Midlake evoke a bygone era of stoic chivalry, witch trials and a dependence on the land. It could be 1960, it could be 1850, it could be 1500 – any period of time it seems, but modern day Texas. In reality they’re neither minstrels nor cultists but a group of musicians from Denton, Texas who formed in 2000. Their debut EP, 2001’s “Milkmaid Grand Arm”, attracted the attention of Simon Raymonde, bassist for the Cocteau Twins and owner of Bella Union record label in the U.K. It was through their association with Raymonde that the band met skater and actor Jason Lee who would go on to direct their first music video in 2004. Midlake drummer, McKenzie Smith, recently talked to Pedestrian TV about dark times, Jason Lee and how gold curtains and brown couches help the songwriting process.
Hey, how are you?
I’m doing very well thanks. I’m just at home getting ready to go to Europe tomorrow.
Do you look forward to touring or is that something that you dread?
No I love touring! And all of us in the band love touring, Tim’s not really a huge fan of touring but everyone else really enjoys it. We’re looking forward to getting out there and playing our new songs.
So are you anxious or excited to play your new songs to the European crowds?
Yeah, absolutely. We really love playing in Europe and it’s nice to know a lot of the shows in the UK are sold out already. You get a really good welcome over there and it’s like people really want to see you there so you feel kind of confident and you feel good about what you’re doing so it’s kind of exciting to go over there and play. You hope to deliver to the fans what they came to hear and hopefully its not a waste of their money (laughs).
Is there any place around Europe or around the world that you’re really popular which you didn’t really expect?
Well we went to Australia a few years ago and I didn’t know we’d have really great shows over there when we went but they were awesome. I wouldn’t say that we were really popular but we didn’t expect it to be as good as it was. It was nice to go to a place so far from home but still see people singing your songs. Its nice to meet people who know who your band is and know your record and stuff that’s pretty cool.
That’s good to hear. I’m calling you from Australia actually.
Yeah that was one of the best and most crazy times of my life! We had a really good time in Australia, we really can’t wait till we go back. But yeah when we flew into Australia, we flew into Byron Bay and it was December and in Texas it was really cold, snowing or close to it and winter time and we were transported into this luxurious paradise in Byron Bay. It was incredible. The whole trip was really special actually. It was a really, really fun trip.
Great, well I’m glad you enjoyed Australia. What do you see as the main difference between The Trials of Van Occupanther and The Courage of Others? What changed in the studio or in the song writing process from your last album?
I think the major difference was how we recorded. We recorded a lot more live together as a band and we tracked as many instruments at the same time as we could. Even if the instruments wouldn’t stay on the final take we would play together anyway, it’s just to get the feel of the song down. Like we’ll start with recording heavy bass and drums and we would still play with as many people at the same time as we could, so that we could get more of a live feeling to the record. ?Also the musical influences on the two albums were very different. So naturally Tim’s song writing seemed to have a different feel on both records. So I guess those are the main two differences. And also the new album took twice as long to record and that was a difficult thing to go through.
What do you attribute that to? The extra time it took to record this time around.
Well coming off from touring, we went straight into the studio and we were excited to get going but at the same time we didn’t know what we were doing. And Tim had written the songs and we tried working on them but they just weren’t really happening. They weren’t coming together and then Tim had kind of stumbled upon one of the bands in the British folk era, Steeleye Span, and it was like a light bulb went on and then he stumbled onto more of those bands from that era like Fairport Convention, Incredible String Band and Amazing Blondel. ?So instantly Tim thought “this is where our inspiration should come from” and he made a playlist for the band to listen to and get into the sound and the thing is it didn’t just happen overnight. You can’t drastically change your performance on anything in life in just one day, one week or one month. It took a lot of time for us to really work at it. And a year went by and we were recording, and though nothing we were recording was really working out we were getting better, we were learning and we definitely figured out what not to do for the first year. ??We basically recorded enough music to say well this is not the album we’re going to do (laughs) but that’s good. So we tried a bunch of things and none of them were working and then we finally got the first track of the album, Acts of Man, Tim brought that in and we all loved it, and within a few days that song was complete. That was great because it gave us some wind in our sails, which was much needed because we were very deflated at that point, we were very upset and frustrated that we hadn’t got anything. And it was good, it was like we found our direction for the album now so lets keep going and if we got one we can get another. So the next thing you know we spent another year recording, which at that point made sense because that’s how long we spent on our first 2 albums.
So was it hard to bounce back after that initial year? You mentioned that morale was really low before Tim brought that track in and it all gelled together. Could you see the light at the end of the tunnel?
Well it was definitely a small light but it was a light. It kept us going. and we were like “okay well we got one so lets work on another one now” and then another one came together and we were like “oh my gosh at this rate we’ll actually have an album done in like five years” (laughs). But yeah it was hard, it definitely wasn’t easy but no one wanted to give up and we had about 3 or 4 songs that were sounding very good and it was like even though its been frustrating and its been a long time, do you just quit now? Well that doesn’t make any sense.
As hard as it is you just gotta keep looking forward and we did and now we all feel good and we’ve got this new sound and 2 new members that we’ve added. Now everyone is playing to their strengths, we’ve rearranged some people in the band and Eric Nichelson, he used to play all the keyboards live with us is now back on guitar which was his original instrument and Eric Pulido is playing a lot of the acoustic guitar, a little bit of electric and a lot of background vocals. And then when the new guy is back, Max Townsley, is doing most of the electric stuff and some background vocals and then the other new guy Jesse is playing all the piano and keyboard parts and is playing flute live, and Tim is also playing flute live now.
Obviously there’s nothing like a band’s relationships, which has friendships, creative relationships and egos and also professional relationships, all rolled into this crazy mess. How did you guys keep it light when you were all frustrated at each other and the time you wasted? How did you keep the unit cohesive?
Well yeah that’s a tricky thing for sure. It wasn’t always light, that’s just a fact. There were arguments and its part of life. There was some turbulence there and its definitely not as easy as you would like it to be but we’ve also been in this for so long that we know even if its bad, somehow if we keep doing it, it’ll turn back around. We would do things like have bbq’s with the band, even after a terrible week if one person says “hey this weekend lets have people over, and grill some food and get some beer” all of a sudden everyone would go back to just hanging out and it would ease the pressure and give you enough momentum to go back into the studio the next week and start working again.
Do you guys have a specific atmosphere or place in mind when you sit down to write your albums?
Yeah Tim has always enjoyed that. The stuff that I have seen all the imagery, that’s what inspired the album cover, and our last album cover. Those kind of images do come from a place and Tim does love the Renaissance and the Medieval feel of things and definitely yearns for a life with less cell phones and facebook and more nature, campfires and things like that (laughs). He has a lot of classic literature that he is inspired by and reads a lot of poetry that he usually uses before he writes his own lyrics, he uses other peoples poems or certain phrases from books, he uses their words first and ends up replacing them with his own.
So to help transform that mood do you guys change the space physically in the studio like do you have props to help lock into that mood or is it just all in the music and all in your heads?
No, usually we have music playing. Almost every time we’re not recording something there’s something playing. We’ll go back and put something else on to kind of keep the influences coming, and keep the creativity there to get inspiration from outside sources. Our studio’s definitely been outfitted to kind of be aesthetic. Like it’s got gold curtains in there and drapes on the wall and a lot of browns. We got brown carpets and brown couches and we have this really neat brown and gold wall paper. It kind of looks like Tim’s house (laughs) with that vibe, and the music and we usually burn incense in there too.
And finally, how did you guys meet Jason Lee who is a really vocal supporter of the band. He’s also a personal hero of mine because I used to watch his skate videos when I was younger.
Oh he would love that, he always appreciates people knowing his skateboarding past. But Jason is a huge Cocteau Twins fan and Simon Raymonde who owns our label in London and I guess several years ago, Jason had found out that Simon from the Cocteau Twins had his own record label and I guess Jason was poking around on the internet and contacted him and sent him a email and just said “I’m a huge fan I love what you’ve done” so Simon and Jason struck up a friendship and through that Simon would start sending him records of bands he was releasing on his label, and several years ago he sent Jason our first record in 2004, and he just really loved it. Because of that he really got behind the band and came to Texas and filmed a video for us and then I guess from then on we became friends with him. We’ve become really good friends over the years.
And he’s also come down a few times this year to film a short film about the record and it’ll be released as a box set that’s coming out with our album. Its going to have a little booklet with a bunch of photos and it’s going to have a CD, its going to have a double gatefold vinyl and it’s going to have the film that Jason filmed for the record as well. So he’s still supporting us and being part of the band, it’s just been really cool. We even used music from our first record on his skateboard film of his skateboard company “Stereo Skateboards”. We’re part of the soundtrack to their skate movies called ‘Way Out East’, it was pretty fun.
Was that hard to have a camera thrust in your face during the recording process? Or was Jason pretty much invisible because he’s such a great friend of the band?
It was just for a few days at a time where he would be popping in the studio, filming some footage and we kind of made time for that. We all knew we weren’t really going to get any work down while we were in the studio, while Jason was in town. So we would just rehearse. well they were working on some stuff just a little bit but it wasn’t as focused as when he wasn’t around. It’s hard to focus and work in the same way that you do when you are being filmed but he got enough footage to be included in the film.
And then he came down again one time when we were having a huge crayfish boil and he filmed all that and got everybody’s wives and girlfriends with dogs and kids running around and he thought a lot of that was just cool and then he came down again towards the end of the album and filmed around Denton and got the whole vibe in it. I’ve seen the whole film now it’s really beautiful, I really like it.
Well thanks so much for your time Mckenzie, I hope you have a lot of fun in Europe and also come down to Australia again sometime this year
Yeah absolutely, we’re looking for it. Thanks man, take care.
