The Minneapolis duo Bad Bad Hats are named after a little-known song from “Madeline,” a beloved children’s book series about a mischievous young girl and her yellow-clad classmates. Founded by singer/songwriter Kerry Alexander and guitarist Chris Hoge, the band traffics in similarly playful concepts and warm scenes of youth. Bad Bad Hats are celebrated for crispy, lived-in melodies, big choruses that stick for days, and an easy musicianship that carries across their eclectic, wide-ranging releases.
The band’s lead singer Kerry Alexander grew up between Tampa, Florida and Birmingham, Alabama. As a child, she was a student of the glossy MTV pop that defined the early 2000s, as well as the David Bowie and Tom Petty CDs her parents would play while making dinner. Singer songwriters like Alanis Morissette, Kim Deal, and later, Michelle Branch, were an early inspiration for Kerry.
Psychic Reader, BBH’s debut LP, arrived in 2015. Led by the ebullient single “Midway,” the album highlighted the band’s cinematic sound, punchy rhythm sections, and Kerry’s heart-aching vocals. With Psychic Reader, the band expanded their audience beyond local Twin Cities venues, as their music spread organically via college radio and shared links. New fans seemed to discover the music daily, their growth coincided with a renaissance in young bedroom musicians via streaming through the 2010s. With their follow up full length albums Lightning Round (2018) and Walkman (2021), Bad Bad Hats expanded their sound and look, with hilariously DIY music videos that cast the band as ice hockey players, Elvis impersonators, secret agents and more. In the years since their initial noodling around St. Paul, Bad Bad Hats have toured globally with peers like The Beths and Hippo Campus, and storied acts like The Front Bottoms and Michelle Branch, who picked them up for her 2022 headlining world tour.
Last January, Kerry, Chris, and longtime bandmate Con Davison got together in Chris and Kerry’s Twin Cities home, writing and recording their latest, self-titled LP. The group recorded more quickly than usual, and even incorporated a few songwriting prompts sent in directly from their fans as jumping-off points. Where BBH are typically known for big song topics like love and heartache, Kerry took to smaller ideas this time round – included are songs inspired by parking tickets, scorching Tampa grocery store lots, and other autobiographical scenes woven into dancefloor-ready numbers.
Today, Bad Bad Hats are back to their founding duo, and their upcoming record is the band’s first time self-producing, with a freewheeling, pristine tone and several unexpectedly funky turns. The new album suggests a band still having deep fun creating and playing, inviting listeners new and old to live life to their heartfelt tunes.