Stereoboard Talk To Passion Pit Ahead Of The Release Of Second Album 'Gossamer' (Interview)
Friday, 20 July 2012
Written by Katie Territt
Massachusetts based electropop band, Passion Pit have only been making music for a mere 5 years, yet they’ve managed to establish themselves quite quickly with their fantastic synth-tinged indie electro tunes, particularly with debut long player ‘Manners’. Three years after that release, the band are ready to explode with ‘Gossamer’, their second full release, and a development in their unique sound.
Lead singer Michael Angelakos took time out from his hectic (yet well organised) schedule to talk to Stereoboard about what we can expect from the new album. “Well, erm, it's not a departure but it's some form of a maturation. I mean its growth; it's certainly growth, hopefully in the right direction. It's a very colourful, expansive album. It covers a lot of territories but I think it's cohesive nonetheless and I'm very proud of it. I can't believe I actually managed to finish it *laughs*”
On first listen, it’s obvious that ‘Gossamer’ is full of eclectic sounds, influences, and a want to experiment. “I don't think that you can have an album that isn’t eclectic. I think most people feel like they have to make a record that's so cohesive and is essentially the same song, front to back. I really don't think that. If you read a book and each chapter has its own significance to the larger story, and that's how I look at this record. You know, each song might not exactly match up 100% with the last or the one to come, but I think that's the beauty of it. It's more of a 90's record in that sense. You know like back when people weren't afraid of making interesting, unique sounding records, and I think today to make an eclectic record is almost to make a unique record. Most of the records I hear coming out are essentially two or three songs which are hits, and then regenerations of those songs. That's exactly what I wanted to stay away from, that's exactly what I wanted to try to steer clear of so I'm hoping that I achieved that in some sense.”
‘Gossamer’ seems to be a growth and almost a change in direction, but the band were keen to ensure they didn’t lose their signature sound. “Well I don't think it's so much different because it still has that Passion Pit filter. So no matter what I try to achieve or no matter what sound or style I try to go for, it just comes out the same end, its still Passion Pit. I thought that this was a really interesting, not collection, but a series of songs that told a story in a way I thought was most appropriate. Although sometimes fractured, I found it much more interesting than what I've been listening to. I just think that it was scary putting out a record that has songs that are so unique from each other, and that sucks because we should be putting out records that are a little more daring.”
Having spent a while making the new album, Passion Pit have obviously grown as a band and their approach to making new music has also moved with the times. “There was some changing, well adapting, the vocal style. I mean I got bored of just singing in the style of 'Manners'. I felt like people only heard one style of my voice, and I made a distinct effort to show them my full range on this record, and actually sing as opposed to just, you know, more or less yell, and I think that's the most jarring thing for most people, that they're hearing me really sing. Its like, "oh this person can sing", "well yes, this person has always been able to sing". That was just the sound of 'Manners', it wasn't like a character. This is more me being myself, as a singer.”
“Dynamically, I think it's a much richer album in terms of the mix. I think that the song writing is essentially better; I think it's a lot more tuned into movements within the song rather just being blocks of sound. We have a pension for utilising synthesisers and layering them in ways which make them basically unable to be replicated. The way in which I layer and make the music is so detailed and so meticulous, so no one can really get the sound that we're doing. I mean there can sometimes be over 200 tracks on a song and no one would ever know that. You just hear this one sound and you're like "oh that's one synthesiser", but no it's actually like five synthesisers and also processed through beat pedals and this piece of gear and this effect on the computer, and no one would know that. But I go to sleep at night knowing there are loads of little mysteries. *laughs*”
With such a detailed, layered, complicated sound, you would think that Passion Pit would struggle to replicate that live. “No, a lot less hard work than people would think. I have a great band behind me and I've got really smart band members. They're all really excited about the record and really excited about the challenge of it and even right now, they're working hard replicating and coming up with new ways of doing it live. We're really moving away from this new found love of backing tracks that most bands have and trying to actually perform everything *laughs*. It's rare for a band in our genre to do, it's rare for us to have like 7 keyboards to one person, and they're actually playing all the parts. We're sampling the songs and it's actually going to surprise people how close we get to the record, but also we leave it up to interpretation, we leave it up to the openness of playing live, that's the exciting part.”
With such an eclectic group of songs on ‘Gossamer’, it must be hard to choose a favourite track. “I am really proud, for the first time I can say I really like the whole collection. My least favourite is 'Take A Walk', but it was the record that kind of got me in the mood to write Passion Pit songs again. It was a little entry level for me - not lyrically, lyrically it's very interesting - but it's not my favourite. My favourite could be 'Love Is Greed' or 'Where We Belong'. We've been playing 'Carried Away' live and it's amazing, it's so fun. And also 'Mirrored Sea' live is really really moving, it gets me very excited. It reminds me of like, I can pretend I'm in At The Drive-In when we play that song *laughs* It's so fun.”
It certainly sounds like the live shows will be exciting to see. “They're as participatory as they've always been and we're adding 3 female backing singers and multi-instrumentalists so it's gonna be a big production and totally crazy and wild, and actual musicianship.”
With a fairly large break between albums, it’s clear that a lot of work went into making ‘Gossamer’ into something to be proud of. “I mean records can take sometimes a week, to 5 years, I have no idea. I took some time off in between. We were tired from touring, I got engaged and I wanted to take time to myself. I'm happy to have taken the amount of time I took because I needed it. I needed it and so did the record. There's so much attention to detail and a story behind it, and if I'd rushed it, it wouldn't have been as rich and detailed as it is. So many bands don't do that, they think they have to get something out as quickly as possible, strike while the irons hot. If that's the way it's gonna’ be, I don't want to participate in that. I only want to make music to make music, and if it's going to be popular or it's gonna’ be commercially viable then that's fine, but I'm not gonna’ sacrifice the work or the process because there's a certain industry. That might upset some people internally but you have to do what you have to do. You have to be true to yourself and I'm very happy with the decisions I made. It was a long time coming but I'm proud of it, this is the best I could do.”
“I have a home, I like staying at home with my fiancée, I like walking around and reading, and I like living normally and taking time to myself. If you don't, you're gonna’ go crazy. I spent a lot of time by myself and that's when I realised what I really needed to do and started coming to terms with what the fuck Passion Pit is. What is this project? What does it require of me? Is it me fully? As the leader of a project? These were the things that were plaguing this recording process and that time was so significant and saved me so much grief I think in the end. I don't know if that's maturity or chance or whatever, but I feel very lucky to have had that time.”
The first single release from ‘Gossamer’ is funnily enough Michael’s least favourite track on the album, ‘Take A Walk’. So why that choice for the album’s advert? “What makes people think it's the artist that chooses that? *laughs* I have no say in what was gonna’ be released. That's why I signed to a label to release my music instead of doing it on my own, because I cannot pick singles. If I did, it would be a commercial failure probably *laughs* so they pick what works, and they picked that song because it's probably a segway between the last record to this record. We've got a lot of other songs that will surprise people and I don't think they want to surprise people too soon; they want the excitement to build. There's enough of a departure on that song to ease the anticipation of the record being a 180 degree turnaround. So it's not a departure, but it's new, but not too different. It's an interesting song, I like it thematically, it serves its purpose and I put it on the record for a reason. It sets people up for what's to come, and what's to come is the exciting stuff.”
Passion Pit are soon set to be on the road promoting ‘Gossamer’ and all it has to offer. A highlight of that touring schedule is a trip to the UK for their second appearances at Reading and Leeds Festivals. “Our Reading performance was one of the highlights of our UK touring cycle, it was unbelievable, so we hope a couple of people show up this time *laughs*. I'm not anticipating much, I'm not trying to stoke any kind of fire, I'm just open to anything. This is a new record, a new campaign, a new cycle, and I think whatever comes, comes. I think the shows will be great and I'm excited about the live show. This will be the premiere here, and I think people will respect it a lot, we've really grown. I promise you it will be really fun, it's pretty cool how we're doing it. It's a bit of a challenge, it's pretty crazy. I always set myself up for these challenges and then I'm scratching my head thinking why the hell did I do this *laughs* but you know, that's exactly it, that's the fun part. It seems like we've got our heads on straight, the whole bands in a really good place, we're all really happy and we're all excited to get this moving. The festivals will be great and if they're anything like last time, then we should be fine. But I think they'll be much, much better.”
As well as festival dates, Passion Pit have a huge co-headline show coming up with Hot Chip in September. How did that come about? “I don't know, I guess we wanted to just do a show together and we ended up planning it at the Hollywood Bowl, it's gonna be a huge show. We're both used to putting on our big shows, and they're a big influence on us. We wanted them to play after us because we're like the little kids *laughs* To us, like, they're Gods and we really respect them. It's gonna be so good, they're a really smart band and we're really happy that we get to be involved with them on a co-headline bill.”
It certainly seems that the rest of 2012 will be a busy, yet exciting year for Passion Pit. ‘Gossamer’ is an addictive album from first listen and the diverse and exciting sounds show a real growth, maturity and, no pun intended, passion from the band. The live shows should be fantastic and it’s exciting to think how they will reproduce the songs live to create a new spin on what are already thrilling performances. A very welcome return to a very underrated band.
‘Take A Walk’ is available to download now, and ‘Gossamer’ is released on 23rd July.
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Lead singer Michael Angelakos took time out from his hectic (yet well organised) schedule to talk to Stereoboard about what we can expect from the new album. “Well, erm, it's not a departure but it's some form of a maturation. I mean its growth; it's certainly growth, hopefully in the right direction. It's a very colourful, expansive album. It covers a lot of territories but I think it's cohesive nonetheless and I'm very proud of it. I can't believe I actually managed to finish it *laughs*” 
