“I’ve just opened my eyes,” says Chandler Lucy, one half of The Hellp — hungover and, as a consequence, camera off. Usually based in LA, he and his bandmate, Noah Dillon, touched down in New York last night and headed straight out with their “lawyer/finance bro” friends. Lucy reports that he “drank a bunch of Guinnesses ‘till I couldn’t see.” Dillon didn’t drink, but did “stare at [his] phone for three hours” — maybe, Dillon suggests, it would have been better to have a couple of beers. 

The begrudging IYKYK darlings of indie sleaze are in town to premiere the music video for “Live Forever,” the fourth single from their new album Riviera (out now), at a listening party later. This new era for The Hellp feels decidedly restrained compared to last year’s record LL, a boisterous clash of glitchy electro that slotted neatly into the so-called “recession pop” trend. Now, they’re stripping things back: polished, grown-up songs that refine the clattering experimentalism that originally won them fans over the past few years. 

Courtesy of The Hellp

It's a major step for the pair, considering how The Hellp’s origin story revolved around the recent indie sleaze craze — a label they both resent and lay claim to pioneering. Neither of the two had any musical experience when the band formed in 2015. But they quickly became the kind of artists who inspire your favorite artists. The music video for 2016 track “Confluence” reportedly appeared on Frank Ocean’s Blonde moodboard; Virgil Abloh commissioned Dillon — alongside model Luka Sabbat, with whom Dillon founded the art collective Hot Mess — to create a book for Off-White. A 2020 The Hellp show in New York was, according to the pair, the genesis of the hedonistic electro revival that’s since shot artists like The Dare into the stratosphere, attended by some of the genre’s now-biggest players. Most recently, Dillon, who also works as a photographer and director, shot the album artwork for Rosalía’s universally acclaimed LUX. 

That same creative eye is applied to everything The Hellp do, including the “Live Forever” music video, which Dillon also directed. Featuring a split-screen narrative — cheerleaders on one side, a man who is ultimately shot on the other — it’s the kind of music video that demands explanation. Luckily, even when hungover, The Hellp are ready to walk us through it. 

Courtesy of The Hellp

The “Live Forever” music video seems simple at face value, but it is also so striking and ultimately quite beautiful. How did you arrive at that concept?

Noah Dillon: It’s actually an idea from 2019, around the same time that the song’s demo was made. It’s co-opting the typical ideas of Friday Night Lights, football — these very American ideals — but twisting them into this beautiful horror film that happens in the first half. And although all of this “bad” shit happens, in the end, it’s just a love story. It’s a video I have been waiting years to make – I just needed the money. 

How important are visuals to the world-building of The Hellp? 

ND: I mean, it used to be that people didn’t like our music at all. They only liked the visuals. Like Chandler once said, half of being in a band is the look – being cool. Obviously, the visual component is essential to driving that. Not a lot of people take it as seriously as they should. It’s kind of a lost art form. There are obviously people like FKA twigs or Rosalía. But I can't really think of any music video I've seen the last couple of years that set the bar at an insane level.

It’s interesting that you mention Rosalía, because you recently shot the album artwork for LUX. Do those kinds of collaborations ever feed back into your work with The Hellp?

ND: It definitely works both ways, but I think that the downstream effect is more how The Hellp influences culture. The reason Rosalía and Pili, her sister and creative director, came to me, was because they were fans. Some of the first things they said were, “Oh, we loved [the 2024 visualizer for The Hellp track] ‘Colorado.’ They knew the language that I have developed, and they wanted to canonize that inside of their workflow for this record. So, rarely does the external stuff influence what's going on here, to be honest. The Hellp is a bit of a sandbox – we do what we want. 

Courtesy of The Hellp

Tell us about the new record, Riviera. How does it evolve what the band’s built so far?

ND: So, quick back stories: Chandler and I are from classic small towns in America. He’s from Northern California, I’m from Colorado — areas that are very blue-collar, low income. I love the idea of “riviera” — just the word and the definition of where it comes from, and the popularization of it being the French Riviera, an escape in the summer. It was using that and thinking about the American Riviera — this take on disparate Americana. Melancholic, sullen, serious, evocative, but it has a silver lining. The tracks are not for partying. It’s not a recession indicator album, like this indie sleaze, hyperpop, or whatever we were doing with our last record. These are just songs – and they're much more poignant and down to earth. 

Chandler Lucy: This record feels like you're on a road by yourself in these large landscapes, but there's always hope at the end of the tunnel, even though your gas tank's on empty. You know what I'm saying?

You’ve never really embraced the “indie sleaze” label, even though you’re heavily associated with it. What do you find frustrating about being lumped in with that scene?

ND: The scene didn't have enough time to actually develop. Bloggers, magazines, internet pundits and labels needed a term to place onto this burgeoning scene, but it ended up being seen as a reductive replay of recession music. You're already seeing some of these acts deviating from it. The indie sleaze world is dead. It was over before it began. 

CL: It really took away from what Noah and I are trying to accomplish. It was like, “These guys are trying to dress like The Strokes,” We've been working really hard for 10 years, and now we just look like we watched the first season of Skins and a Crystal Castles video.

ND: Yeah, we far predated [the trend]. We’ve been making music that sounds like that since 2016.

Courtesy of The Hellp

Over that time you’ve established a pretty extensive lore, from your small-town upbringings to the people you’ve inspired or collaborated with. Is that intentional?

ND: Well, the Pitchfork article about us last year called us “self-mythologizing” and they’re not wrong. We have to bring it up. It’s a survival instinct because everyone’s trying to try us. They’re trying to forget. We know our impact. There’s no coincidence that you’ll see some livestream of guys who used to be really close to Virgil [Abloh] being like, “Noah’s a legend!” or me being on the Fakemink album cover – there are so many things that point to our influence. Not that we’re doing this for pure influence. We’re doing it because we want to make cool shit. 

CL: Maybe we’ve talked a little too much at times, but I think it's a natural defense mechanism. I've seen comments on a TikTok video about us that say, “Wow, these guys are just a fucking bunch of Nepo babies.” I'm like, dude, my dad lost his job during the recession. I was broke. Noah lived in a fucking tent when he was six. 

ND: Yeah, it's disheartening to see people think we're just privileged guys, when that’s so not the case.

So it’s the disconnect between how you’re being perceived and the truth. When you talk about setting the record straight, what specific moments do you want to be remembered as your legacy? 

ND: There are multiple – none of which have anything to do with indie sleaze. If they make [2022 indie music documentary] Meet Me in the Bathroom in 2040, I would love for The Hellp to be remembered for pushing culture forward and inspiring a lot of these acts that are larger than us – as two guys who really just cared a lot about trying to make something cool despite the odds.

CL: That’s what it’s really all about. If someone looks back at us in ten years, for them to go, “Shit, I wish I was at that show.” What’s that horrible Tupac quote that goes around Facebook? “I'm not saying I'm gonna change the world, but I guarantee that I will spark the brain that will change the world.”