MUNA: Photos From the Billboard Cover Shoot

In 2022, MUNA dropped the self-titled album that would launch it to a new level of recognition — but the night of the record’s release, June 24, was a bit of a letdown. While the group was celebrating the release at dinner, news broke that the Supreme Court had overturned Roe v. Wade. “Obviously, nothing about that is good,” says the queer band’s Josette Maskin four years later. “But it is nice to be humbled that nothing is actually as important as you think.”

So before MUNA put out “Dancing on the Wall” — the first single off its latest album of the same name that relentlessly pushes the BPM of its signature synth pop — in February, singer Katie Gavin, arguably the most mystical of the group, shook up the trio’s release routine: she gathered her bandmates for an unexpectedly emotional bonfire.

“Katie tricked us into it and we were the only ones to cry,” Maskin lovingly complains. She looks to Gavin: “You were just staring at us.”

“I know. You guys did amazing,” says Gavin, smiling. Her voice is more gruff in-person than the beguiling mezzo-soprano that leads on the band’s four studio records, but she has a gentle, unbothered tone with her longtime friends and bandmates Maskin and multi-instrumentalist Naomi McPherson. “We had a good discussion [there] where Jo was talking about how the difficulty of setting goals is that we don’t want to peg our happiness on … ” She pauses, then laughs: “I got distracted because I said peg.”

Read the full Billboard cover story here.