Interview: Matt Shultz from Cage The Elephant
Heading our way at the end of the month for the Big Day Out tour, Kentucky rockers Cage the Elephant are one of the most anticipated sets on the enormous lineup. Max Quinn grabbed vocalist Mike Shultz after a show recently to chat about his musical goals, coming to Oz and their upcoming album.
Hi Matt!
Hi, sorry if you’ve been holding on the phone for a while. We just got finished with a show.
How was the show?
It was wicked. We were in Milwaukee, and we played a club called the Eagle. It was awesome. I climbed up onto a big balcony and was peer pressured into jumping off.
Do you have any concerns for your own safety in a scenario like that?
Um! Yeah. There’s always that split-second of concern, but that kind of fades away as dumb, blind faith increases.
Do you think that element of dumb, blind faith permeates your music as well?
Yeah, for sure. I think that whenever I’ve created anything, there’s never been an instance where I haven’t been second-guessing myself the whole way. I’m very suspicious when there isn’t any second-guessing. Normally you don’t want to listen to that voice too much, because anything that is a product of fear usually doesn’t turn out very well.
The thing that strikes me about the record that you’ve just put out is that it sounds unhinged – fearless if you want to put it that way.
We definitely had the approach of just letting things happen very organically. We tracked everything live; in some respects we were really trying to pull things together and in other respects trying to let go. There are songs on the record that are very soft and whimsical, and then you also see the opposite of that – songs that make you want to break things.
What brought that decision about?
We were writing a lot of songs for the second record, and trying to cater to what we thought the record should sound like. We weren’t very excited by anything that we were writing – it felt very forced. At the same time, we were writing songs that we didn’t feel like would fit the record, but we really loved. We were joking that these songs would be better suited for a side-project, so for a short while we had this pseudo-side-project going on. After a while we realised that it was just the direction we were moving in. The stuff we were really into – our bastard children – became what the record is now.
My favourite song on the record is Aberdeen. What’s that one about?
I don’t even know. I just stitch words together.
The film clip for that song is heartbreaking. I get so sad when the dragon explodes at the end. Was that your intention?
I actually wanted it to be funny. Like really dark and gory. I just thought, ‘man, wouldn’t it just be great if at the very end the hero was brutally murdered!?’ The director went with the more emotional angle. Unfortunately for me, it didn’t come across that way, so I guess we broke some hearts with that video.
It’s been a big year for you guys. Do you think you’ll look back at 2011 years down the track and think that this one was ‘the’ year for Cage The Elephant?
I hope not.
Why is that?
I hope that we never reach that place where we’ve accomplished everything that we set out to do because it’s something that I want to continue to do. I was talking to a friend about this earlier. When you’re creating things, you tend to compartmentalise different parts of the process – visual, audio, texture – so the thing for us is that we’d like to mash all of that together and just keep moving forward and never have a set goal to achieve. We just want to keep making record with other people’s money.
Truthfully, I just want to have a purpose. I think that there are things that are more important than music, and don’t get me wrong, because I love music. Good music accompanies a great life, but great life experiences inspire great music.
That’s a really interesting way to think about it. What’s important to you outside of music?
Too much to talk about right now.
In the immediate future for you guys is Australia and the Big Day Out. How are you feeling about coming down?
It’s our first time coming down, and we’ve been dying to play there for so long. It hasn’t been an opportunity that has been afforded to us so far. All of our friends have been like: ‘oh, man, you guys have to go down and play the Big Day Out!’ Everyone calls it the Big Day Off because you have like five shows over three weeks and you get to hang out in between. I’m more than excited.
I think everybody’s hanging out for some of the songs from the new record. Are you still enjoying playing them?
Yeah, definitely. I will say, though, that I’m really looking forward to writing a new record. We’re working on that now; after we come back from Big Day Out we’re going to get together and piece it together and hopefully go into the studio soon after.
Have you started writing for the new record?
That process was really underway since we finished the previous record. As soon as you leave the studio you start searching for inspiration – you ask yourself if you know how to even write anymore. There’s always that pinnacle moment that you hit with any cluster of ideas and songs just start falling out of your eyes and mouth and ears. I feel like we’re hitting that stride at the moment. Usually it’s just one song that you write that ends up being the catalyst for the rest of the record.
So what’s that song?
That’s a secret! You’ll have to wait until we’re done recording.
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