News Mix #005: NZCA/LINES

NZCA/LINES has seemed to have come out of nowhere, even to the most astute tastemakers with their ears to the Soundcloud. Just a couple of months back, Michael Lovett - the man and mind behind the electronic pop project - was opening for Halls, still with only a handful of shows to his website’s Events page. However impressive he was, even those who rushed to convert their gushing applause into 140 characters wouldn’t have guessed that within mere weeks the svelte singer in front of them would have an full-length album out and have lapped up over 30k views for his lead video.

But such bonafide electro-pop smashers such as ‘Okinawa Channels’ and ‘Compass Points’ has pushed Lovett right to the fore of forward-thinking, intelligently pondered and slickly-produced dance music. To get a better sense of where all this pop sensibility comes from, we asked NZCA/LINES to make us a mixtape while we had a little chat with the man himself.

You’ve been kind enough to assemble an exclusive mix for us, care to explain your some of your choices? Do you think they sum you up as an artist and offer a good introduction to all things NZCA/LINES?
I’ve tried to cover a range of influences, ranging from true garage, like The Tuss, to DMX Krew’s favourite Minnie Riperton track. I had to include something from The Beach Boys’ incredible post-Pet Sounds record ‘Surf’s Up’, but also felt compelled to include a track from Shabazz Palaces’ amazing debut. Hopefully there’s something for everyone. And I had to dedicate it to all the teachers who thought I’d never amount to nothing. Actually, that’s a lie – I’m a swot, a middle class square. It was all a dream.

Your name, we can only assume it alludes to the crop circles in Peru rather than, say, the tracks of Nascar racing. What first inspired you by these ancient geoglyphic designs and how does this link to your music?
I was painfully torn between writing a record called ‘N.A.S.C.A.R. Lions’, or going for one entitled ‘Nazca Lines’. The first would be a folk concept album about a plucky American racing team headed by Chuck ‘The Claw’ Clarysage, whilst the second would form a sexual pop record inspired by Peruvian geoglyphs. The geoglyphs won out. However, they are not the primary focus for this record. They inspire the song ‘Nazca’, and generally the idea seemed to fit well the project, so I decided to name it likewise. The equally mysterious disappearance of its ‘a’ was a functional move, as it helps you search for NZCA/LINES on the internet. But it also looks better. TWOBIRDS/ONESTONE.

There seems to be a geographic motif to not only your name but a lot of your song titles too - ‘Compass Points’, ‘AM Travel Interlude’, ‘Moonlit Car Chase’ - could you expand a bit on this?
Indeed. It’s a concept record about ‘New Magnetic North’, a narrative idea that another set of magnetic poles exist, which are constantly moving. Each track on the record forms a little snapshot of this larger ‘film’. In that sense they’re approached by traditional means, involving love, lust, danger, and anger amongst other personal emotions, and they’re from the perspective of characters. Trying to explain the whole concept in lyrics would have been utterly rubbish. So, I don’t expect people to really get this from the songs alone, unfortunately. ‘Compass Points’ is about a guy and his female counterpart alone in an aership trying to find NMN, whilst AM Travel Interlude forms a prelude to the song Nazca – you’re flying over unknown terrain, all your navigation systems shut down and tuning through the airwaves you stumble upon this unsettling, unearthly singing. The song Nazca itself is about a pilot who falls in love with his ship, and wants to kill all the other crew so he can be alone with it. But, he realizes that without the crew, he would crash and destroy them all. ‘Moonlit Car Chase’ is about a couple who make a pact to be cryogenically frozen but the woman chickens out – the man hunts down this now much older love interest across a desert landscape, decades later.

There also appears an element of escapism to your lyrics. ‘Okinawa Channels’ opens with the portrayal of 9-5 city life, while the bridge of ‘Nazca’ pleads for you to be transported away. Would you agree with this?
Partially. The record is more concerned with injecting science-fiction ideas into everyday life, and vice-versa. The idea of New Magnetic North is that a ‘place’ exists in relation to the shifting poles, not in relationship to literal physical terrain. This means that everyday locations become imbued with a magical quality, if your compass points that way. Similarly, Okinawa Channels is about the supernatural, technically advanced communications of a city infecting the lives of an civilised island community nearby. Everyone’s going about their daily lives, but then this weird signal starts streaming across their houses. Like in 2001, where David Bowman encounters alien beings that are sufficiently advanced to be completely bewildering in communication and appearance.

Would you regard being a musician and able to tour and travel on the back of your music is a sort of escapism in itself?
I’ve not been on any huge tours, but I do know that when you’re travelling around, playing the same music every night, the way you initially viewed the music becomes separate from the act of playing it. I think the biggest escapism in music for me is when actually making it; that’s when you’re in a fantasy world. When I’m playing live I’m generally just hoping that people aren’t bored. But yes, to be able to live purely from making music would indeed be escapist, and brilliant. Unfortunately I’m not in that position at the moment. I think lots of musicians aren’t.

What were you doing in your life when you started to write this record? How long had you been working on the album?
I’ve been making music since my teens, and have always oscillated between electronic, computer based approaches and the desire to write concise pop-songs in a 4-piece band format. I dropped out of art school in Edinburgh to play bass for Your Twenties, and follow this dream of the guitar pop band. During this time I worked delivering sandwiches, in a record shop and in a cinema, whilst getting to do fun stuff like playing at the ICA. After a couple of years of this, I moved into a house in Clapton where Charlie Alex March lived, who’d played with YTs briefly. After a couple of months, over brunch, we decided to re-record a demo of mine using his studio setup. It seemed to work pretty well, and we gradually began developing a sound, through working on existing demos I had and through writing more by myself. So it took around a year and a half, although the actual time me and Charlie spent together is probably about two weeks.

Even though you have a few others involved, NZCA/LINES is still perceived as a solo venture. Would you regard yourself as someone with a firm artistic vision?
I’ve always been borderline fascist about my musical wants. This was often in an unreasonable manner, and since I’ve met Charlie, who is even more of a musical dictator than myself, I’ve realized that I should mellow out. But yes, I want to make music that is very clear and focused, with no compromise, no ‘fat’ left on. However, although my ambition was to work solo, I’ve realized that having someone to bounce off can also be good. Although, with Charlie producing it can result in a borderline fistfight, as we’re both incredibly stubborn. Rest assured, nothing on this record is arbitrary – most of it has been fought for, one way or another.

You’ve only recently started to play a flurry of gigs, how have these first shows been? How was the jump from the original production to the reproduction of these tracks in a live setting?
The main ambition for the live show was to bring some energy and excitement to these songs, rather than just playing them electronically. That’s why I’ve got Leo playing live drums and Ady playing electric bass, to give it something fresh. It’s been an interesting transition, and I’m also very keen for live shows to be a visual spectacle, hence the use of synchronized projections. Up until now the aim was to represent the sound of the album as best we could live, to give the best possible impression of the music, but I’d like to take things further. It’s inspiring seeing people like Toro Y Moi or Caribou approach their music in a very different way live. To properly play the NZCA/LINES record we’d need about three keyboardists, two drummers and myself, so we’re a bit of a way off yet. But we’ll get there.

Your album comes out next month, how would you say it continues or differs from what we’ve already heard from you so far?
I think the Timbaland influence is much less than people might expect. Vocally, the album was influenced by commercial R n B, but instrumentally it has more in common with artists such as DMX Krew, Ovuca and Bochum Welt. I’d hope it sounds quite French, too. We’ve put out the more concise tracks as singles (obviously), but tracks such as ‘Work’ and ‘Moonlit Car Chase’ have come into their own when played live, so I hope people will enjoy those, maybe listen to them on the bus home, thinking of loved ones …

Are there any unheard tracks that stick in your mind as being ones that will inspire listeners the most when they come to hear the record? Could you tell us a bit about said tracks?
I think a neglected track from the album is going to be ‘Patrol Late Back’, and I hope people manage to hear it (legally). It’s the most genuinely melancholic track on the record, and is the perfect soundtrack to seeing our third moon rise beneath the Western spiral arm of the galaxy.

What can we expect from NZCA/LINES now the album is out?
We’re going to be playing at KOKO with Of Montreal on April 25th, which is ridiculously exciting for a number of different reasons. I can pinpoint particular moments of my life to go with most of their records, for a start. We’re playing with them in France too, and will be doing several other European dates around it. You’ll see us at summer festivals, and hopefully on tour with another excellent (secret) band. Obviously what happens next musically is an exciting prospect, but first we shall do this record justice. Anyway: see you in the charts!

NZCA/LINES’ self-titled debut album is out now via Loaf.