Midlake - On The Courage of Others
Featuring: Midlake
Written by: Tim Clare
Published: Jan 20th '10
With a complex, dark new record in waiting, WB sits down with Eric Pulido from Midlake to discuss following up Van Occupanther and how the band’s new approach influenced The Courage of Others.
WB: How difficult was it to follow up The Trials of Occupanther?
M: Any pressure that was there was just pressure that we had put on ourselves. It wasn't necessarily to compare with Van Occupanther, it was just to make a great record, a better record. We were still the band that just played a year and a half of touring Van Occupanther, so of course that is going to be what we know the most. Not that that's a bad thing, but because the influences changed some, and our desire was to grow and mature, we just weren't in the place that it was right to make another record that sounded like Van Occupanther.
A long story short, the British folk influences started to creep in even during the time at the end of Van Occupanther and we started recording and it just wasn't right. A lot of the songs that we were trying to record were taking forever to get right and we didn't know what was wrong, we just knew that we were missing it. But during that time we were playing together more and we were getting more and more immersed into that influence and we finally hit a stride of sorts when Tim wrote some new songs. This became something that we thought was right for this album.
What specific British folk influences were they?
Bands like Pentangle, Steeleye Span, Fairport Convention, Amazing Blondle, Incredible String Band - a lot of those bands were in constant rotation, just finding things. Also a lot of those bands did side things, like Pentangle and John Renbourn and Burt Jansch, and all the beautiful voices of those singers like Sandy Denny or Jaqui McShee or Maddy Prior. There was this ton of music that was all new to us.
Just listening to it all the time, no matter what type of art you're in, whatever you're taking in; in some ways inherently it's going to come out. We knew that we weren't making the same record as them, and we didn't want to try to emulate, but yet interpret those influences in a voice of our own in a way and still be Midlake.
How did you get turned on to these acts?
I personally don't think it is a huge far stretch as much as it may seem from the last record, although it was more of the American folk, west-coast thing that was influencing Van Occupanther. We were listening to stuff like Jethro Tull, which does touch upon that British folk scene, and I personally thought that that was a kind of a gateway. I think it was Tim, we'd all do the record browsing and stuff and you'd find records that look cool, and I think it was that which began it, I think he found a Steeleye Span record that he thought looked cool and it was a gateway further into other things and you find this other music. He was also into this blog called Time has Told Me and it would have a bunch of discontinued music and certain themes, and it takes you down a trail of all sorts of music and it was a sort of continual thing after that.
You said that the initial songs that Tim came up with, which were heavily influenced by the British folk scene, weren't quite right. Where there other influences on the songs that ended up on record?
The songs he had written before and some of those are on the record, we had to work and rework because your instinct has you playing it like we were when we first started working on it. One of the songs 'Children of the Ground', that was a song that we were playing live and that was very Fleetwood Mac oriented, which is not a bad thing by any means, because I love Fleetwood Mac and I think we all do. But when we started making the record and trying to do that song, the influences were changing.
We wanted it to be a complete album from front to back of where we are now. At any time an album is only where you are right now, who knows where we'll go next, this is just where we were right now. That song 'Courage of Others' was a song that was written a long while back and it was going to be a B-Side on Van Occupanther and we just thought ‘Man, that's too good a song, let's save it for the next record’, not knowing that the influences were going to change some. So again that song got worked and re-worked to be right.
Speaking of the folk influences, do you think it's possible to make an album per year like they did in the ‘60s or would there be too much filler?
I want to listen to an album from front to back. I don't want to listen to track three and then throw the album away. I don't necessarily think an artist sets out to do that, but making a record can be tiring, it can be exhausting, it can be draining and I can understand how you might feel like ‘OK, we've got these three songs and let's just go through the rest of them and just put them strategically in place’, that can happen as well but that would never happen with us.
I think we're just too anal about things. We want an album that from front-to-back is a whole piece. I think this album works better like that, like you said it's not an album of singles, so if that's the case I would say that Beck's Seachange, you could just listen to that album from front-to-back. There's not really a single, but it's just got a feeling that I would want people to feel with this record.
There's been a lot said about the industry changing, but has it changed how you have done this album?
In some ways more so in the promotion of it. The way that you make it, I understand how that can sometimes be a manufactured thing. I think we continually try and try being more organic and breaking it down to ‘let's put up some mics, let's play the songs together and let's really get this feeling right’ and not just being this contrived, manufactured thing, even though you're recording it digitally, there is still a sense that it's a modern thing.
On the PR side, yeah. You're trying to get your music out there with an industry that is all over the map, you're not going to get some song on Top 40 radio necessarily, you're not always just shooting for this MTV video, I don't even know how one does that. It's just something that whatever you do with an album or a shirt that you make or a video or a B-Side, we just try to do the best that we can do and make it true to whatever the imagery or vibe is of the band and hope that those things are picked up and that people appreciate and know more about the band.
For an independent type band that might not be able to solidify some of the more mainstream type things, you're just trying to get your music out there in any way possible and of course there's the internet and satellite radio. All those things help the band.
It sounds like the band was very conscious of Van Occupanther when making the follow up.
You can get yourself in a difficult position if you’re just trying to figure out what people want and to do that every time because no matter what you do, some people are going to like it and some people won't. Granted the style, well that's a subjective thing, one person could say that they like the first record more than any record we've done, and another might prefer this. So at the end of the day all you can do is just try to do what's honest and true and hope that people get it.
We generally aren't trying to say "We're going to do what we want, we don't care what you think". No, that's not the case, we do care what people think, we want them to like it. But, we don't want to do what is not true to yourself and then people don't like it and you're like "What! I don't like it either". It's something we love and are moved by this sound or that style and this is where we are now, and if someone would rather hear the old album, well then come to the show because we'll still play 'Roscoe', 'Head Home' and 'Young Bride'.
On that point, this album doesn't have an immediate song like 'Roscoe' or 'Head Home'.
Because of the overall style and feeling of the album, it doesn't have those same types of tunes that you would think that were more of a toe tapper. It's got a darker, more melancholy, heavier type of emotion feel to it. There's a place for that in music as well, and I can obviously cite music that moves me, but I wouldn't necessarily hear it on the top 40 of dance songs, but that's OK. There's a place for that and that's where we were on this album. Not to say that it's a downer because of that, I can see the difference, and to me it makes sense as a progression of where we are. For one, all the songs are in a minor key, so automatically it carries a darker feel, whereas the last one did have a bit more of a brighter sense to some of the songs.
Lyrically the album seems to be dealing with man's place in the world - with nature, other people and powers. Is this accurate?
Tim is the lyricist so I couldn't go too deep on that stuff, but he's always had a pastoral type of commonality with the albums. I think one of the biggest differences in this album for him is that it's more of a first person viewpoint whereas other albums had a character like Van Occupanther.
So I think it's more honest in that way, which I do appreciate, but I think there are some bigger themes, or heaviness in songs like 'Acts of Man' or 'Core of Nature', where you can sense lyrically and musically that it's heavier. It's not necessarily as sunny or bright as the previous record, but some of those lyrics do have a dark sentiment to them. I think on this one, the music and the lyrics go a little more hand-in-hand in that sense.
If it was a little more personal for Tim, is it hard as a band to come at that?
Even though there's been a character in the past records, I know Tim well enough that even when he's discrete or quiet about reasoning or meanings behind things, I have a decent idea of where he's coming from. And in some ways, it's a very common sentiment that others would feel as well, this desire to escape, this desire to start over or a dissatisfaction with man or yourself – all these themes that humankind feels. It's not a large stretch for anybody to relate to that.
What's next for the band, short and long term?
We're about to set out on a month long tour of Europe and we'll be there when the album releases in early February and we'll just be playing throughout the year. We're going to try to be more on top of recording and writing the album so that we can be a little quicker this time around.
I'm going to start working on some solo things that I'm excited about, and we're just glad to be doing it all again and just want to be out there and put the album out there and tour again and have fun and enjoy the time together. We've gotten a bit older now and we've got wives and some of us have kids and it's a thing where you want to enjoy what you do and keep doing it and when you come home spend time with your family and have a good time and just keep doing this thing because it is a joy and it is a pleasure and a gift to be able to do this as a living.
What's one thing that no one in the world knows about your band right now?
People might not know that we added a couple of guys to the live show. We have another guitar player and a flautist/piano player that is going to be out with us, obviously with the new sound being more guitar oriented and the keyboards going away. We'll have a couple of new guys, new faces on the stage with us on top of us five, so it should be a cool, stronger live thing.
Who are they and where are they from?
They're all from Denton, Texas where we are. The piano/flute player's name is Jesse Chandler and the guitarist is Max Townsley.
Are they just friends of yours?
Yeah, Jesse's been a long time friend and musician, he moved to Denton last year with his wife and we've known him and played with him and he's toured with bands that we're with and so it made sense for him to take on the flute stuff namely because Tim plays flute on the record and he couldn't do that live because he's singing obviously.
The other guy is just a young guy that's been here and we knew that we wanted some help in the electric guitar department and he's just a phenomenal person and musician. It just fit right and he actually played a little bit on the record as well, so it's just been a great process of getting more people and making it a bigger and better show and I hope that those guys work with us in the future.
Any plans to come to Australia in the short term?
I've heard that we're going to do Splendour in the Grass in June or July and try to mix in some shows while we're over there.
