25/04/11
How are you doing?
Oh, I’m doing well. Can’t complain, just enjoying the day. We’ve just been doing some rehearsal at the studio and so I’m just on my break right now.
So what’s the weather like there?
It’s about 50 degrees here, maybe 45.
Are you looking forward to Christmas round your way?
I am yes. It’s always a good time to see the family and have a break. My family lives in the south part of Texas - Houston, so my wife and I will go down there this year and see them.
I have to say, it’s a real honour to interview you guys; ‘Trials of Van Occupanther’ is one of only few albums that the Outline office likes in unison, and my Mum loves you too…
That’s our goal, to unite offices and moms and daughters!
Now Eric, you were the last one to join the band, back in 2001, so how did you come to join the already-formed Midlake?
Well the drummer and I used to play in a band together in high school, so we knew one another and we probably met when we were like, sixteen years old. He came up to Denton, to the school, UMT, where he met all the other guys, but I actually went to a different school, but I guess I kept in contact with him. I’d come up and visit the town here in Denton and the school and people here. I was there almost as a fan in the early, developmental stage of the early years where they were going through jazz-funk and then when they made the switch over to rock music. Then I finished school and moved up here and joined the band and that was 2001, almost 3 years before we even put out our first record, so it was quite a developmental stage of Midlake.
So you weren’t the new boy…
No, but I’m still the youngest; I’m the youth of the band.
Does that have any bad effects? Do they patronise you or make you cook them tea all the time?
No, it’s pretty equal rights in the band! No unfair treatment!
So the band formed in Denton, TX, but were you all born in Denton?
None of us grew up here, but all of us have been here for the last 10 years, but we all grew up in different parts of Texas, mostly. Tim - San Antonio area, like I said, Mackenzie and I came from the Houston area, Paul grew up in Arlington and the other Eric in the band actually grew up in Louisiana.
Denton was named ‘Best Music Scene’ in 2008 by the New York Times, so what is it about the area that’s made it so fruitful a place for music?
Yeah, I think there’s just something in the water here. Y’know, a lot of it has to do with the artistic community here, which is encouraged and has grown here, starting with school. You have a lot of people who go through the school and have a lot invested in the arts, whether it be photography, or music - I mean, I think music is a big part of that, but there’s an arts community that comes out of that and they - like we did - end up staying here and you make a home and maybe you meet your wife and you start working a job, but you also have this passion for music and it creates, well obviously, a lot of bands, but there’s also this sense of quality in those bands. There’s a lot of great music that comes out of this town and I think a lot of that comes out of the community that encourages one another and helps promote one another, you know, I think people start saying ‘There’s another band from Denton, and there’s another one… where IS Denton anyway?’ It’s kind of a cool thing for us and the city has really taken hold of that as well, which is cool, like when you’re supported not only by the community, but by the city as a whole as well who are trying to nurture that scene.
I think you should bottle some of that Denton water and make some money when you come over to Norwich - there’ll be a lot of bands who’d think ‘yeah, I want some of that shit!’ They’ll pay hand over fist - just bleed them dry! So your early gigs attracted the attention of Simon Raymonde, head of Bella Union, but how did that come about?
Well there was a band that was actually signed to Bella Union called Live to Experience, and this was at a time when we were actually working on that first record, ‘Bamnan and Slivercork’ and we thought, ‘Man, wouldn’t it be amazing if we were on that label’. I mean, when you’re a band and you’re just starting out, you cling to anybody who’ll just listen to you, y’know, you just want to be heard and the thought of being on a label was such a romantic idea and such a magical one, like, ‘Woah, that’d be cool’, like this record label that we’ve heard about that existed in the UK, where I’ve never been y’know, how do you get that? So to cut a long story short, one of the guys from that band gave our record to Simon and he wrote us and said I wanna have Midlake’s babies! So this next record will be his third child that he’s giving birth to of ours.
So why was it a British label that you signed to?
Well at the time - and I’ve always respected Simon in that he’s always stuck to his guns in this way because he only puts out music that he likes, that he’s a fan of - sometimes it’s not always the quickest way, but he’s gotten there in the end and established himself as a very respectable label and a successful one at that. If you look at his past roster - and I personally am a big fan of a lot of those bands and records - even ones that didn’t do as well, y’know, it’s still a great resume of music that’s come out on this label and that’s a great thing to have - a catalogue of really great music, not just ‘Oh well, with that one we were just trying to make a dime’. I think that’s pretty rare.
You’ve produced all your records yourselves - can you see yourself letting anyone else in?
Well it’s just that we’re just a bit crazy; it’s difficult to do ourselves and develop and have a great specific idea, ‘cause it’s always just evolving and developing things where you couldn’t necessarily go to a producer and say ‘This is what it is - this is what we’re trying to do’ and do it, y’know. It’s always this process and I think between time and money that I know would have to be put into it, it’d just be quite a task. I know that there are great producers out there and at times, we almost wish we had that objectivity that you lose when you’re recording an album for so long. It’d be nice to have that guy on the outside saying ‘Well, let’s try this’ and we do try and give sneak peeks to friends and people like that - especially Simon - to say ‘What do you think’, but ultimately, we just try to graft and get it right, then if no-one likes it, we’re the ones to blame!
Well you seem to have done everything right so far. Was ‘Trials of Van Occupanther’ bigger than you ever expected?
It definitely continued to grow, so we were in a different predicament to the last one, because there wasn’t so much expectation. We started out doing a tour with the Flaming Lips and that really set that record off in a good way for us, because those guys are just so great and encouraging and almost took us under their wing and befriended us; Wayne or Stephen would be back there giving us tips like ‘You just gotta stay together as a band - I know it’s rough, I know you struggle, but you guys are a great band’. They’d come out on the side of the stage or get the crowd riled up - it was just a cool experience for us to set that record off. Then ‘Roscoe’ started to catch on with people and blogs, or radio and stuff and that really gave the album a continual lift, and then we just kept touring, I mean, we toured for about a year and a half, which is a pretty lengthy time, but it kept growing, so we wanted to sort of see that through. It put us in a better position and we didn’t expect to take this long on the record, but we wanted to get it right this time and knew that we weren’t making the same record and it took us some time to digest the influences on us and to try to say what we wanted to say. What you’re thinking, you can’t just put out really quick - it just wasn’t happening that way, so it took some time for us to get it right. But as I say, Van Occupanther was an important thing for us and it’s something that we’re still glad that we did and we’ll still play several of the songs from it on the new tour.
It’s an exciting time - this Monday, ‘Acts of Man’ is being released on just 500 copies of 12” vinyl in just a handful of independent record stores. Is that acting as a stepping stone before the full album release, or is it to pay back the hardcore fans who’ve been waiting for new material?
I think it’s a little bit of both, y’know, I mean, we’ve been wanting to put this record out and we’ve been chomping at the bit to just get it out there and share it with people. It was at least a way of doing something before Christmas and a couple of months before releasing the album to give people an introduction to the album and to just put something out there. We thought the two songs that are on there are a good representation of the album in some ways, but obviously the media folks have the luxury of hearing the full album and I wish that everybody could at this time. We felt good about these two songs, so yeah, we’re just glad to be able to put them out and give people a taste and some more anticipation for the new album.
Can you give us an idea of the direction you’ve gone in?
Yeah, we started to get influenced by the British Folk era bands of the late sixties and seventies, which I think personally made sense as a progression for us, just ‘cause the last album was influenced more by the American Folk Rock, West Coast type music, like Crosby, Stills and Nash, or Fleetwood Mac even, and that type of stuff, so with this one, we took the gateway to a little bit darker side of music. It’s a little bit heavier and it was just something that started influencing us and especially Tim and his writing, so we all started getting into that. Jethro Tull was influential in the last album as well, and I think that was the gateway into a lot more British folk stuff -
So are we talking Fairport Convention, that sort of thing?
Yes, Fairport Convention, Pentangle, Steeleye Span, y’know, The Strawbs - all those amazing bands who just started really moving us. I mean obviously I don’t think you’re gonna put on the record and feel like you’re necessarily putting on a Fairport Convention record, it’s obviously just our interpretation of those influences, y’know, we’re still the same guys. I’m interested as well, because as I said, it’s difficult for us to know, from our position, what people think and I hope people like it and understand the progression and the maturity and ‘…Van Occupanther’ is what it is and this one is what it is as well. We didn’t try to not make the same record, it’s just this is the music that’s been influencing us; if we were still influenced by the same music, I’m sure it’d be a closer mirror of ‘…Van Occupanther’.
It’s almost four years ago that you made ‘…Van Occupanther’, but then you seemed to inspire a slue of bands in your wake - people like Bon Iver, Fleet Foxes etc, seem to have been influenced by you. Are you hoping that you can inspire again with this new record?
I don’t know, y’know; it’s quite a compliment when someone even says they like your band, never mind are influenced by it as well with their own music, but I know those bands are influenced by a slue of other music, some of which has influenced us as well. It’s great with music that it’s all about your interpretation and I think it’s a great thing if they’re influenced at all by our music. Obviously you don’t think about that when you’re making a record; you don’t say ‘OK guys, we’re gonna go down this route and see who follows’, because at the end of the day, none of us are reinventing the wheel - it’s hard to do something completely new. We’re just trying to write good songs and be a solid band who enjoys what we do and continue to do it as long as we can.
You used to live together, but it seems since the last record, you’ve all got married…
Yeah, and of course when everyone started getting married, we had to move out. But yeah, we used to live in quarters of the same house and as each person got married, we’d have to get a roommate or something, but then there was only one of us left, so it was like, ‘OK, let’s get a rental space or something to work from’.
I bet that person felt very pressured to get married, if they were the only one left - who was it?
Haha, Mackenzie, our drummer!
Did he get married?
No, he’s not married but he’s got a serious girlfriend, so he’s getting close!
You’re going back on the road again for this big tour, so what’s that going to be like, all back together again?
We’re looking forward to it; we’ve been excited about rehearsing the new songs and even the old songs and we just think it’ll be a really cool experience. We have a couple of guys that are going on tour with us, one playing the guitar and the other playing flute and some piano, so it just adds to the sound and the fullness of it, so I think it’ll be a really cool live show.
You’re doing just a few dates in January, then the rest in February and the Jan dates are in small venues for a band that’s used to selling out the major UK venues.
We just really wanted to start smaller and have a room that’s hopefully packed full of hardcore fans and we can show them these new songs and the live show too first, and then go from there. These cities, as well, are ones that we hadn’t been to before and might not be able to as easily as the year goes on, so we were like, ‘Let’s start now and get things rolling in that type of way’, and also maybe a smaller crowd will be more forgiving when we aren’t as warmed up yet!
Emma Roberts
Catch Midlake in the rare intimate setting of the Norwich Arts Centre on January 27th. For tickets, go to www.norwichartscentre.co.uk or
call 01603 660352.