Every moment counts, and you’re constantly making split-second decisions. “Like songwriting, climbing forces you to step outside your comfort zone, be vulnerable, try, fail, and overcome,” she says. The creativity Krauss used to figure out the beta is a trait that spans both her climbing and musical lives.
“Both performing and climbing take a tremendous amount of confidence, and with either, it’s all too easy to slip into a space of self-doubt.” Finally, she summons some try-hard, does the move, and stands atop the precarious spire. “I went into full-blown panic mode,” she recalls. When she reaches an impasse below the corkscrew summit, her mind fills with uncertainty and she wants to retreat to the belay, 20 feet away.
Studded leather bracelets go halfway up her left arm, and she wears a white tank top that reads “Parental Advisory: Explicit Content.” As a singer, songwriter, and frontwoman of the indie rock band Sleigh Bells-known for hard-driving hits like “Crown on the Ground” and “Rill Rill”-the New Yorker Alexis Krauss, 33, is fully in the moment, making instinctive decisions on how to move and sing.įast-forward a few days and Krauss’s hair whips through the air again, this time as she leads the last pitch of Stolen Chimney (5.10) on the Fisher Towers’ Ancient Art formation. Get access to everything we publish when youĪlexis Krauss leads Rhododendron (5.6) at her home crag, the Shawankgunks Chris Vultaggioīeams of red and yellow light cut through a smoky 2,000-person theatre, offering glimpses of a petite figure on stage spinning to an electronic beat overlaid with heavy guitar riffs while her long black hair whips back and forth.