Cover Feature The Maccabees: Into The Wild

The pitfalls of the third album are often understated. Whilst we’re consistently led to believe that we’re only meant to point and laugh at a band’s dismal sophomore offering, and should they survive that humiliation it’s smooth sailing ahead, in truth it’s often easier to coast through that with the leftovers from the blistering debut. If being forced to actually sit down and be creatively productive only occurs again for the third outing, it’s then that the cracks actually begin to show. The Strokes’ debut, ‘This Is It’, managed to be both a commercial and critical success, earning them the kind of plaudits that ‘Room On Fire’ was never really expected to live up to. But third album ‘First Impressions Of Earth’ found the NYC boys faced with a critical mauling for the first time in their career, consigning it to petrol station bargain bins at the speed of sound. We probably shouldn’t really mention ‘Humbug’, right? After releasing two genuinely brilliant albums, the Arctic Monkeys’ third offering was met with a fairly universal sigh of disappointment. And when Oasis invited us to ‘Be Here Now’, the obvious response appeared to be a dismissive ‘no thanks, I’m washing my hair’.

Which isn’t to say that it’s impossible to release an outstanding third; ‘OK Computer’ completely changed our perceptions of Radiohead, whilst ‘Parklife’ catapulted Blur from being indie near misses to an arena sized proposition. It’s just that, whilst popular theories label the second album ‘difficult’, the third could easily be considered the real ‘challenge’. So it’s with some trepidation that we settle down, in a dressing room filled with Maccabees, to listen to a selection of tracks from their own third album, ‘Given To The Wild’, painfully aware that our every facial expression and toe tap is carefully being scrutinised.

It’s a difficult record to predict, given that there was such a leap in both style and tone between the Maccabees’ debut long player, ‘Colour It In’ and their second effort, ‘Wall Of Arms’. The implication seemed to be that of a band manoeuvring themselves from being ostensibly run-of-the-mill indie, to a far grander, darker, meatier sound. First impressions of this album, laden with brooding guitars, ferocious drumming and epic melodies, suggest that the Maccabees have been busy pushing the boundaries still further. And whilst circumnavigating the band’s genre leaping career thus far might be considered a daunting enough task alone, to add to my current predicament, guitarist Hugo White appears to be testing reactions to a specific track, ‘Heave’, which he informs me is dividing the band as to its inclusion on the album. It’s hard to know what to say, in truth it’s quite gorgeous, filled with heart wrenching strings that exemplifies how far the band have travelled in the last six years. But it’s easy to sound sarcastic too sincere and coming across like some kind of sycophant.

After proffering gentle reassurance that it’s a beautiful track, this seems a prudent point to address the issue of their re-invention, and any concerns that those fans of the Maccabees circa ‘Colour It In’ might feel a little alienated by this new record. “I can’t even remember what we were like when we made that first record though,” guitarist Felix counters, “I feel like, with those people who came on board back then, that saw something in us, I always thought that they could already see the progression of it. Getting beyond that, it’s almost… not rewarding exactly…” He tails off, seemingly frustrated at his inability to vocalise his argument. “We’re proving to the people that had faith in us that we’re worthy of it?”, his younger brother Hugo offers. “Yeah,” Felix agrees, “It’s like, we’re proving something to the people that slagged us off on the basis of the first album, for those people that saw something in the band.”

So, any notions of a band with a point to prove seem validated. It’s understandable though, as when the Maccabees first emerged in 2005, the musical landscape was awash with similar sounding bands with very little to say. Rallying against those preconceptions is no easy task, even whilst second album ‘Wall of Arms’ showed glimmers of the grandiose nature of ‘Given To The Wild’, Arcade Fire’s producer Markus Dravs appeared, through no fault of his own, to walk off with the majority of the credit, affording doubters an opportunity to accuse the band of simply jumping on a different bandwagon.

“We were kind of conscious of that”, Felix affirms, “Throughout that record, Markus was intent that it didn’t sound like Arcade Fire, that it represents something different. We chose Markus primarily because we liked him, and he was a good referee.” Frontman Orlando, who up to this point has been an enigmatic figure lurking in the corner, uncomfortably playing with a teaspoon, quietly contradicts Felix a little, “We did choose him because he’d worked with Arcade Fire, though.” Whilst Felix does nod agreement, he seems keener to set the record straight, “But it’s not like we phoned him up and said “Can you make us sound like Arcade Fire, please?” and he went “Yeah, I know exactly how to do that!”, that’s not how it worked.”

However, for the third album, the band appear to have made a particularly leftfield choice when it comes to co-production duties. Tim Goldsworthy is best known as part owner of DFA Records, with previous production credits including Massive Attack, UNKLE and of course, LCD Soundsystem, but despite his presence, the Maccabees have not spewed forth a glaringly electronic record. It definitely seems like a less than obvious choice, but perhaps that’s the point.

“We’d done a lot of the production ourselves, so we understood how we wanted it to go, rather than just turn up and record it” Felix affirms. “We already knew how we wanted it to build up, and that sort of thing. We just felt like we needed somebody who had a bit more nous, with a specific ability to make things three dimensional. And Tim turned up and loved the songs, and I think he saw that this was our best record, and it doesn’t just sound like another indie band going ‘blah blah blah’.”

For that to be the case, this record must find the Maccabees’ moving away from their usual lyrically oblique style, with something very definite to say, which seems to be a fair assessment. Within their little unit, things are changing, people are growing up, and ‘Given To The Wild’ appears to be their opportunity to document the shift in their lives. “This morning, one of our good friends had a baby, and that sort of thing wasn’t happening when we made the last record,” Orlando confirms, “There’s been so many births, and that makes you start thinking about things in a different way, the shift in responsibilities, that tipping point, the age that we’re at. And I’ve felt it very acutely, I guess. You’re so happy for people, but at the same time, you’re so agog at the thing that they’ve just taken on. And it makes you start thinking about those things, concerning your own family and your own really close friends. So that’s the thread of the record. And with that comes all the anxieties of what that means for me, and for us…”

It’s all getting a bit serious, and so we shift the conversation on to the location chosen to record the album, the illustrious Rockfield Studios. With a rich history of previous occupants, including The Stone Roses, Iggy Pop, Manic Street Preachers and (umm) Gay Dad, it must have been quite a domicile for the summer? The mention of the place seems to light up the room. “Oh yeah”, Hugo beams, “In one of the rooms, there’s the piano that Freddie Mercury played ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ on!”

“It was important for us to go somewhere that’s not super slick. We never feel very comfortable in those sorts of places, because we’re a little ramshackle band. Somewhere old and full of character,” Orlando enthuses, before Felix interjects, “It’s an amazing place, and that type of studio is kind of disappearing because people are recording more and more in their own spaces. So it was good to go somewhere with history.” History, and as they inform us in an attempt to challenge for the position as the least rock and roll band in history; lots of kittens. “They were really scared of people so you had to go back every day to see if you could get a little nearer…”. Hugo becomes incredibly animated as he discusses worming his way into the affections of those cute little bundles of fur, “They let me go in the barn!” “They did warm to you,” Orlando teases him, “Kittens, they like your face!”

And so, if there was any underlying discomfort lingering at my presence in the dressing room, it’s almost certainly now dissipated. Orlando has even ceased fiddling with his spoon. It seems only right then that I ruin the jovial atmosphere by querying a quote where Felix asserted that this record has been inspired by the Stone Roses, David Bowie and Kate Bush. It seems prudent to point out that those artists sound nothing like either each other nor, from what we’ve heard of it, the new record. He looks a little bashful, before clarifying his comment. “The point that I was making, was that ‘Low’, ‘Hounds Of Love’, and the first Stone Roses records, they all have a very identifiable sound to them, they have a kind of freedom, and you believe in those records quite quickly.

There’s just something about them, you could live inside them forever. Once we’d got some songs together, we were just trying to work out how it could have its own identity, be this thing that exists on its own, like all those records do.”

So does this mean that this is the Maccabees’ shot at a Classic Album? “It’s definitely an ambitious album,” Felix asserts, before adding that their entire approach has changed, “With the last record, while we were writing it, we’d look to play a few songs to people, just sort of gauge it. And with this one we didn’t do that, we just ploughed through and concentrated on it, but with enough of a view to how it would translate.” And it seems a point they all agree on, as Orlando concurs, “The big difference with the writing of this one, is that it’s written much more from a production aesthetic, not thinking as a guitar player. So you’re writing an overall piece of music, rather than Sam playing the drums, me playing guitar…” Felix interrupts his train of thought, “It’s been a different way of making music.”

Animatedly, he continues, “This time around it feels like we’re ready to go out and play live again, without being too fidgety about it, because we’ve got a record and a piece of music that we feel deserves a stint at it, and we can play it without thinking, ‘oh we can do better, or we should just stop this and start again and make a different record’. So I think this time, touch wood, should be the most enjoyable.”

But does such an obsession with detail explain the long gap between albums, after all, it’s been over two years since ‘Wall of Arms’? “It’s a long process,” he confirms, “It can get pretty clinical, so it takes a long time to make not very much music. But it’s an incredibly rewarding thing when it happens.” Orlando seizes the opportunity to interrupt, “That’s the best bit of the whole thing, that really tiny moment when you think, oh god, this might actually be alright, and it’s so fleeting because five minutes later someone else says they don’t like that bassline and you have to change it, but just for that minute, that twenty seconds or so, where you’re making something from scratch, it’s unbelievable…”

The attention to detail appears to have stretched beyond the recording process too; the Maccabees are well known for their attempts to capture the odd traditions of our fair nation for prosperity, with their video for ‘Can You Give It’ having featured the Gloucestershire sport of Cheese-Rolling. Apparently, it’s a theme that they’re keen to continue, sticking to this ideal with the artwork for ‘Given To The Wild’. “Am I allowed to say?” enquires Orlando of his band-mates, and after getting the affirmative continues, “We’ve got Andy Goldsworthy on board, who’s a sculptor we’ve persuaded to let us use his work.” Now if, like me, you’ve no idea who that is, he’s apparently best known for using his bare hands and teeth to create artworks out of flowers, icicles, mud, pinecones, snow, and stones. “There’s so many cool eccentricities about Britain, that it seems only right to try document them. And also, it looks awesome.”

Before we’re ejected from the Maccabees’ dressing room, we quickly enquire if there’s to be another Christmas single, akin to last year’s ‘Walking In The Air’ offering. “It

was a nice thing to do, we should do something like that again. But it has to be odd enough. If we ever do covers, it’s always got to be something a bit ‘boom boom pow’, it’s got to be something so different that it can’t be judged. We’ll have to think of something so far removed. Any suggestions?”. This is my moment to put forward ‘Simply Having A Wonderful Christmastime’, with the implication that it’s about time they put the Macca back into the Maccabees. Felix shoots my dreams down with a quick fire retort, “You can’t out McCartney McCartney!”

It might have been an ambitious suggestion, but since that is the new buzzword for the Maccabees, it was worth a try. After all, it appears they’re foregoing ‘Third Album Syndrome’ and opting instead to climb the next rung of the ladder, moving away from venues the size of tonight’s gig in Coventry, and instead glancing, shyly, at the possibility of arena tours. And indeed, why not? Tonight, they literally rock the Kasbah with five new tracks, including the deliciously epic ‘Ayla’ and the furious ‘Feel To Follow’, both of which are implausibly greeted like old friends by the audience. So let’s be straight, if you disregarded the Maccabees completely, wrote them off as a throwaway band singing about minty fresh kisses, ‘Given To The Wild’ seems like the perfect opportunity for a reappraisal. And you know what, if you still don’t like it, fine, but in the words of the band themselves, if you’ve got no kind words to say, then you should say nothing more.

The Maccabees’ new album ‘Given To The Wild’ will be released on 9th January via Fiction.

Taken from the Winter 2011 issue of DIY, available now. For more details click here.