News MT: ‘You Can’t Be Hung Up On All The Bad Things’

Huddled round a rain-sodden table in a West London pub, the four members of MT don’t look like strangers, exactly, but pick all four of them out in a crowd and you wouldn’t instinctively place them amongst one another. MT aka Michael Tomlinson is bright-eyed and smiling, while Gabi Woo sits over her pot of tea like it’s a vital remedy to a long day. Macks Faulkron and Frederik Tyson-Brown meanwhile are both impeccably smart, one leather-draped, the other sporting an impressive tache. ‘We’re all very different,’ states Gabi. Which might be why, as a four-piece, they work so well together.

Four months before we speak, MT draw the biggest crowd out of all four of Neu’s ‘Hello 2013’ shows at London’s Old Blue Last. Sure, it’s doubtless something of an industry get together. But beyond the folded arms and cursory glimpses there are some genuine fans here. All covered in flowers. A friend of the band - a florist - arrived at the show with 100 red tulips, ‘a complete surprise’, remarks Michael. It lent the show a sense of occasion, almost like the group with mid-stadium tour, the O2 Arena squeezed into one relatively minuscule, arm-raising extravaganza.

The live show in January struck me how, as a band, you brought light and happiness into a dark dingy venue. Not many bands can pull that off.
MT: I think - not for all bands, but when it comes to our band you just wanna go to gigs and have fun and have a party. That’s what we feel playing a gig should be like. For us, lugging your stuff up the stairs, setting it up and getting back at 4 o’clock in the morning - there are elements of gigging that aren’t fun, so the gig itself has to be.
Macks: It wouldn’t be worth it otherwise.

Is it a genuine enjoyment?
Macks: If it was a big conscious effort it would come across as try-hard.
MT: It’s authentic.

It was almost like you were playing in a huge arena or stadium - do you imagine that when you’re performing?
MT: I think - I mean we played a lot at Koko, and when we can get onto a bigger stage the sound has more space to breathe.
Macks: We’d pretty much play anywhere. House parties. At the ‘Mesmerist’ show in Brighton everything went wrong, but it was still one of the best songs we’ve ever played. The crowd were left and right!
MT: They did that out of their own free will! We were on this tiny stage so I thought it’d be a good move to get the crowd to separate, get a bit of a dance-pit.
Gabi: And then in dot-to-dot in Nottingham we played in a bar. So no matter where it is people just want to be part of it. They just wanna be happy and dancing.

Is that something that you bring to the songwriting, genuine positive songwriting. A lyric runs: “All this obsession with darkness, well it won’t get you anywhere.”
MT: Life is just about balance. I wouldn’t say that we’re only up. I certainly wouldn’t say we’re only down. Some of the lyrics to the songs - not many songs are out - the lyrics could have a totally different meaning if you took the music away. Often a song is coming out of a need to deal with something, and transform how you feel about it. Like a catharsis. I think in general one can’t be…You can’t be hung up on all the bad things, it’s not a very good way to be. The songwriting is reflected from a holistic attitude. That song you quoted is asking the question ‘don’t you wanna be happy?’ And everyone wants to be happy. When you’re dealing with something that’s pretty heavy, this writing process changes it. Something that might wreck your day can become uplifting.

Where does it stem from - is it happy experiences or is it enjoyment in recording?
Macks: I reckon a lot of it’s come from day-to-day life. Some of the songs are quite old. Some of the new ones are…I know I relate to the happy one a lot because it related to something I went through at the time, a tragedy. That lyric is the one I always think of anyway. I think that’ll naturally happen to anyone who listen to it, it’s relative to their own experiences.

Do you guys strive for universalism?
MT: I think that everybody is fundamentally the same, and can all feel the same things. The simpler we can be in relating to that, the better. But that’s not a conscious thing. Most of the lyrics: I will generate a thought about something. For example ‘doesn’t this person wanna be happy?’ All the lyrics pretty much come straight out. There’s no real drafting process in fact, I never really write ‘em down.
Macks: It’s organic, it’s quick. It’s not too thought about. It’s whatever’s on your mind. There’s not a lot of redrafting, nothing really seems to change. A song’s just a song.
MT: Whenever we’re jamming together in the rehearsal room, you just get an idea after idea. Bands in the past we’d slog. But with us, with every single song we have on any single day, there’s been work leading up to it but on its day it becomes its own.

You’ve all been in bands before, then. What have you learnt from those experiences to apply to this?
MT: Destruction of ego.
Macks: Ego’s the killer.
Gabi: And girls in a band, it’s not great! It’s a lot of…hormones.
MT: A lot of people think I’m a girl from behind. We’ve all got some hormones.
Macks: You should see some of the hormones on me.

Is it a case that as soon as a band gets momentum things spiral out of control?
Macks: Generally when we get momentum I realise I’m the best.
Gabi: Some people can handle it, some people can’t. We all have experience of it.
Macks: Being in a band is more of a team-sport than a football team. You might write a number 1 but if the whole thing is corrupt you’ll never write anything like that again.
MT: The problem that happens is that people forget - if you’re lucky enough to have people pay you to make music - people forget that’s amazing. They start thinking…People forget they’re among the luckiest people in the world to be doing that. These days you’ve gotta work pretty hard. You’ve gotta be talking to the people that love your music. You’ve gotta be prolific. I think it’s a healthy culture. It’s not bloated. Bands can’t sit on their arses for three years…You know what I mean. It’s a good healthy system.
Macks: The pocket between getting your hype and making a record is tight. You don’t get enough time to develop. That’s tough. You have to have a smash.

Did you feel like the dynamic between you guys was really special?
Macks: I met Michael, some weird thing happened and I was like ‘yeah alright, this’ll be good.’ We did a Christmas song.
MT: It might come out this year, might next year.
Macks: Maybe not even at Christmas, who knows. We knew we had the Koko show. When I came back from Ireland we met Fred and then Gabi. Things were happening so we had to get on with it.
Gabi: We’re all very different, so it kind of works.



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