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For More on Mute Math
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by Mike Newdeck Snow in New York prevented Mute Math from flying out for the first date of their very first European tour in Glasgow during the early part of February 2007. Champing at the bit and with a critically acclaimed debut album already garnering favourable UK press, band leader Paul Meany was clearly excited about playing to a new audience. Since this interview took place, Mute Math was chosen to perform the theme tune for the upcoming new film release Transformers. This could provide another welcome stepping stone toward mainstream recognition for a band that have been on the cusp for several years. Mike Newdeck caught up with Meany in the band tour bus prior to the Manchester concert.
“Yeah we couldn’t get out of New York for days” he recalls “it was very frustrating although in the end we only had to cancel one gig thankfully. It was serious enough snow to stop planes flying. We had got on the plane and had to sit there for 9 hours prior to take off once the runway had been cleared. Ultimately with these sorts of delays you worry about whether your gear will make it with you. In the end we sat around for about 26 hours before we could fly.” As if that wasn’t bad enough and with thoughts that their transatlantic flight might perhaps be jinxed the band guitarist had to take a trip to the hospital in the interim. Meaney explains. “Yeah he got a shrimp caught in his oesophagus had to have emergency surgery pretty quickly, so we thought we wouldn’t make any flight at all. We really did have to just keep laughing, that’s all you can do.” Life's journey from Mute Math’s early roots has been almost as arduous as the physical journey to Europe. “I knew Darren (King) from the age of fourteen” he remembers “and he was just a fan of the band that I was playing in at the time. He would send me CD demos of stuff that he was doing. Most stuff that you receive isn’t anything to write home about, but this guy’s was. I knew he was just messing about with computers and an effects pedal but it was really impressive elaborate tracks with limited resources. I called him and invited him down to New Orleans where we recorded some new songs and I was just treating it as a side project. Shortly after that the band that I was in Earthsuit split up, Darren moved down to New Orleans and we started a new band.” Tedd T had been making a name for himself as a producer and became involved with the band fairly quickly from the band’s embryonic beginnings. Meany explains. “We knew Tedd from the Earthsuit days” he clarifies “we kept in touch and when we sent him the new demos he freaked out…..he loved it! At the same time he wanted to move away from the production side of things and get more into the label side of the music business and in particular artist development .” The Teleprompt label was consequently formed. “That really was a best case scenario” he chimes excitedly “it’s kind of a conglomerate of management development and label formed by us using our input along with people we know.” Warner initially signed the band and after the ‘Reset’ e.p cracks began to appear in the relationship between the band and the label. With the band still on the Warner label it seems that those cracks have been repaired. “There was some confusion from the start” explains Meany “people assumed that Mute Math was a continuation of Earthsuit who a Christian artist, however I was really trying to do something completely different and I developed aspirations to do something outside the Christian box.” Christian music has always been something of a taboo, with many bands failing to crossover into the mainstream due to their beliefs. A recent interview with the quite exceptional Skillet highlighted this point. “Sure there are always those kinds of problems occurring” asserts Meany “and I’m sure some bands have actually benefited from going the Christian way, but it really wasn’t working for us. I always thought that I had to find my true musical self.” So did Mute Math get released from the whole deal? “Officially we’re not part of the Christian music industry anymore” he announces “We’ve broken free. We still have a lot of Christian fans and a pretty large fan-base from that world, and we’re really grateful. However our goal is to get our music heard by the world at large and music lovers everywhere, so we’d like to play by those rules.” But the band still carries the Warner logo on the debut album, an association concisely explained by Meany. “We decided to go ahead with a record anyway on the Teleprompt label” Meany concedes “and then distribute it ourselves as we didn’t have a distribution deal. We sold the album at our shows and it sold well. After about six months of doing that Warner finally got what was happening and realised what we wanted to do, with the result that they thought that they could help us do that. They were extremely helpful; out went the old deal and in came the new.” Warner perhaps thought that they were losing out on a band that could break out at any moment? “Well yes it could be” he agrees “that could have influenced it, but either way we worked out something that was in the spirit of a true partnership and ultimately something that offered the best of both worlds.” To date the band have sold 30,000 copies of their ‘Reset’ e.p and 10,000 copies of their debut (the latter solely off their own back), does Meany see the U.K as a shop window for the band to gain a record deal. “Our goal is to get our music heard worldwide” he enthuses “whatever we can do to achieve that makes good sense. This is our first UK tour and to get the word out we’re doing the small venues.” The story of L.A band Orson is unfamiliar to Meany as is the band itself, but he understands the need to improvise and go where you’re wanted. “We’re not really that big anywhere at the moment” he theorises “but we don’t really need to attract labels as we let Warner sort us out on a worldwide basis, if they think that it’s in our interests and theirs to subcontract out to another label then fine.” It’s always difficult to gauge your popularity in your homeland as an artist but Europe makes that measurement even more difficult. “Yeah it is difficult” he offers “but we sold the album via our website and it goes on iTunes next week, the UK won’t see the album on general release until June. The June release ties in neatly with another small European tour at some slightly larger venues and the release of the Transformers movie on Warner-a sure sign that the label are right behind the band. Quite possibly June 2007 could be a defining moment for Mute Math. “It could well be” Meany agrees “but so far the debut album release tour has been our most defining moment. We worked our asses off trying to finish the record; mixing and mastering with limited resources to try and get it ready for the tour. We got it ready, but due to its success, a two month tour turned into a five month tour and it really flipped the page for us right there.” Positive press on both sides of the Atlantic aided Mute Math’s course, but it wasn’t all a bed of roses. The vocalist explains. “We had our fair share of criticism” he announces laughing “people just don’t like the music, perhaps because we’re not clear cut, lying somewhere between the pop and the hip” Most of the press are looking for the next big thing and anything with crossover appeal is usually lauded and hyped to the max in the quest to push something different. “I’d like to think we offer something different” he continues “but it all comes down to opinion. All of the guys in the band believe in what we’re doing and we love the music that we make, but there’s always someone out there who doesn’t care, that’s life!” Negative press can mark career low points, although vocalist and guitarist Meany seems unconcerned. “Well hey! We’ve had lower points than some poor press coverage” he laughs “but to be honest we’ve risen to the challenges and building process and life has been kind to us. I mean we’re now touring Europe which is something that we wouldn’t have been able to do a couple of years ago. In a way you’re waiting for somebody to jerk the rug from under you.”
Mute Math has a debut album and the ‘Reset’ e.p available for purchase, but they also have a little known DVD available. Meany explains. “It should be on general release” he offers “but at the same time it is probably very difficult to get hold of, but should be available online. It’s basically our first DVD that we went for very early on, we want to get the word out on this band as quickly as possible and this is another way of doing that. It features concert footage and behind the scenes stuff along with video blogs.” Mute Math have often been compared to The Police and indeed Meaney does bear an uncanny resemblance to Sting vocally however the vocalist seems fully comfortable with this comparison. “Yeah I haven’t got a problem with it” he explains “and it’s no secret that The Police are one of our greatest influences, they’re our heroes! We feel uncomfortable being compared to them only with respect to the fact that we have them on such a high pedestal, it’s very flattering.” With The Police reforming during 2007, it could make life more difficult for Mute Math. After all it’s ok to be retro but only if the band that you share your characteristics with is defunct. “I hope it improves our situation” Meaney admits “people can often be more accepting of offshoots if they can see something massive going on around them. In the past some people just couldn’t understand why we liked The Police they didn’t think of them in the same way as us” And the Sting comparisons? “I actually can’t see the similarities” he grudgingly offers “maybe some of the melody lines are similar, but the closest that I could come to any sound that he makes is blowing a noise out of my ass. My feeling about the reformation was how I could get involved, it’s historic, and perhaps we could open for them.” Mute Math have never been a band to sit on there laurels and even during touring the next album is clearly to the forefront of their thinking. Hurricane Katrina and the aftermath could understandably have affected the progress made by the band in New Orleans “Yeah we’re writing the next album now” he interjects “but the hurricane had minimal effect on the process. We write during any spare moment that we have and that’s pretty much what you would expect from a song-writer, loads of ideas twenty four seven. We’re itching to get back into that studio I can’t wait.” The debut album has been around for quite some time now and the vocalists attitude is understandable. “Well, we’ve lived with the songs from that album for a while now” he adds “and we’ve played them over and over live. We do stuff differently from tour to tour, but you can only put a different spin on it so many times can’t you. We’re quite excited about new stuff and although ideas are a bit fragmented and experimental at the moment it’s giving us quite a rush.” Experimenting with different styles harks back to the days of the ‘Reset’ e.p which dabbled in dub mixes at times reminiscent of The Chemical Brothers at their trance inducing best. “The Reset thing was really when we were a two-piece, just Darren and I” Meany muses “we were really still developing, however, when we toured as band we got to know what worked for us and what sounded comfortable. We put what we had learnt into the album which is much more band driven and song orientated. We do like going on detours on occasions though. Undoubtedly the next record will reflect what we have learnt over the past few years.” As a duo, only two people were responsible for song-writing, according to Meany things have changed slightly. “Well we write in several ways as a band” he says authoritatively “jam sessions, a concoction of individual ideas, messing around with sampling and drum machines to get a basic idea. Or we do what we did at the beginning, throw stuff on cd’s and pass them back and forth. What’s important is that we don’t recreate a song of the past, throw out the past and look forward, we don’t want to stagnate. It’s hard to say what the next record will sound like. We try to go off in different directions but no matter how hard we try it will sound like Mute Math. The bands tinkering with unusual instruments-usually homemade- which they incorporate into their live act have become legendary. The one that springs to mind is the Keytar, but the band has plenty of others ready to make appearances at any time. “We’ve actually been using one for a while now” Meany enthuses “it’s called the Atari, but it was Darren our drummer who really started all that. He went to see a local gig in New Orleans with an artist called Mr Quintron who specialised in playing instruments that were homemade. The things that he used were way over the top; you know he used to have stuff running off fire. Darren came back from the concert really jazzed up about it all. He’d get out his little Casio keyboard and start soldering stuff to it. But the one that really sounded great was when he joined a cigar box to his keyboard. We use to use it in our early days until it kept breaking and that’s when we got hold of this guy in New York who helped us make things a little more roadworthy. That’s where the Atari came from. It’s basically an old Atari and a load of stuff from Radio Shack glued together.” Entertainment is the name of the game with Mute Math and live the combination of the physical visual element with the audio oddities makes for an extremely involving experience. “We just love putting on a show” the vocalist asserts “provoking an audience reaction is fun for us and fun for our audience.” Mute Math has a wide range of influences but it is often interesting to know what they listen to recreationally. “Recently I’ve been listening to David Axelrod” he enthuses “he’s an old composer from the seventies who we’ve discovered recently. He’s having a bit of a revival at the moment. He’s a brilliant songwriter and we’ve been studying his vibe.” Not all of the band share Meany’s enthusiasm for other artists. “Our guitarist sometimes thinks stuff that I listen to is crap” he laughs “but the others generally agree on what’s great. He keeps us in check and questions where the guitar parts are in the music. I can see why, because if it ain’t got any guitar then he feels left out. Darren (drummer) he’s got the most eclectic taste whereas the rest of us are quite happy listening to something more mainstream like Coldplay.”
The band’s music is quite simply a sum of their equal parts, at times unfathomable at others eclectic but always melodic. With a European tour ahead including several spots at the Carling Festival the future looks bright. Mute Math is one of the most original and hardworking bands around today, get on the bandwagon and discover the band before they undoubtedly break big in the near future.
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