satanism has also brought a lot of unwanted attention literally at your doorstep, right? You got unwanted packages and...
Z JAMES: Yeah.
CHANG: ...Maybe some visitors or...
Z JAMES: Yeah, someone broke into our backyard. They went through our recycling. They took boxes that we had torn apart and taped them back together serial-killer style, like, seam to seam so the words matched up. So I went outside, and I'm staring at this box that's ripped to shreds but taped. And then, like, we kind of kicked it, and it was super heavy, filled with Bibles, hardback Bibles.
CHANG: It's just interesting because you arrived at satanism in part for sanctuary, to feel belonging, but it's become this basis for other people to ostracize you.
A JAMES: Yeah, and I think to a degree we've accepted that our role is as disruptors to a certain degree.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "I WANT BLOOD")
TWIN TEMPLE: (Singing) You brought me daisies.
CHANG: So I'm going to talk about your music. There's been a long history of dark imagery in music, a fascination with the occult. But I'm talking about, like, more in metal, whereas you guys are doo-wop musicians. And it was so funny because last night I was blasting your music in my house, and I was dancing, and I was like - it struck me, like, Ailsa, you're bopping to satanic lyrics.
(LAUGHTER)
A JAMES: Yeah.
(LAUGHTER)
CHANG: And when I think of doo-wop, I think poodle skirts, I think...
A JAMES: Yeah.
CHANG: ...Teenyboppers. I think...
A JAMES: Yeah.
CHANG: ...Innocence.
A JAMES: Yeah.
CHANG: So you tell me, is there something about that contradiction that delights you?
Z JAMES: Yeah, I think it's the transcendence of it. You know, it transcends what's expected, you know? And I think we like the cognitive dissonance that it creates.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "I WANT BLOOD")
TWIN TEMPLE: (Singing) I want blood, I want blood.
Z JAMES: You know, I think that's kind of a core idea with this band, as well.
CHANG: But the thing is, like, not all of your songs are totally or narrowly focused on satanism. Like, I feel like this new album - there are a lot of songs that don't seem to have anything to do with satanic images.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "MONSTER"
TWIN TEMPLE: (Singing) After midnight, when everyone's asleep...
CHANG: There's, like, something just sort of personal and intimate about this album.
A JAMES: Yeah, no, absolutely. I think on this record, I - after going through such a hard time over the last few years - it was, like, one of the hardest times of our lives both personally and professionally. You know, I lost my halmeoni (ph). We lost our dog. We lost people in our life that were really, really important.
My halmeoni was, like, basically my mother. She raised me. She strapped me to her back Korean umma (ph) style.
CHANG: Yeah, yeah.
A JAMES: Like, she - I just loved her so much, and so I went through a really, really heavy grieving period.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "MONSTER")
TWIN TEMPLE: (Singing) I'm chained to your memory. You made a monster out of me.
CHANG: Well, my last question for you is just sort of a fun one. What are you guys doing for Halloween? I mean, what are you going to dress as?
Z JAMES: We don't really dress up for Halloween.
A JAMES: (Laughter).
Z JAMES: No. 1, we're always on tour on Halloween. I think we've had one Halloween off since the band started, and that was during COVID.
CHANG: Ah.
Z JAMES: And nobody came to trick or treat, which I was so bummed about.
CHANG: (Laughter).
A JAMES: Yeah.
Z JAMES: I was like, this is the year we're going to get trick-or-treaters. I'm putting candy coin in a skull.
(LAUGHTER)
Z JAMES: And nobody showed up. I was so bummed.
A JAMES: We were.
Z JAMES: We had, like, a graveyard in the front yard. It was sick.
CHANG: Oh.
Z JAMES: Nobody showed up.
(SOUNDBITE OF TWIN TEMPLE SONG, "HAUNT ME")
CHANG: Alexandra and Zachary James - together, they are Twin Temple, and their new album is called "Doomed Lovers." Thank you so much for having us over at your house and sharing this conversation with us. It was awesome.
Z JAMES: Yeah, thank you for having us. Great.
A JAMES: Thank you so much, Ailsa. We really appreciate it. Hail Satan.
(LAUGHTER)
CHANG: I was wondering if you were going to come out with that.
A JAMES: (Laughter).
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "HAUNT ME")
TWIN TEMPLE: (Singing) You're the only one who haunts me. You're the only one, oh, who haunts me. You're the only one... Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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