Stay clear of nasty foam-headed clear-yellowed corn-malted adjunct lager. Sugary rice caking usurps cloy lemon pop fizz. Almost disgustingly offensive.
MGMT, SYNTH-POP KINGPINS, RETURN ‘CONGRATULATIONS’
One of America’s newest musical sensations has been a humble East Coast quintet that grew out of an absurdist art project at a snootily unappreciative upscale college. It may’ve taken them a few months to catch on with the masses, but MGMT incredibly made the jump from interesting indie pop apprentices (with an addictive techno edge) to universal dance-pop champions (raised on a diet of Rhythm & Blues, prog-rock, new wave, disco, and, for good measure, ‘60s psychedelia). Theirs is a mind-bending admix of savory musical ingredients caught in a perpetual quest for the golden chord.
And so it was. MGMT managed to slowly climb to the top and receive a Grammy nomination with the tantalizing Oracular Spectacular, a righteously titled entrée perfectly in tune with current trends, at least on the vogue surface, but also halfway aspiring for hip cred amongst astute underground pundit. Either way, it was inarguably a mighty first step.
Invigorated by Malibu surf riding and related ‘60s surf culture, MGMT’s next project, Congratulations, doubled the ambition and tripled the compositional complexity. Simply put, it was a riskier pursuit built upon the final far-reaching ideas scattered across Oracular Spectacular’s most daring, least perused, fare.
Born in Columbia, Missouri, before moving to Arlington, Virginia, then Pittsburgh (for an eight-year stint), MGMT co-founder Andrew Van Wyngarden settled in the soulful confines of Memphis, Tennesssee, before attending Connecticut’s haughty Wesleyan University, where he met fellow gifted artisan, Ben Goldwasser. The two would concoct various keyboard-programmed laptop tracks before coming of age.
Growing up alongside New York’s Lake Champlain in nearby Wesport, Ben plays the nerdy bespectacled brainiac to Andrew’s pretty-boy rock star profile. Together, the adaptive duo, now living in Brooklyn, would soon become reluctant synth-pop kingpins, buttressing their buoyantly brightened neoteric psychedelic whimsy with a few likeminded pals that’d determinedly help fill out the increasingly imaginative arrangements at hand.
MGMT became a full-fledged band when Andrew brought guitarist Hank Sullivant onboard. Hank had performed in various bands while they were both living in Memphis as youths. When he left to form Kuroma, Hank’s pal, Warwick, New York-based drummer, James Richardson, moved over to guitar. Meanwhile, stick-handler Will Berman, who went to Wesleyan with Ben and Andrew and played in a few local Connecticut combos (one which opened for indie rock faves, Of Montreal), joined the crew. Will then got bassist Matthew Asti to enter the fold.
Rounding up prodigal Flaming Lips/ Mercury Rev producer Dave Fridmann to advance their surrealistic enlightenment for impressive ’08 debut, Oracular Spectacular, MGMT initially caught fire when the ethereal flute-fluttered percussion-thudded dance-floor sparkler, “Electric Feel,” gained magnificent mainstream, club, and rock approval. That opened the floodgates for two more completely accessible and undeniably charming cuts written and recorded prior to the albums’ release.
Firstly, spiffy ‘live fast/ die young’ anthem “Time To Pretend,” a sweepingly swaggering symphonic slam poking fun of self-destructive celebrity lifestyles, placed flatulent phase-shifting keyboard blurbs atop allusive techno-imbibed machinations with ample success. Better still, vivaciously dippy sing-along enchantment, “Kids,” lovingly imitated Eno’s bold avant-Industrial inventions (especially those consuming David Bowie’s monumental ’77 album, Low).
A recent co-headlining Bamboozle set, May ’10, became a cheery celebration captivating an anxiously awaiting crowd at dusk (prior to Weezer’s proficient pro-pop pap). Utilizing swirling light schemes, oscillating keyboard swells, glossy guitar grooves, seismic beats, and galactic jaunts to get across their most popular songs, MGMT proved to be one of America’s latest and greatest modern rock finds. Everyone sang along to the pleadingly ascending ‘take only what you need’ chorus of “Kids.” A truly fuckin’ amazing life affirming moment!
Cagey producer Peter Kember (a.ka. Sonic Boom) of former psych-futurists, Spaceman 3, and active garage-prog plodders, Spectrum, provides the proper rococo, echo-drenched atmospherics to experimental sophomore endeavor, Congratulations. Heady lead track, “It’s Working,” takes mystical adventurers on an enigmatic journey back in time to the Summer Of Love with its radiant Epicurean flights of fancy – reaching several euphoric climaxes. Crossbreeding Arthur Lee’s Love and Ted Nugent’s Amboy Dukes with Pink Floyd’s Saucerful Of Secrets in an elliptical fashion, the opium-laced magnum opus extensively re-creates the valiant prog-rock scurry of the happily abstruse “4th Dimensional Transition” (from the debut).
Recorded in a Brooklyn apartment, the equally ebullient hook-filled ode to exploratory art-pop brainiac, “Brian Eno,” goes bonkers as a sharp-witted ditty ready to please bubblegum pop admirers as well as fussy avant-rock aficionados. Another wonderful, though less known, British artist, gets glorified on carnival organ-doused “Song For Dan Treacy,” an espionage-like whirlwind lauding the Television Personalities guiding light with early REM-styled 6-string jangling.
Reminiscent of early Flaming Lips, grandiose three-part opus, “Siberian Breaks,” galvanizes into a mammoth Arctic surf-riding symphony one step beyond the kaleidoscopic multi-harmonized illuminations igniting “Flash Delirium” (influenced by the Beach Boys Big Sur number, “All I Wanna Do”). Finally, the serenely salutary title track, an entrancing balladic dirge engaging synthesized Eastern mysticism, facetiously sums up the overall contentedness the band found gaining unexpectedly expeditious fame.
Just as Radiohead’s colossal 2000 masterpiece, Kid A, expanded and compounded the bands’ electro-rock abstractions, these clever musical designers have transcended the inceptive investigations bracing Oracular Spectacular by risking it all creating a fascinatingly perplexing follow-up, the recondite Congratulations. Enriching the lavish exuberance of their earliest recordings with curiously elaborate twists and turns, MGMT slyly disguise the juicy melodic intrigue drawing in the incipient pop crowd while handily elevating each broadened arrangement in a meritoriously uncalculated manner that requires careful listening.
MGMT may be overreaching at this point in time, but by overstepping their boundaries a bit, these altruistic spirits have proven to have an uncompromising commitment to the betterment of imminent mimickers. Let’s face it: instant fame leads to immediate imitation. Though MGMT may’ve lost a couple nascent “Kids” fans in the process of getting headier, they’ve undoubtedly gained the respect of more diligent audiophiles. And that may seem ideal for a band whose future directions are still uncertain to them.
I got to speak to MGMT in person @ High Times Magazine in June. Happily, I spent 3-plus hours with MGMT, acquiring enough cool info for two completely separate articles. Here’s a snippet of conversation for Aquarian Weekly.
Both of your albums lead off with sarcastic tracks snubbing drug-fueled celebrities. Why?
BEN: It’s nice to see the sad human side. We love pop culture. I was raised on it. Maybe we mock out media culture because it’s more productive than getting blatantly pissed off about it and easier to rail against it.
Distinguished cartoon surrealist Anthony Ausgang’s gorgeous front cover artwork for Congratulations depicts a two-headed piano-eyed purple feline surfing out of a blue cat’s tongue. Did Malibu surfboarding inspire the CD’s colorful design?
ANDREW: Even when we were writing for the first album, I had a psychedelic surf movie, Morning Of The Earth, in mind. Its soundtrack was soft rock-inspired. That film gave me a look at the ‘60s psychedelic culture and the images that matched up with the psychedelic music of that period. We were imagining ourselves as the cat on the surfboard and the wave is about to crash down. It caused a bit of a stir. Many people thought it was a computer graphic. But it’s really a hand-drawn thing painted into the image. I’m not saying our music is perfect like the art, but we like music that may be deemed awful and cannot be understood. But if you listen a few times, you’ll hopefully start to realize what the musicians are all about.
How’d the West Coast beach culture affect Congratulations in a way that couldn’t be captured had MGMT recorded the album back East in the woodsy upstate New York cabin where the compositions were spawned?
BEN: I think it’s funny. When we were talking about writing the album, we mentioned trying to get a surf feel. But we were trying to write in upstate New York. We had some real good stuff. But when we finally got out West, it took away the irony of writing West Coast-inspired rock.
The lyrical twists seem more emotionally compelling on Congratulations.
ANDREW: It’s a little melancholic. We began right after we got off tour in England. It was wintertime – a post-tour comedown in a way. And there’s all this pressure (to follow up a gold selling debut). We didn’t know what would happen dealing with pressure. We weren’t in an entirely serious mood, but we had uncertainties.
BEN: The more simply arranged songs on the first LP, like “Kids,” were our earliest songs. It felt natural to move forward. There was a 14-minute B-side, “Mennanoya,” on the back of “Time To Pretend.” But that doesn’t mean it’ll affect our future works. Mystical balladic venture, “Someone’s Missing,” shrewdly settles into an early ‘70s soul groove.
ANDREW: That’s an Isley Brothers/ Shuggie Otis-influenced thing. And studio wiz Todd Rundgren. Todd’s production and instrumentation were magical.
BEN: Flaming Lips’ Dave Fridmann (Oracular Spectacular’s producer) was a big fan of Todd Rundgren. I think a lot of the cool stuff he does is mixing something that sounds unconventional. The levels are all wrong. And some of the instruments are weird. But he leaves all this stuff in the mix you wouldn’t ordinarily be able to hear.
Phil Spector did that.Was ‘70s Krautrock inspirational for the more proggish instrumental maneuvers?
ANDREW: We like obvious Krautrock bands like Can, Neu, Cluster. The drummer from Asra Temple – his synthesizer LP’s are really good.
Why was the Television Personalities front man evoked for the carnival organ-doused guitar-jangled espionage-like tune, “Song For Dan Treacy”?
ANDREW: That song was very much inspired by this band, Deep Freeze Mice – an obscure bizarro band from the early ‘80s. That’s where the chromatic chord changes and time signatures were inspired by. But we are now friends with Dan Treacy. We met him at a Spectrum show in Norwich, England. One of the things he said onstage was, ‘Hello London!’ All these people yelled at him so he countered with ‘I’m not in London? What the fuck am I doing in Norwich?’ People were throwing shit at him so that’s the first impression we got of him.
Where’d the quirky ode to genius studio manipulator, “Brian Eno,” come from?
ANDREW: Musically, I don’t know what that’s inspired by. It was a song that started with a few chords and watered down to ‘Brian Eno.’ He was this wizard living in an Eastern European castle and we go there to find him at this mystical magical place and eventually we try to run away and he chases us off. The song isn’t aping him. It’s taking the piss out of him.
“It’s Working” came across quite good live on Jimmy Fallon’s show in June. On top of what I said about that tune beforehand, it also reminded me of ‘67-era Beatles via Tears For Fear.
BEN: That’s fun to play live. The harmonies… Maybe in some way it’s the toughest to do live because we have to get tough vocal harmonies down.
ANDREW: Jimmy Fallon was a real cool talk show host. He compared the new album to Syd Barrett. He even mentioned the Zombies Odessey & Oracle. He came by the dressing room and made sure we had the mixes in the control room right.
KASTEEL BIERE DU CHATEAU DONKER
Dark chocolate-spiced brown-bodied quad gains sweet rum-soaked barleywine-brandy attributes. Brown-sugared maple molasses and plum-wined raisin-fig deepen resolve. Soda-like hop fizz nearly overwhelms moderate mocha malt strength.
(SHIPYARD) VIRGIN ISLANDS TROPICAL MANGO PALE ALE
Bottled by Shipyard for Virgin Islands-based St. John’s Brewery, refreshing tropical-fruited pale ale punctuates ripe mango sweetness with brisk lemon-hopped papaya, passion fruit and pineapple delectation. Peach-lacquered maraschino cherry, strawberry, blueberry, and tangerine illusions come and go above honeyed wheat spine. Unfortunately, quality has gone down. Phenol-hopped fizzing and perfumed tongue overwhelm soapy watermelon and mango illusions of light summery dessert treat.
CLIPPER CITY HEAVY SEAS THE GREAT’ER PUMPKIN
Scintillating bourbon oak-barreled concoction retains a mere hint of expectant seasonal gourd spicing. Instead, wonderful Scotch-dried Jim Beam warmth spreads across endearing mandarin orange-spiced cognac and Courvoisier illusions to sweet clover-honeyed almondine finish, relegating unmissed pumpkin seed oiling. Moreover, butterscotch-candied luxuriance ripples through mild hazelnut-oiled roasted chestnut, buttered pecan, and macadamia illusions at cream soda midst. Simply out of this world.
COLD SPRING HONEY ALMOND WEISS
Dreadful 32-ounce canned version, labeled a ‘weiss’ during 2010 campaign, retains nasty vegetal-soured citric-rotted acridity. Mild raw-honeyed astringency drifts into phenol hop bittering. Cheap champagne flow overrides meager almond wisp and mandarin orange zest.
BALLAST POINT SEA MONSTER IMPERIAL STOUT
Resoundingly bittersweet raisin-pureed cherry jubilee entry receives sharp hop-charred nuttiness buttressing everlasting coffee finish. Maple-sapped oats roast and nutty hazelnut-macadamia rampage positively reinforce chewy chocolate fudge nudge and tertiary Swiss chocolate, dark-roasted cappuccino, black licorice, and soured raspberry nuances. On tap at Julian’s, delightful 2011 version (aged 5 years) picked up syrupy dark chocolate richness, creamy coffee serenade, black currant spicing, oak-smoked cocoa bittering and black cherry nip above brown-sugared oats base.
SOUTHERN TIER 2X IPA
Completely inviting well-balanced moderate-body proves you don’t have to knock people over the head with heavy hops to be an enjoyable India Pale Ale. Sweet-buttered caramel malting anchors lacquered peach-pear-grape ripening, juicy pink grapefruit tang, and ascending tropical-fruited pineapple-mango climax. Easygoing grassy-hopped pine nut bittering never overwhelms appreciative hibiscus-rosebud flowering to polite grain bottom. Softer golden-pale ale palates will appreciate its delicate tension. Hop heads should regale its durable 8% alcohol haze and ambitious fruiting.
HARPOON GLACIER HARVEST ’10 WET HOP ALE
Annual copper-hued medium-bodied autumnal ‘100 Barrel Series’ brew never obscenely bitter despite ‘wet hop’ tag. Dank fruit-soured entry alleviated by sweet-grained rye-breaded barley roast. Dry-hopped lemon pit acridity hinders cherry-dried plum-fig-date paucity, tannic grape wining, and caraway-seeded rosemary-thyme influence. Dark floral nuances come and go abruptly.
BORN RUFFIANS JUST WANNA ‘SAY IT’
Sometimes rock-based musicians are better off scaling back and stripping down the instrumental expanse to work in an intimate acoustic setting. This live-in-the-studio approach allows for greater up-front emotionalism and deeper lyrical compassion to shine through. MTV’s revolutionary Unplugged Series exploited this toned-down roots-based idea with acclaimed artists such as Nirvana, R.E.M., Alice In Chains, and Korn, all of whom totally prospered in the crystalline acoustic environment. Similarly, Born Ruffians believed the best way to advance their latest batch of songs was to cut back the electronic noise (including some wailing sax) for understated masterstroke, Say It.
Hailing from a small town north of Toronto, Born Ruffians first made waves with ‘08s fully formed entrée, Red Yellow & Blue. That’s when singer-guitarist Luke Lalonde, long-time childhood pal, bassist Mitch Derosier (who’d been jamming together since high school), and drummer Steven Hamelin moved to Toronto and toured with several big name acts, garnering an impressive fan base along the way. Joined by ex-Caribou bassist Andy Lloyd, who’ll supply keyboards, guitar fills, and backup vocals on tour, the friendly foursome hit the road again, this time to promote their eagerly awaited follow-up record.
But life wasn’t always so cushy. At the start, Born Ruffians often got dissed in favor of the trendy emo bands making the local club scene. It seems sniveling suburban white boy blues were more popular than the Strokes upbeat Classic rock-derived subterranean pop nearly a decade ago, at least in the Great White North.
“When we formed the band in 2001, we were fifteen. The Strokes Is This It came out. That polarized us. We realized the reason we weren’t into new music was because emo was so big. Whiny screaming stuff we didn’t like. We got laughed at and booed in Midland for being different, but we felt as if we were probably snotty about it,” Lalonde recalls.
Sticking to their guns, Born Ruffians also learned the ‘less-is-more’ approach to arranging could truly benefit a song’s enduring power. One of Lalonde’s inspirational bands, the Beatles, prospered by taking that risk on the archetypal Rubber Soul.
“It’s all about the groove and feel, getting across an idea in a simple way,” he claims. And he’s out to prove it.
Sprightly rudimentary jingle, “Oh Man” (which approximates the Strokes clever styling), neatly sets up Say It’s easygoing flow, relying on a good hook and tribal tom beat to captivate underground pop heads, new folk rockers and mainstream taste-makers alike.
Scurried six-string spangling juts out of jittered flitter, “Retard Canard,” a quirky bass-slapped drum-tapped military march interrupted by the declaratory “I just wanna set the world on fire’ refrain and probably inspired by the Talking Heads fidgety new wave eccentricities or, perhaps, the Violent Femmes resultant elementary scruff.
Effortlessly syncopated percussive patter underscores the minimal guitar-bass frenzy consuming half-spoken reflection, “The Ballad Of Moose Bruce.” Its made-up superhero from a bygone era looks back and gives advise to weary minions, channeling the ‘stop and smell the roses’ adage in a diligent manner.
Skittering along a little faster and louder, “Blood, The Sun & Water” anchors gently strummed guitar lucidity with dotted drum dollops and a booming bass bottom. Beseeching sax-sulked slow roller, “Come Back,” and swiftly galloping stroller, “Higher & Higher,” make the grade as well.
I spoke to the head Ruffian via phone before his band hit the road for an autumnal 2010 US tour.
How and why did Born Ruffians scale back Say It’s tracks to their sparsest acoustical auspices?
LUKE: It was a case of not wanting any ideas to go unchecked. In the studio, if someone had an idea to try an overdub, we’d get it on tape. But a good chunk of that stuff, when it came to the mix, didn’t make it. The less cluttered it was, the better it sounded. It came out sounding like a 3-piece record like the last one. Aesthetically, it’s similar sounding. The difference was in time and songwriting. It wasn’t a big production. A lot of saxes were toned down. There’s prominent sax on “Come Back’s” introduction, but the rest is hardly audible and sounded like synths.
How would you compare the new album to Red Yellow & Blue? They’re approached similarly with producer Rusty Santos (Animal Collective/ Panda Bear mixer). We recorded very much live and were inspired by ‘60s and ‘70s bands. Isolation is what the Beatles did best. It makes us sound better together. There’s not a lot of compression – which is sort of a modern sound. I don’t know if we’ll continue with that sound. There’s no autotune. It’s not overly slick. It’s more organic. The difference is the time between the two records and where we wanted to go with the songs. We were concentrating on distinct verse-chorus pop. We haven’t had a huge hit single. But it’s in the traditional sense of pop-friendly music.What has producer Rusty Santos done to hoist Born Ruffian’s studio sound?
He’s really good at being an innovative mixer. His approach to production is an art form. He approached each record distinctly. He has all the experience we don’t. It’s great having him on the team stamping his sound all over our records.
Are you upset your music doesn’t get played alongside tertiary emo bands on conventional mainstream radio? In the ‘70s, you’d obviously gain a modicum of aboveground contemporary exposure.
To me, a good pop or rock record could be based on ‘70s pop as a reference. To reference pop now, you immediately think of Lady Gaga. This record is by no means close to that.
Who were early influences?
I tend to listen to a lot of older music. Say It is our mid-’70s to early ‘80s record. Talking Heads are an ever-present influence. To a lesser extent, Violent Femmes and David Bowie. Newer stuff I tend to take with a grain of salt. There’s not a ton of new music I find extremely engaging. I’d rather hear an older record I haven’t discovered or find a cool contemporary band and find what influenced them. At the same time, you have to keep up and release stuff that’s relevant. We wanted to avoid being a Classic rock band like the Rolling Stones. We wanted to evolve from that reference point, like The White Stripes, Hives, Vines, Libertines, The Coral, and Kings Of Leon.
“Retard Canard” has a distinct percolating Talking Heads feel. But their influence seems buried elsewhere.
That was a nice riff-based song that we went big on the C and G chord. They’re overused chords, but we didn’t have any songs that used those chords. So it was fun to play. We realized when we were rehearsing, why make it so complicated when sometimes the simple tunes are the most fun. Hopefully, that infectious feel will come across and people will enjoy it. At the same time, we do enjoy a challenge, pushing our comfort zone, and making us concentrate on what we’re doing. There’s a math-y type feel.
What songs were the most difficult to compose?
I guess something like “Blood, The Sun & Water.” “Nova Leigh” has parts that we weren’t sure of the time signature. It jumps in at weird intervals in a needlessly complicated way. (laughter) It sounds crazy.
On the other hand, I was struck by the easygoing temperance and unembellished whimsicality of “Sole Brother.”
That’s one of the worst cheesy puns as a title. It’s about me whining as an eleven year-old kid because I have to do all the chores. It’s supposed to be from a child’s perspective and how my sister never helped rake the yard. In a roundabout way, it’s about wanting to be an only child. It’s fictional though. It’s not like I don’t love my sister. Steve had these other lyrics for the second part about wanting his favorite rappers to be best friends. The ideas seemed to pair up well. It’s actually the first time we had a lyrical collaboration since high school.
Did Bob Dylan, in a circuitous way, influence your poetic narrative?
I bet it was a lot of Dylan. He was a catalyst in my writing in general – a fascinating obsession that rubbed off lyrically. I do read a lot fiction-wise. I like Bukowski, Steinbeck’s East Of Eden. I’m actually reading a lot of non-fiction now to get stories floating around in my head.
(WILLIAMS BROTHERS) KELPIE SEAWEED ALE
Precarious brown-hued ruby-hazed moderate-bodied adjunct beer defined as Scottish gruit and described as chocolate ale rejuvenates ancient herbal recipe. Musty chocolate liqueur-wafted hop-oiled barley roast saddles cocoa-powdered hazelnut coffee mildness. Underlying black chocolate creaminess induces tertiary molasses cookie and maple sap illusions to earthen peat-seared bottom. Local bladder wrack seaweed provides salty brine accent to mocha-dried finish. Just a tad unassuming despite peculiar auspices.
LAGUNITAS FUSION III IMPERIAL STOUT
On tap, unconventional dark brown Imperial Stout (with hefty 10% alcohol volume) brings rich mocha malting to fruit-dried nuttiness. Belgian chocolate spicing accents sugared fig, raisin, and plum illusions as well as bourbon-burgundy boozing. Green-hopped rye-grassed chipotle-peppered earthiness lifts underlying peanut-shelled hazelnut-macadamia conflux. Muscat grape, orange compote, and marmalade nuances flutter by.