Every band deals with this; it’s part of what makes pop music pop.
Cobra Starship will have a very specific market and they will be like, ok we are going to write a song like this, over and over and over again, because that will work and sell. But I can tell you right now that [Passion Pit’s] next record is going to be so radically different, because I basically want to show people that this is not a one-track band. I’m planning on recording a single in the fall and releasing it on 7-inch and coming out being like, Boom! And dropping another single right after we drop “Little Secrets.” People think that we are going to be this one-trick pony because that is what most electropop bands are, they have a few singles and that’s it, let’s be honest. Not exactly in a genre that is the songwriter genre.
It’s an ephemeral genre. That’s part of what the charm is.
I know, but as a songwriter, I struggle with that. This is just one field. I can dress up pop any which way. I just dress it up as electropop. This could have easily been an indie pop band. It could have ended up sounding a lot like Phoenix. This band is always going to struggle with the way people perceive it until we take a break and people sit on it.
Do you have in your head bands or artists who you think of as having done it the right way? How do you get control of your own story? There are bands that somehow manage to do that.
It’s all about the initial hit. The initial perception, then that’ll just follow through. Our first impression was: hipsters playing some weird sampled pop music that’s delirious and weird, with an annoying vocal sound. We can’t escape that. Not that we can’t escape a hit. I can write a better song than “Sleepyhead.” I mean “Sleepyhead” is a very elementary song in terms of structure, which is why it works and why people love it so much, because it’s so familiar, yet so foreign in terms of production. That’s the balance. I’m just trying to find how I can circumvent the hype. The hype has written the history. The hype is so loud. It just makes everything so much more difficult for an artist.
I think you’re at the worst of it right now. I think it can only get better. If you think of Radiohead after they wrote “Creep.” Those guys were fucking miserable. And it’s all about getting through that part and all of a sudden you get this opportunity. You’re stuck in this place where you know what the perception is and you feel helpless to change it and you sort of have to persevere until you get to that other thing.
The key to pop music that becomes exceedingly autonomous…Björk did the pop thing. Now she can do whatever the fuck she wants and sing obtuse ballads and close with “Human Behavior.” You have to play the game, shake the hands, do the political thing. And after that, once you’re in, it’s all yours. This is essentially what I’m trying to do. I love playing the game because the jokes on them, really. I understand what they want and how they work and I can give them what they want and then do what I want someday, hopefully.
I’m such a huge fan of pop music for pop music’s sake. But every time I try to write about that stuff it’s an uphill battle because everybody is stuck in their identity crisis of who they are and what they listen to.
People just don’t want to like pop music. I have no problem loving parts of like Owl City. We met them at Sasquatch; they opened for us to maybe 600 people. He’s the Postal Service 2.0. But, holy shit, does that kid have it fucking down, and it’s so amazing. I looked at him and was like, “you are singing live with auto-tune. I don’t know if that’s the coolest thing ever or the stupidest thing ever.” And all the guys in the band were like, you’re crazy, this band is awful. No, this band is predictable and you don’t want predictability, you’re looking for cool. This band is so not cool. And let’s be honest, there are a bunch of early high school girls freaking out. There’s a song called “Hot Air Balloon” where he talks about this romantic journey on this hot air balloon where he’s brushing the trees and his lyrics are so mid-career Death Cab for Cutie. Look, I want that kid to succeed, I absolutely do, because he should. That shit should be top 40. If that’s Top 40, I’m happy, because he’s got formula and he’s smart. People who say that pop music is dumb and obvious…I appreciate pop music where I can say whoever’s been writing the Jonas Brothers’ songs is a fucking genius.
...
