Her first book, The Raincoats, was published in 2017, a volume in the 33 ⅓ series about the feminist punk band. For a launch event at Rough Trade in London, the band’s 1979 lineup reunited on stage for the first time since the recording of their classic debut album. During the final of three book-related events at The Kitchen, Bikini Kill played for the first time since 1997. A Japanese translation of The Raincoats was published in 2021.
Pelly’s interview subjects have included Fiona Apple, Patti Smith, Lucinda Williams, Kim Gordon, Ronnie Spector, Anohni, Jenny Lewis, Carrie Brownstein, Kathleen Hanna, Hayley Williams, and Courtney Love. Since going freelance in 2018, she has written liner notes, catalog essays, and press biographies for many musicians, visual artists, and filmmakers, including press notes for Todd Haynes’ 2021 documentary The Velvet Underground. Her conversation with Haynes, John Cale, and Maureen Tucker is included on the Criterion DVD of the film.
Her essay on Lucinda Williams, “Fruits of Her Labour,” was included in the 2022 anthology This Woman’s Work, co-edited by Kim Gordon and Sinéad Gleeson. Her essay “Unraveling the Sexism of Emo’s Third Wave” was nominated for the 2018 Reeperbahn music journalism prize. She was the first woman to write a 10.0 Pitchfork review of an album upon its initial release, for Fetch the Bolt Cutters by Fiona Apple, which was also the first album by a woman to receive such a score. It quickly became the most-read review in the site’s history.
Pelly had her first print bylines in 2006 as a high school contributor to The Long Island Press and cut her teeth contributing to local music periodicals and school papers. She went on to write for Spin, Rolling Stone, Nylon, and The Village Voice before joining Pitchfork shortly after graduating from NYU in 2011. She grew up on the south shore of Long Island and lives in Brooklyn.