STACK #126 Apr 2016

MUSIC

NEWS

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M ichael Angelakos (right) is the heart and soul of Passion Pit. After the euphoric eruption that was 2012's Gossamer, Angelakos is wearing a slightly more reflective hat for new album Kindred, although the pop-rush and electro sophistication associated with Passion Pit remain in spades. "These are honest songs about real people, real scenarios that happen," he tells STACK . "But I take on a certain role and I distance myself through Passion Pit. This isn't necessarily 'Michael Angelakos singing' – it’s Michael Angelakos singing through a filter." After Angelakos's well-documented ups and downs, audiences have tended to take every word literally. It's not lost on the singer. "The title, ' Kindred ', is not necessarily honest, literally speaking. People are like, ‘So, this record’s about your wife?' I'm like'NO!' You just give up. I wish I could just write a record about my wife." Another great example of life and metaphor colliding resides in the album track My Brother Taught Me to Swim. Angelakos's younger male PAssion pit are kindred spirits!

Sitting down with POkey lafarge

Q1/ Your music is a timeless brand of rootsy Americana; why does this style continue to connect with audiences? It's always been alive: it's never died. It's music that got its birth, and it's evolution, via the

sibling didn't literally help him out of floaties, but the song is about him. "He came back into my life recently. He’s given me such amazing perspective and he’s helped me through really hard issues," Angelakos says. "It’s an amazing thing when you connect with a sibling later on in life when you’ve been distant." But music remains the great healer: "There's no better way to deal with the anguish we all deal with... Listening to a record, blaring on headphones in your car, or at a show, singing lyrics with everyone."

underground – it's never been 'popular music.' The Grand Ole Opry has always been a 'thing' but only a small percentage of artists make it to the Grand Ole Opry. But blues, jazz – very few genres had an outlet like Grand Ole Opry. It's always been music of the people, created by the people and preserved by the people. Q2/ What is intrinsically American about your music that even Americans don’t understand? Some Americans take culture for granted. Music, architecture – things that people through blood, sweat and tears worked to create and preserve. The slang sometimes people don’t understand: they might understand the word I’m saying, but not the context. It’s a huge part of the music. A lot of people don’t understand that the influence of the Germans, in America and in Mexico, was a huge. A lot of the early brass band culture comes from Germany and that influenced the early parts of jazz. Q3/ Preservation Hall is seen in the New Orleans episode of Foo Fighters' Sonic Highways series. It’s tiny, there’s no PA, it’s just a room. Have you played in there? Oh yeah! I have. That’s the great thing about early music. People’s ears must have been totally different. Go back to rock’n’roll in the ’50s: you have 1000 screaming fans, there’s one PA speaker about them, the bass isn’t miked, the drums aren’t miked, the only thing that’s miked is Chuck Berry or Elvis’s voice, and the guitar is just blaring. Go back before that : they were having dances with 3000 people with bands that weren’t even miked. Preservation Hall was like that, but it only fits 50 people! You don’t need a PA, you don’t need electricity. But, for every Preservation Hall, there are 100 other places people don't know. Q4/ Tell me about the video for Something in the Water, with the girl chasing you up the street with a baseball bat. We were trying to have fun, trying to accentuate the absurdity of the conflict that often arises in a relationship. No matter how tough things are, people still love each other. That's my partner in the clip; she's the one I wrote the song about.

Kindred by Passion Pit is out April 17 on Sony Music.

God help kanye west!

K anye West has dubbed his upcoming album So Help Me God. Having dropped several singles online – including his surprise collaborations with ex-Beatle Paul McCartney (the recent single Only One) – the release of his seventh album is imminent. West, of course, hasn't been adverse to publicity lately; from gatecrashing Beck's Grammy party to various Kardashian-related media hijinks, he's hardly been invisible. But next to the strides his music has made with the acclaimed My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy and Yeezus, the rapper/producer's personal eccentricities hardly seem important. West also performed the track Wolves alongside Sia and Mensa on Saturday Night Live ’s recent 40th anniversary special, and his performance of All Day – complete with pyrotechnics and a stage-filling

phalanx of highly choreographed dancers – was the talking point of the evening. West will also headline Glastonbury 2015, a performance to which he will no doubt bring his trademark controversy.

cribbing away for the sisters

O nly three brothers from Yorkshire on a shoestring budget get away with filming a clip in The Bahamas, with a pig, in 2015. But The Cribs – Gary, Ryan and Ross Jarman – did just that for single Burning for No One. "It seemed surreal; it seems extravagant but it was really basic," says Gary, speaking to STACK from Portland, Oregon. "I’m not confident on camera, but hanging out with pigs it’s impossible to take yourself too seriously!" Their new album For All My Sisters was produced by Cars luminary

Ric Ocasek: "You’re like, 'I had no idea they wrote that song! My Best Friend’s Girl!' I like what Ric represents: it’s a great pop song, but he comes at it from a very left field, weird viewpoint." The cover of the new album is a screenprinted pop-art collage by the

For All My Sisters by The Cribs is out on Sony Music.

band's friend Nick Scott, and The Cribs are looking forward to seeing it on vinyl: "It looks really tactile. It'll look great on 12-inch, definite."

Something in the Water by Pokey LaFarge is out now via Universal. He tours April 8-12.

APRIL 2015 JB Hi-Fi www.jbhifi.com.au

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