Speaker 1: You know, there were lots of moments where we were like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, like we should not have messed with
Speaker 1: these people. Like we were trying to kind of prank
Speaker 1: people and like, oh, you think that we're baby shambles
Speaker 1: rock stars, so we're gonna like get wasted and act
Speaker 1: like that. And then it's like, oh, now it's on
Speaker 1: like a newspaper the next day.
Speaker 2: So we had to stop doing that pretty quickly.
Speaker 3: Hey how are you doing, Greg?
Speaker 4: I'm good, Thanks to you. How are you?
Speaker 3: I'm doing very well? Thank you. Hello to everyone listening.
Speaker 3: Thank you for downloading this episode of Midnight Chat's the
Speaker 3: late night interview podcast where Greg and I get to
Speaker 3: meet some of our favorite musicians every week. Tonight's guests
Speaker 3: on the show are two people who, Greg, you have
Speaker 3: a very deep and personal relationship with.
Speaker 4: I guess deep and personal or just met them a
Speaker 4: long time ago. Yeah, I'm being a bit facetious that.
Speaker 4: The reason I say that is because tonight's go is MGMT,
Speaker 4: the American duo MGMT, who I must admit, but I've
Speaker 4: never It's not that I've not been a fan of
Speaker 4: this band. I've just never really.
Speaker 3: Listened to them. If I'm totally honest. Other than the
Speaker 3: huge hits that everyone will know, Kids Time to Pretend,
Speaker 3: Electric Feel, beyond that, I am struggling a little bit.
Speaker 3: You were there from the beginning. You interviewed them when
Speaker 3: they came to London way back.
Speaker 4: I did. I interviewed them on one of their very
Speaker 4: first trips to the UK, when they were first playing
Speaker 4: shows over here two thousand and seven, and so it
Speaker 4: was nice to get to speak to them again and
Speaker 4: remind myself that that was a long time ago.
Speaker 3: What I really enjoyed when I listened to this was
Speaker 3: a few things actually, but ultimately MGMT were quite a
Speaker 3: party band back then, weren't they. They were known for
Speaker 3: enjoying the good things in life and some substances, shall
Speaker 3: we say. And I did get the feeling, Greg that
Speaker 3: a lot of the time they I didn't remember anything
Speaker 3: at all, And I think there were times when you
Speaker 3: were asking questions and I could hear them thinking, I
Speaker 3: don't know what.
Speaker 4: This guy's talking about. I actually thought their recall was
Speaker 4: pretty good, considering Yeah, I mean we're talking about an
Speaker 4: area here where MGMT we're releasing, like you say, Kids
Speaker 4: Electric Feel songs like Time to Pretend, which lots of
Speaker 4: people would have heard recently on the Saltburn soundtrack, and yeah,
Speaker 4: it was a huge time for them when they kind
Speaker 4: of emerged. They were suddenly supporting Paul McCartney in baseball
Speaker 4: stadiums and meeting arts hit monkeys, et cetera, et cetera,
Speaker 4: both of which they talk about in this podcast. And
Speaker 4: the reason we were talking to them is because they
Speaker 4: recently released their fifth album, Loss of Life, back in February,
Speaker 4: which is amazing. You said that you haven't listened to
Speaker 4: them too much of recent times. I think this is
Speaker 4: their best album and it's got two of my favorite
Speaker 4: MGMT songs, and it's got people in the streets and
Speaker 4: nothing changes, both of which I urge people to go
Speaker 4: and check out because I think they're amazing, and they
Speaker 4: do still have that sort of shy, introverted, mischievous, offbeat
Speaker 4: sense of humor where you're not actually quite sure whether
Speaker 4: what they're telling you is true or not, Like the
Speaker 4: story that Andrew tells in it about Adele singing him
Speaker 4: Happy Birthday, and we revisit some good stories through and
Speaker 4: I'm not sure if he knows if that was true.
Speaker 4: I know that's I think that goes back to your
Speaker 4: earlier point about how much they were taking in at
Speaker 4: that point before we get into this view and mindful
Speaker 4: that we need to do a quick TikTok update after
Speaker 4: we spoke about it on last week's King Gizzard introduction.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's not good, Greg, I think they might be
Speaker 3: going down.
Speaker 4: I didn't even realize that was a thing that could happen.
Speaker 3: Yeah, the TikTok's not going well, but it's still there.
Speaker 3: If you'd like to follow us, it's Midnight Chat's pod.
Speaker 3: Instagram's going better. There's some stuff on Instagram, and I'll
Speaker 3: tell you what is on Instagram actually has a picture
Speaker 3: of us from around the time you would have first
Speaker 3: interviewed MGMT two thousand and seven. That's something that I
Speaker 3: just happened to post a while but it is there
Speaker 3: in the grid. So if you want to see how
Speaker 3: Greg and I used to look. Greg looked a lot
Speaker 3: worse and I looked a lot better. That's what That's
Speaker 3: what we've come up with from that. That's all that's
Speaker 3: to us. Here is on episode one hundred and twenty
Speaker 3: six of Midnight Chats.
Speaker 4: Is it think it's.
Speaker 3: Greg Cochran talking to MGMT.
Speaker 4: Ben it was your birthday yesterday, wasn't it?
Speaker 2: It was?
Speaker 4: It was? It was that my internet research told me
Speaker 4: that I'm not like a kind of creepy talker, like
Speaker 4: how did you know?
Speaker 2: I know?
Speaker 4: How? Did did you have a good one happy birthday?
Speaker 5: Thank you? Yeah? I just turned forty one, which is.
Speaker 6: It feels like the most uneventful birthday in a way,
Speaker 6: which I really enjoy.
Speaker 4: Did you do something eventful for your fortieth? Did you? Like?
Speaker 4: Did you go big on that one?
Speaker 2: Did?
Speaker 6: Did a woodworking class yesterday, like an intro to woodworking,
Speaker 6: which was really fun.
Speaker 4: What did you make?
Speaker 6: I made a cutting board, so basically a block of wood,
Speaker 6: but but it's.
Speaker 5: It's cool.
Speaker 2: It was.
Speaker 6: It was really fun, like working on the big tools
Speaker 6: and learning how to like you know, perfectly square the
Speaker 6: corners and stuff like that.
Speaker 5: It was fun.
Speaker 4: Dare I ask Andrew do you do? Do you do
Speaker 4: presents to each other on each other's birthdays?
Speaker 2: We did for fortieth both of our last year.
Speaker 1: Well, I know, I forced our managers to like go
Speaker 1: in on this big present and I was really happy
Speaker 1: about that and it's great.
Speaker 2: Ben loves it.
Speaker 6: Yeah, it's really really nice chair like a click a
Speaker 6: very classy, classy kind of lounge chair that it looks
Speaker 6: like you should be like smoking a pipe sitting in
Speaker 6: it or something like that.
Speaker 4: That feels very that feels so adult. For like forty,
Speaker 4: Like I got a really nice chair. What did what
Speaker 4: did what did you get for your you forty? Andrew?
Speaker 4: Did you? What did you get for your fortieth?
Speaker 1: So for my fortieth, I was it was like a
Speaker 1: joint present with Ben and our managers and my wife
Speaker 1: and uh, they chipped in and got like a projector
Speaker 1: screen and projector for our house.
Speaker 2: So we have like a little home cinema setup. Now.
Speaker 4: Well, I'm super excited to speak to you both because
Speaker 4: we have met once before. And I was looking back
Speaker 4: at the dates and the run up to this, and
Speaker 4: it was November two thousand and seven, which, much to
Speaker 4: my horror, is like seventeen years ago. It was. It
Speaker 4: was backstage at a venue called Coco in London. We
Speaker 4: were young, and we were fresh, and and I think
Speaker 4: I feel like, Andrew, you might have been wearing like
Speaker 4: a cape on stage that night or something like that.
Speaker 4: Could that be possible.
Speaker 5: It's highly likely.
Speaker 2: It's very possible.
Speaker 1: Yeah, probably like a cape and like leggings must like
Speaker 1: kind of go to back.
Speaker 4: Then you were you were playing on a bill with
Speaker 4: some other bands, one of one of them my remember,
Speaker 4: which was the Courteenas, who were a British band who
Speaker 4: are still still going now. But yeah, what what were
Speaker 4: your what are your memories from those like first tours,
Speaker 4: those first like movements outside of the States.
Speaker 2: Is that sorry?
Speaker 1: Is that the that's not the venue that had like
Speaker 1: the like giant giant disco ball, is it?
Speaker 4: It is? It is? And it's like there's like a dome,
Speaker 4: so from outside it looks like an old theater and
Speaker 4: there's a big dome, and then inside there's, uh, there's
Speaker 4: like the floor and then maybe like three tiers where
Speaker 4: people would be watching the bands.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I remember. I'm pretty sure that we the like
Speaker 2: following Winter.
Speaker 1: We played there with when we were on tour with
Speaker 1: Florence in the Machine, and I think I remember the
Speaker 1: the backstage being this like very like little like narrow
Speaker 1: stairways up to like dressing rooms and stuff.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's exactly it.
Speaker 1: I don't remember too much about that time period though,
Speaker 1: so that's kind of impressive.
Speaker 5: Impressive that you don't remember that.
Speaker 2: I do remember that. I remember there's a disco.
Speaker 4: Yeah, you're please are the recollection on that? Well? What
Speaker 4: about you, Ben, What were your memories of sort of,
Speaker 4: you know, basically the band going abroad for the first time.
Speaker 4: Did it feel overwhelming? Did he take it in your stride?
Speaker 4: Was it just sort of like I mean, I remember
Speaker 4: you both being like fairly relaxed.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean, I think, well it was, I mean
Speaker 6: it was. It was a wild time for us because
Speaker 6: so many things were happening for the first time, and
Speaker 6: I think, I mean, we didn't have like the normal
Speaker 6: trajectory of having like been in a band for a
Speaker 6: long time, just like doing the whole like touring and
Speaker 6: everything before things really blew up, So it was like
Speaker 6: it was all happening in real time, just right in
Speaker 6: that moment. And and I I don't know if I
Speaker 6: think probably a lot of people who talk to us
Speaker 6: around that time didn't really like realize that or like
Speaker 6: fully realized that about us. So I I think, you know,
Speaker 6: probably a lot of the ways in which we came
Speaker 6: across as pretty strange in that at that point in
Speaker 6: time like could be attributed to that also just us
Speaker 6: being weird weird people in general.
Speaker 1: But yeah, when I think back on it, it seems
Speaker 1: like we both had this, uh, this kind of smug
Speaker 1: quality because we thought that it was all just going
Speaker 1: to totally vanish and that this was kind of just like,
Speaker 1: you know, there's no way this would actually last. It
Speaker 1: was it was so ridiculous, and suddenly we're in England
Speaker 1: having just been you know, touring in a van, and
Speaker 1: I don't know, it's just like it all felt like
Speaker 1: like a kind of surreal joke, and then you know,
Speaker 1: over the course of the next year, it quickly became
Speaker 1: less of a joke.
Speaker 2: Yeah, for better or for worse.
Speaker 4: And I just I always remember, like, speaking from the
Speaker 4: UK perspective, like lots of the music publications, we're trying
Speaker 4: to sort of box MGMT in describe what you were doing.
Speaker 4: So like at one time you were like you were
Speaker 4: you were indie, another time you were like new Rave,
Speaker 4: another time you were sort of like this new wave
Speaker 4: of like psychedelic pop music, and they were all you know, basically,
Speaker 4: you know, when music journalists are struggling to describe what
Speaker 4: an artist sounds like, when they reach for words like
Speaker 4: oddball or like oddball poples something like that, And did
Speaker 4: you find all that quite funny at the time as
Speaker 4: people were trying to sort of like characterize you and
Speaker 4: what you did.
Speaker 1: It was funny in the same sense that I was
Speaker 1: just saying, where it's like it's funny, like oh my god, Like,
Speaker 1: how are we in this situation now where the British
Speaker 1: you know, tabloid media is coming up with ideas and
Speaker 1: stories about us. So I think we had fun playing
Speaker 1: into their expectations and kind of like foiling them if
Speaker 1: we could, but then also quickly realized that we were
Speaker 1: like way overpowered like that we had we you know,
Speaker 1: there were lots of moments where we were like, oh
Speaker 1: my god, like we should not have messed with these people.
Speaker 1: Like we were trying to kind of prank people and like,
Speaker 1: oh you think that we're you know, baby shambles rock stars,
Speaker 1: so we're gonna like get wasted and act like that.
Speaker 1: And then it's like, oh, now it's on like a
Speaker 1: newspaper the next day, So we had to stop doing
Speaker 1: that pretty quickly.
Speaker 2: It just definitely in lots of ways it forced us to.
Speaker 1: Change our approach to music and what we were doing.
Speaker 2: Well.
Speaker 5: There was a lot going on.
Speaker 6: I mean, it did feel like in some ways there
Speaker 6: was like a combination of of like being sort of
Speaker 6: built up by journalists to be this like kind of
Speaker 6: this contrived like thing that like you know, either like
Speaker 6: fit into a box or fit into a scene or
Speaker 6: something like that, which is wild to us because I
Speaker 6: think we kind of we were just like doing what
Speaker 6: we were doing and didn't feel attached to a particular
Speaker 6: scene or something. And then and the other side of it, too,
Speaker 6: was it felt like, in some ways it felt like
Speaker 6: we were being built up just so that we could
Speaker 6: be taken down, you know. And I think, as you know,
Speaker 6: it happens with a lot of like movements in popular
Speaker 6: culture where it's like, you know, there's this thing that's huge,
Speaker 6: and then it's like, oh, that's really not cool anymore,
Speaker 6: and now this other thing is is the thing. And
Speaker 6: you know, I guess I'm grateful that after you know,
Speaker 6: however many years, that we're still here, and I think
Speaker 6: part of it is that we were able not to
Speaker 6: not take that stuff too seriously.
Speaker 1: It's like we were on little jet skis and we
Speaker 1: were like there's like this giant like tanker ship we
Speaker 1: were going around like.
Speaker 2: And then like they like they're like, oh yeah, like
Speaker 2: we were freaking huge tanker.
Speaker 1: And we were just like like, let's get out of here,
Speaker 1: and we just like then we hid.
Speaker 2: And went away.
Speaker 4: I'm sure it's just the same in the States, but
Speaker 4: the British press are particularly well known for that kind.
Speaker 2: Of Uh yeah.
Speaker 4: Backstab basically. I mean eighteen months after you played that
Speaker 4: Cocoa show, you were you were supporting Paul McCartney in Boston,
Speaker 4: Like it was a wild couple of years.
Speaker 1: He needed our support too, he wasn't doing that well.
Speaker 7: We really propped him up in a moment, although he
Speaker 7: was picking up MGMT in the press of that time,
Speaker 7: which you know, is always a sense that like, you know,
Speaker 7: you know you're doing something right when somebody like Paul
Speaker 7: McCartney is talking about you as like an artist that
Speaker 7: they love because they want to kind of be associated
Speaker 7: with the with.
Speaker 4: The latest thing.
Speaker 2: That's insanity.
Speaker 4: Yeah, those shows, what were what were they? Like, dude,
Speaker 4: what do you recall from that?
Speaker 2: It was?
Speaker 5: Well it was he said, so it was one show.
Speaker 6: It was it was at uh Fenway Park in Boston,
Speaker 6: and uh, I don't remember, like we we met Paul
Speaker 6: McCartney and and uh, I mean it was like this
Speaker 6: kind of like Paul will see you now, like this
Speaker 6: very like arranged like.
Speaker 4: But he was very yeah, yeah, yeah, it did feel
Speaker 4: it felt a little bit like like having like an
Speaker 4: audience with a with a king or something like that.
Speaker 6: But but also like he was very like in that moment,
Speaker 6: seemed very like genuinely present and uh you know, took
Speaker 6: took time away from whatever he was doing and like
Speaker 6: had like a very like warm, like nice handshake and
Speaker 6: and very sincere nine seconds. Yeah, but yeah, I remember
Speaker 6: there was really terrible Mannicotti in the catering because it
Speaker 6: was like all vegan.
Speaker 1: I think all of us catering is vegan, and I
Speaker 1: was just like, oh, man, like this sucks.
Speaker 2: I don't want to eat this. And I remember my family.
Speaker 1: My family was there, like my mom and I think
Speaker 1: my sister, and we were hanging out and it was
Speaker 1: just really fun. We were in the hotel where we
Speaker 1: were staying, and the Arctic monkeys were there, and we
Speaker 1: hung out and like we're like having oysters and drinks
Speaker 1: and my mom and Alex Turner were like really getting
Speaker 1: along well and it was just like so fun.
Speaker 4: Still in touch now, still chatting.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, they're still talking.
Speaker 4: I'm glad to hear that. You kind of had a
Speaker 4: very sort of like level not take it too seriously
Speaker 4: kind of mentality because you were at the Brits, you
Speaker 4: were heading to the Grammys. It was all of this
Speaker 4: like incredibly surreal stuff happening.
Speaker 6: Well, one distinct memory I have from around then was
Speaker 6: that there was some I guess it was like a
Speaker 6: party at the Beverly Hills Hotel and like on our way,
Speaker 6: like in a cab or something, and somebody like we're
Speaker 6: like just walking in and somebody This was like when
Speaker 6: Los Angeles was like a foreign concept to me, Like
Speaker 6: I live here now, it's a very like normal place
Speaker 6: to me.
Speaker 5: But when I was we were coming.
Speaker 6: Here on tour and whatever, it was always just like
Speaker 6: this is the most like cuckoo place in the world,
Speaker 6: Like what what even is this city?
Speaker 5: And we're walking in still to me.
Speaker 6: By the way, we were like walking into this swanky
Speaker 6: party and somebody's like talking about Ron Jeremy for some reason,
Speaker 6: like just his name comes up. You're like, just as
Speaker 6: we're walking into the building, Ron Jeremy is like lounging
Speaker 6: on the sofa in the middle of the lobby of
Speaker 6: the Beverly Hills Hotel and that at that moment, I
Speaker 6: feel like that kind of broke my brain.
Speaker 5: I was just like, what.
Speaker 2: Is was there? Yeah?
Speaker 1: And we went to a Grammy's after party for Columbia,
Speaker 1: our label, and uh, it was my birthday or like
Speaker 1: right around my birthday, Adele saying happy birthday to me.
Speaker 4: That's crazy, that is incredible.
Speaker 2: You can't make that shit up.
Speaker 4: You need to tell how did that come? Aback, She's
Speaker 4: just like on your table and.
Speaker 1: Yeah, she was in like our booth area. It's probably
Speaker 1: not as I'm doubt she's singing the whole song. But
Speaker 1: in my mind, after like seventy five years after the
Speaker 1: experience Adele saying happy birthday to me, maybe you could
Speaker 1: ask her one day if that actually happened.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I'm trying to think back as well. So if
Speaker 4: this is like twenty ten, is Adele like a global
Speaker 4: megastar at this point? I guess she probably is right.
Speaker 2: Not like Mega Mega. I don't think like right before.
Speaker 4: Still, though, that's that's a hell of a claim.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I know, let's hope it's true.
Speaker 4: All of this was happening around the release of the
Speaker 4: debut album Miracular Spectacular and last year you played that
Speaker 4: album in full of the Just Like Heaven festival in Pasadena.
Speaker 4: How how did that feel.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it was the first time we've done it, and.
Speaker 6: It was really cool because we kind of took it
Speaker 6: as this opportunity. I mean, especially like we hadn't played
Speaker 6: a live show at that point in years, and.
Speaker 4: Like it was.
Speaker 6: I don't know, I think we'd sort of in distancing
Speaker 6: ourselves from that the idea of the sort of like
Speaker 6: nostalgia festival, like revisiting you know, like like we didn't
Speaker 6: want it to feel like like, oh, we're reflecting on
Speaker 6: our dinosaur of a career that doesn't exist anymore or something,
Speaker 6: And but I think we took it as an opportunity
Speaker 6: to sort of have a sense of humor about that.
Speaker 6: And like we actually worked with a friend who who
Speaker 6: like writes for comedy and and sort of like we
Speaker 6: wrote little skits in the middle and and like I
Speaker 6: ended up having a really good time with it, and
Speaker 6: I think in some ways like reconnected with the spirit
Speaker 6: of the band when we started, like before things really
Speaker 6: blew up. And and we also had so we dug
Speaker 6: up all of our original demo recordings from Oracular Spectacular
Speaker 6: and we actually used a lot of them in the
Speaker 6: show where kind of like formed new tracks out of.
Speaker 5: Them and stuff like that.
Speaker 1: That was fun, like just even seeing the names that
Speaker 1: we would give to different tracks in a recording session.
Speaker 1: They would always you know these like really silly little
Speaker 1: inside jokes back then, and it's sort of like a
Speaker 1: time capsule to open it up.
Speaker 4: One off thing, you'd be tended to do it again.
Speaker 4: Or was it just like it was fun, just has
Speaker 4: something to do and you move on.
Speaker 5: I don't know.
Speaker 6: I mean, we we put a lot of work into
Speaker 6: that show, like kind of an unreasonable amount of work
Speaker 6: where I think like maybe a you know, like a
Speaker 6: more possibly more sensible person would have just been like
Speaker 6: take the check and just like just do and but
Speaker 6: we were like, oh, look, they give us like a
Speaker 6: good budget to put on this show, and we just
Speaker 6: like put a ton of time and effort into the
Speaker 6: production and they did like dress rehearsals and stuff like that,
Speaker 6: and then it's like it was so much work, like
Speaker 6: so much work, and then and then it was just
Speaker 6: done and like and now we're you know, working on
Speaker 6: releasing a new album, so we've kind of been putting
Speaker 6: more energy into that and haven't really visited the idea
Speaker 6: of doing that a regularly spectacular thing again, but it
Speaker 6: would be cool.
Speaker 5: It would be a cool thing to do.
Speaker 2: I'd love to do it again.
Speaker 4: You should do it. It's like a Broadway residency or less
Speaker 4: Vegas Reency.
Speaker 6: We have slightly tongue in cheek approached that subject. I
Speaker 6: mean it be it'ud be incredible, but I don't know.
Speaker 2: I think it'd be awesome. Yeah, I really was getting
Speaker 2: into this sort of.
Speaker 1: That different style of rehearsing and where it's like a
Speaker 1: production and there's like set changes and costume changes and
Speaker 1: scene changes and like lines and all this stuff.
Speaker 2: Like I didn't I never was much in the theater.
Speaker 2: I did never did.
Speaker 1: Like I was like a little boy and Bye by
Speaker 1: Berdie when I was. But but I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: this is nice.
Speaker 2: I like this whole kind of communal group production thing.
Speaker 4: It's nice one hundred percent some of the best stuff
Speaker 4: I've ever seen. Like I saw David Byrne play like
Speaker 4: five years ago. The name of the tours escape me now,
Speaker 4: but it was basically that sort of like highly choreographed
Speaker 4: kind of like three sides of a box kind of
Speaker 4: stage set, like everything moving between all the live players.
Speaker 4: Even the drummers were like wearing their instruments and so
Speaker 4: they were moving around the stage and the whole thing
Speaker 4: had like a narrative, and I was like, this just
Speaker 4: some imaginative like there's there's a lot of values, just
Speaker 4: stuff being like let's just try something completely different. I mean,
Speaker 4: it's David Byrne, and obviously he knows what he's doing,
Speaker 4: but I love that creativity.
Speaker 2: I think.
Speaker 5: Also there's something too about.
Speaker 6: I think when I see like a band performing live now,
Speaker 6: there's like there's such an element of like artifice to
Speaker 6: it where it's it's like it's it is a production,
Speaker 6: and you know, I mean I feel like almost every
Speaker 6: band you see now is playing with backing tracks, which
Speaker 6: is like nothing against that. It's just like the way
Speaker 6: that things are the way that people, you know, people
Speaker 6: expect things to sound like the record on stage or
Speaker 6: something like that.
Speaker 5: But then at that point it's like.
Speaker 6: There's something dishonest about assuming like, oh, everything you see
Speaker 6: is happening live and and like it's this real thing,
Speaker 6: and like why is that any more real than just
Speaker 6: like a straight up stage production with you know, like
Speaker 6: I don't know, to me, it's like more interesting to
Speaker 6: just lean into the stage production side of it and
Speaker 6: just like put on a show like that's that's cool.
Speaker 4: We'll watch this space. I'm excited for that to happen.
Speaker 4: I want to bring things kind of more up to date,
Speaker 4: or at least the last few years, because I want
Speaker 4: to ask you about the reception to the song Little
Speaker 4: Dark Age, which obviously went viral during this sort of
Speaker 4: COVID nineteen pandemic. It was like a massive It was
Speaker 4: massive on TikTok. It was like a massive TikTok meme,
Speaker 4: wasn't it. And I read a stat this morning that
Speaker 4: basically it's soundtracked something like five million different videos of
Speaker 4: that people have made themselves. And I just wanted to
Speaker 4: know what that feels like when you make a song
Speaker 4: and he just put it out there in the universe
Speaker 4: and then it just takes on this completely its own life. Basically.
Speaker 6: It was very humbling in a way. I mean, just
Speaker 6: to be like you, no, it's completely beyond our control
Speaker 6: and you know. And it was a while after we'd
Speaker 6: released that music too, so it wasn't like part of
Speaker 6: the album campaign or anything like that, Like it just happened.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but also I think I've I think I felt
Speaker 1: a little bit like validated or like, like, you know,
Speaker 1: that was our first single and it was the title
Speaker 1: track from our last album, and we always felt like
Speaker 1: it was a strong, catchy song that like could connect
Speaker 1: with people, and it seemed like, you know, it went
Speaker 1: well when we released it, but the label wasn't really
Speaker 1: pushing it or like, it's like, not as many people
Speaker 1: believed in it the way we did. And then in
Speaker 1: two and a half or whatever years later, it kind
Speaker 1: of caught on and connected with tons of people, and
Speaker 1: it was it was kind of fun to just experience that,
Speaker 1: and it was totally unexpected and shocking.
Speaker 4: Yeah, is there anything? I mean, there's no way you'd
Speaker 4: have been able to keep track of all of the
Speaker 4: ways it's been used, But there any Had you seen
Speaker 4: anything that like particularly stuck in your mind where you're like, wow,
Speaker 4: it's being used like this. Oh.
Speaker 1: I mean, there's lots of along with the fun TikTok trends.
Speaker 1: I'm not neither of us is on and TikTok or
Speaker 1: really social media that much, but I am aware that
Speaker 1: there was like one of the kind of lines that
Speaker 1: took that song and ran with it was this weird
Speaker 1: like online kind of like isn't it like sort of
Speaker 1: like proud boy like war nostalgia and like some weird,
Speaker 1: like I don't know, neo fascist thing happened with this song.
Speaker 1: And it was particularly with I think the like slowed
Speaker 1: down version or something so like that was happening. But
Speaker 1: alongside these like really like kind of interesting vibrant TikTok
Speaker 1: trends like the I think the first one was like
Speaker 1: where people were posing like classical sculptures with the song,
Speaker 1: and I was like, Oh, this is cool like that
Speaker 1: that's I wouldn't have thought that would happen, you know,
Speaker 1: I don't know. It's just like we're just observing all
Speaker 1: of these things and also just very happy that.
Speaker 2: We've you know, our relationship with.
Speaker 1: The song kids has been it's very complex, and we've
Speaker 1: made that song when we were nineteen, I think, and
Speaker 1: there's been times where we've been trying to just like
Speaker 1: get away from it and just hoping, hoping against hope
Speaker 1: that something could come and like take the attention away
Speaker 1: from it. And this little Dark Age kind of did that,
Speaker 1: so we were a little bit relieved.
Speaker 4: I don't suppose have we played that many shows since it,
Speaker 4: like since that happened, because it'd be interested to know,
Speaker 4: like there's suddenly a massive song, so like that, where
Speaker 4: does it sit in the kind of MGMT like set
Speaker 4: list now? Is it just like it's one of the
Speaker 4: it's one of the big ones, right.
Speaker 6: We haven't played any I mean outside of the Just
Speaker 6: Like Heaven festival.
Speaker 5: We have not played a single show since.
Speaker 2: And we didn't play Little Dark Age at that festival.
Speaker 6: So yeah, and we actually we thought about playing it,
Speaker 6: and we were kind of wondering, like how that, like
Speaker 6: what that would be like to play live, because yeah,
Speaker 6: the last time that we performed at live as in
Speaker 6: twenty nineteen.
Speaker 4: So you don't really know what to expect for the
Speaker 4: next time you head out on the road, if you
Speaker 4: head down the road.
Speaker 5: No, not at all.
Speaker 4: Yeah, speaking of kind of like the surreal nature of
Speaker 4: the Internet. I love whenever I'm feeling whenever I need
Speaker 4: to reach for some like uninhibited joy. I always looked
Speaker 4: at the clip of Kid Couldie dancing on stage with
Speaker 4: you to Electric Feearl at Coachella like six years ago.
Speaker 4: It's just I mean, obviously he kind of owned the thing.
Speaker 1: It was actually almost ten years ago, was it really Okay, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm pretty sure it was twenty fourteen.
Speaker 4: Okay, time is getting away from all of us. Yeah,
Speaker 4: I just I love that clip. It's just it's just
Speaker 4: somebody who is just enjoying themselves to the absolute max.
Speaker 5: It's true. He really he seemed very happy.
Speaker 2: He was enjoying it way more than we were too.
Speaker 4: Like I was going to say, how were you feeling
Speaker 4: when you saw him doing that?
Speaker 5: Well, it wasn't.
Speaker 1: I would enjoy doing that, but like in terms of
Speaker 1: like playing on stage at Coachella, it's just like it's
Speaker 1: a little bit anxiety inducing I think to be on
Speaker 1: like one of those main stages.
Speaker 2: And so that was nice.
Speaker 1: It was like somebody's coming out to like take the
Speaker 1: spotlight off of us for a second.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah, Well, obviously want to ask you about a loss
Speaker 4: of life and like everything that's happening for you in
Speaker 4: twenty twenty four with the new album Bubblegum Dog is
Speaker 4: one of my favorite music videos for ages because it
Speaker 4: obviously it pays homage to like a whole bunch of
Speaker 4: classic rock videos from like the nineties, And I went
Speaker 4: to ask you about the research stage for that video
Speaker 4: because we did, like you obviously settled on a bunch
Speaker 4: of different videos that you wanted to kind of include,
Speaker 4: you know, Smashily, Pumpkins, Sound Garden, Pearl Jam, et cetera.
Speaker 4: But what what when you were thinking of the idea
Speaker 4: is like revisiting your presumably it coming from like your
Speaker 4: you're growing up with MTV. You would like come home
Speaker 4: from like college whatever throw on mtvared those music videos.
Speaker 4: So what what was that the long list? And how
Speaker 4: did you? Was that quite fun just thinking back to like, ah, yeah,
Speaker 4: that was a video that I saw a hundred times
Speaker 4: when I was sixteen.
Speaker 6: Yeah, well, there was like we had some some really
Speaker 6: hilarious conference calls, like we're like talking with our friend
Speaker 6: Tom Sharplink, who also helped out with the Just Like
Speaker 6: Heaven festival and who directed the video along with Julia Vickerman,
Speaker 6: and and we were I remember being on the phone
Speaker 6: with Tom and like just bringing up all of these
Speaker 6: videos and it was like he was like very like
Speaker 6: paying very close attention to all of the references like
Speaker 6: things that we were just kind of saying off the
Speaker 6: cuff just on the on the phone, and I think
Speaker 6: it was just like everything was very literally referenced in there,
Speaker 6: like he made sure that it was like all everything
Speaker 6: we talked about was in there.
Speaker 5: It was a long list.
Speaker 1: Compiling the list of like tropes from alternative and grunge
Speaker 1: videos in the nineties was so fun.
Speaker 2: I mean, like like.
Speaker 1: The like maniacally laughing old man in like in a
Speaker 1: Fish Islands, and then the oversaturated colors, the like small
Speaker 1: child in this like you know, the stretch lands small
Speaker 1: Child and dripping dirty dripping sink like random basketball rolling
Speaker 1: along like there's just we try to just like check
Speaker 1: them all off. And it was so fun. That was
Speaker 1: the most fun I've ever had making a video.
Speaker 4: It was such a throwback as well, because it was
Speaker 4: literally it reminded me of like getting home for school
Speaker 4: sending on MTV and then later on it'd be like
Speaker 4: MTV two. And I'm mean, to be honest, I'm glad
Speaker 4: that like the sort of stuff of your era, it's
Speaker 4: like still has that loads of credibility because like I
Speaker 4: was thinking, like, oh, what do I think of first
Speaker 4: when I think of like throwing on MTV two, And
Speaker 4: I was like Papa Roach videos, Limp Biscuit videos, alien
Speaker 4: Ant Farm, and was like that was like three years
Speaker 4: later and like you hit two thousand, like nineteen ninety nine,
Speaker 4: two thousand, and like everything changed, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 6: It's funny to me also to think about like people
Speaker 6: who are who see that video who are not around
Speaker 6: when that stuff was on MTV and just like sort
Speaker 6: of like what is this, Like what is this artifact?
Speaker 7: Yeah?
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's the Yeah, so yeah, I've done well. Like
Speaker 4: it's a it's a it's a brilliantly. Uh. I was
Speaker 4: gonna say it's subtle, because it's not subtle, but it's
Speaker 4: just like it's just like the perfect homage. Something else.
Speaker 4: I want to ask you about the new album with
Speaker 4: When people buy the album, they can buy a bundle
Speaker 4: that includes a plushy toy that's designed from Anthony Ozgang
Speaker 4: who You've worked with Anthony previously on like artworks for
Speaker 4: albums and things like that. Is that right?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 6: He did that album cover for Congratulations and we've known
Speaker 6: him for a long time.
Speaker 4: What is a plushy toy to anybody who has no idea?
Speaker 4: And what does it look like? Because I was looking
Speaker 4: at the website thinking, wow, this is this. I've never
Speaker 4: seen a band bundle together this and like the new
Speaker 4: vinyl edition of their albums like Tell Me More.
Speaker 1: Basically, well, I mean it's sort of also another nod
Speaker 1: to something that was not like a direct part. I
Speaker 1: didn't collect them or anything, but like when I was
Speaker 1: growing up, there was an era of the Beanie Baby
Speaker 1: and they're these little stuffed plushy bears, and they became
Speaker 1: like like they would like they started like culture wars,
Speaker 1: and some of them were like selling for you know,
Speaker 1: like twenty thousand dollars and all of this crazy stuff.
Speaker 1: And so that's just like embedded in my my hit
Speaker 1: my head as something that is just totally normal. And
Speaker 1: so we made a plushy for a little dark age.
Speaker 1: We made like the kind of the one out of
Speaker 1: the guy from the cover of the drawing, and then
Speaker 1: I just was thinking, like it'd be some fun to
Speaker 1: do like a series, you know, and have them be collectible.
Speaker 1: So this is gonna be a collectible bubblegum dog one
Speaker 1: that is.
Speaker 2: Sort of this.
Speaker 1: Surreal, deconstructed children's teddy bear dog thing.
Speaker 4: That's gonna say that has faces on both paws.
Speaker 6: Yeah, well, I'm we're it does, but it's really it's
Speaker 6: really cute, though.
Speaker 1: We're kind of ripping off this Teddy Bear that was
Speaker 1: designed by Philip Stark in the nineties that has that
Speaker 1: it's like a bear, but then like one appendage is
Speaker 1: like a different animal, and yeah, we're kind of just
Speaker 1: ripping it off. But it's really it's really fun. It's
Speaker 1: not like that's like a big thing that people know.
Speaker 4: No exactly and it's like, you're right, it's it's it's
Speaker 4: it's scary cute. It's like cute until you realize you're, like,
Speaker 4: there's something else to play here. Yeah, and Loss of Life, like,
Speaker 4: I absolutely love it. Christine and the Queens joins you
Speaker 4: on the album on a track called Dancing in Babylon.
Speaker 4: How did you get to do Did you get to
Speaker 4: do that together? And where did that collaboration come from?
Speaker 2: We didn't. We didn't record it together in the same place.
Speaker 1: But when we were working on the album and that
Speaker 1: song was taking shape, it got to a point where
Speaker 1: it went from being this kind of skip along, lighthearted
Speaker 1: nineties sort of thing, loosely about a young couple called
Speaker 1: Catherine and Bobby, and then it sort of just kept
Speaker 1: changing and evolving in the music. Eventually, the bed of
Speaker 1: music kind of took on this eighties ballad feeling and
Speaker 1: then really started feeling like this is going to be
Speaker 1: a duet, like a call, you know, Colin response kind
Speaker 1: of thing. And at that point when we were like
Speaker 1: in the world of eighties ballad duet Christine and the Queen's,
Speaker 1: his voice was like something we both thought of pretty quickly.
Speaker 1: There had been opportunities over the years where we both
Speaker 1: wanted to collaborate and it never really worked out the
Speaker 1: timing why so this was like the time to do it,
Speaker 1: and he was really into it. And while the music
Speaker 1: I think is a lot different from what he's been releasing, it,
Speaker 1: it sort of shares a similar sentiment and kind of
Speaker 1: theme on how on the importance of love? I think
Speaker 1: so Yeah, it kind of just came together pretty pretty nicely.
Speaker 4: It's a beautiful track, my my other favorites on the
Speaker 4: album People on the Streets, and nothing changes. It's just amazing.
Speaker 4: I wanted to ask a bit about because I'm aware
Speaker 4: we're coming towards the end of our time together today.
Speaker 4: You're more than like twenty years in at this point
Speaker 4: in MGMT, how do you feel like you know everything
Speaker 4: about each other at this point, like creatively and just randomly, I.
Speaker 6: Mean, in some ways, yes, because I mean we're basically
Speaker 6: like siblings at this point. Are like, you know, we've
Speaker 6: like grown up together in a lot of ways, but
Speaker 6: we've also been living on separate coasts for a while,
Speaker 6: and I think we've both like I would like to
Speaker 6: say that we've both chilled out as people in the
Speaker 6: last the last few years, I think, I think, especially
Speaker 6: like the pandemic years, I think we've kind of like
Speaker 6: really focused more on just like domestic life and like
Speaker 6: the simpler things and kind of getting back to basics
Speaker 6: a little bit. So it's been nice to, like especially
Speaker 6: it's been nice to like approach making music together again,
Speaker 6: just from that perspective of, like, you know, getting rid
Speaker 6: of a lot of the extra crap.
Speaker 5: And just just kind of getting back to our roots
Speaker 5: a little bit.
Speaker 4: Yeah. Yeah, And what about you, Andrew? What surprises you
Speaker 4: about Ben? Still? Is it like, what's what's what's the
Speaker 4: what's the best most unpopular opinion that Ben has about
Speaker 4: like a band or a film or something that you're
Speaker 4: just like, how do you not love that? Or why
Speaker 4: do you think that's good?
Speaker 2: Oh?
Speaker 1: I don't know, it's hard to say something specific like that,
Speaker 1: but I think since we've been we've known each other
Speaker 1: and we've been friends and collaborating for half of our lives.
Speaker 2: It's it's surprising and.
Speaker 1: Like heartening and kind of incredible to me that we
Speaker 1: come together and really like we've been doing the same
Speaker 1: thing since we were twenty, where every time we work
Speaker 1: together is is like a little mini epic journey where
Speaker 1: we both are rediscovering each other, learning how to kind
Speaker 1: of work together and like compromise but also hold strong,
Speaker 1: do our gut feelings, and and then that kind of
Speaker 1: all morphs into what this next MGMT sound and experiment
Speaker 1: is going to be. And I think the fact that
Speaker 1: we're never trying to recreate and are somewhat consciously trying
Speaker 1: not to like do the same thing again, it keeps
Speaker 1: it so that our relationship can stay fresh and we're
Speaker 1: still learning about each other every time. And I'm just
Speaker 1: happy that, you know, we haven't tried one of these
Speaker 1: experiments out and come away being like, you know, screw
Speaker 1: that guy, like he's really an asshole now now it know,
Speaker 1: it's like we're kind of like, you know, we like
Speaker 1: we both learn every time, which is really great.
Speaker 4: And last question was your plans for twenty twenty four
Speaker 4: apart from obviously released in this new album. Are you
Speaker 4: going to do some shows? And if you do, we're
Speaker 4: going to bring the giant cowbo with you. What are
Speaker 4: your plans?
Speaker 2: We don't really know.
Speaker 6: I mean, I think one thing that we have told
Speaker 6: ourselves for a very long time is that what we
Speaker 6: would love to do is finish an album and just
Speaker 6: start working on the next one right away. And I
Speaker 6: don't know what it takes to make that happen, or
Speaker 6: if that will happen. I know that, you know, there's
Speaker 6: a certain amount of like promo and whatever that inevitably
Speaker 6: happens when you put out an album, But I really
Speaker 6: would like to keep I feel like we're in a
Speaker 6: very good creative space right now and I would love
Speaker 6: to keep that going.
Speaker 4: Well. Listen, thank you to both of you for coming
Speaker 4: on the podcast. Let's not leave it another seventeen years
Speaker 4: to speak. And yeah, it's been great hearing about everything
Speaker 4: in the new album and I can't wait for people
Speaker 4: to hear it.
Speaker 2: All right, Thank you, Thank you very much.
Speaker 5: Nice talking to you, Good to see you again.
Speaker 4: Midnight Chats is a joint production between Loud and Quiet
Speaker 4: and Atomized Studios for iHeartRadio. It's hosted by Stuart Stubbs
Speaker 4: and Greg Cochrane, mixed and mastered by Flow Lines and
Speaker 4: edited by Stuart Stubbs. Find us on Instagram and TikTok
Speaker 4: to watch clips from our recordings and much much more.
Speaker 4: We are Midnight Chats Pod.
Speaker 3: For more information, visit loudan quiet dot com