Momma’s Two of Me Is a Twisted, Enchanting Carnival Ride
The L.A. band’s new concept album leaves much to the imagination

Apparently L.A. grunge pop group Momma have never heard of the sophomore slump, and we’re all the better for it. The four-piece released their debut album Interloper in 2018, and a short two years later they’re sharing Two of Me, a concept album that manages to capture the imagination and shows incredible restraint at the same time. Etta Friedman and Allegra Weingarten, who share guitar, songwriting and vocal duties, recorded the album in Los Angeles with fellow bandmates Zach CapittiFenton (drums) and Sebastian Jones (bass).
Two of Me explores a shadowy world called the Bug House that resembles our own, but serves as a hell of sorts for transgressors. Friedman and Weingarten are intentionally vague as to what the Bug House looks like, but the descriptions they do provide resemble the realm inhabited by tethers in Jordan Peele’s film Us, down to the twisted carnival elements and the copies of real-world people living in it.
Momma doesn’t hit you over the head with overwrought descriptions of the Bug House, but, rather, this underworld creeps in insidiously through their muddled vocals, spare lyrics and distorted guitars. Two of Me could even be mistaken for a breezy listen the first time around, like a moodier Snail Mail or more psychedelic Chastity Belt. But once you’re clued in, you get the sense that when Friedman and Weingarten sing together, it’s like they’re looking into a warped funhouse mirror, their voices often indistinguishable from each other. They’ve cited this duality in their recording process (“We realized that we’re practically the same, but just different entire people,” they wrote in an essay for Talkhouse), and it’s evident in the way their vocals not only resemble one another, but also blend into one amorphous sound.