SeeYouSpaceCowboy released The Romance of Affliction on November 5, 2021, through Pure Noise Records. Produced by Isaac Hale of Knocked Loose, their second album grew out of a rebuilt lineup and a renewed appetite for experimentation. Its 13 tracks included “Misinterpreting Constellations,” where affection, guilt and the difficulty of letting go run through Connie Sgarbossa’s lyrics.
The changes began with the people writing the music. Following departures during the pandemic, guitarist Ethan Sgarbossa became the main songwriter, while founding member Taylor Allen returned on bass and vocals. Connie told Alternative Press that the group wanted to retain the emotional intensity of The Correlation Between Entrance and Exit Wounds while reconnecting with their earlier material’s playful, unpredictable qualities. Clean singing and stronger melodies became part of that effort. They wrote 30 songs together, working through the material as a group in what she described as their first fully collaborative album-writing process.
For Connie, those melodies created a practical challenge: finding places for her screams and sassy vocal delivery inside music that could also be pretty. She told Revolver that working with Hale felt comfortable because he already understood the band. Sessions could stretch across eight to 10 hours as they developed riffs, tried vocals and reconsidered arrangements. She was also thinking about the album’s emotional progression—how its different moods could form a complete experience. Hale helped the group turn that ambition into decisions they could make song by song.
His input extended to the guest appearances. When Underoath’s Aaron Gillespie agreed to contribute, Hale identified the section where his voice should go, replacing one of Allen’s parts. Gillespie appeared on “Intersecting Storylines to the Same Tragedy.” Connie told BrooklynVegan that he had been their first choice after Pure Noise suggested another feature during recording. They doubted he would agree, then received a yes within 24 hours. Underoath had helped inspire the music they were writing; suddenly, one of that band’s defining voices was part of it.
The greater freedom in the arrangements accompanied a difficult change in the lyrics. Connie had initially imagined the record as a follow-up that would show she had recovered from the grief explored on The Correlation Between Entrance and Exit Wounds. As she explained to Kerrang!, that story no longer matched her life. Writing honestly meant addressing addiction, relationships and behavior she was uncomfortable looking back on. “There’d be no point in writing an album that wasn’t true,” she said.
That honesty also explains the title’s discomfort. The Romance of Affliction questioned the appeal people find in stories of suffering and the assumption that turning pain into music necessarily resolves it. Connie wanted listeners to recognize addiction as something people were experiencing in the present, with a need for understanding and support. The record allowed her to describe that experience while she was still living through it, without inventing a reassuring ending.
The creative relationship with Hale carried into the band’s next album, Coup de Grâce, released in 2024. Matt Squire took the producer’s role, while Hale returned for songwriting sessions. Speaking to The Soundcheck, Connie said she wanted him to remain involved in SeeYouSpaceCowboy’s creative process and valued his enthusiasm for unusual ideas. For that record, those ideas included a speakeasy atmosphere, noir imagery and danceable passages—another set of experiments they could develop with someone who already understood their approach.
