Introduction

Matthew Molnar of super-cool, Brooklyn band Friends talks hype, “yacht rock” and the making of their debut album, Manifest!

Questions and answers

Hi Matthew, how’s the tour going?

The tour’s going really well. Everyone’s been really excited and supportive of us, so it’s been pretty awesome. This is actually our last UK date – we’re playing on a boat in Bristol tonight – but we’ve still got some more in mainland Europe and Scandinavia. And then we get to go back to the States for a week before coming back again to play festivals.

Would you say you enjoy playing live more than being in the studio?

I would say so, yeah: we’re definitely a live band. I mean, we played our first show a week into being a band, and we kinda learned to be a band by playing live constantly. Not to sound like I’m bragging or anything but, even before we’d put any music online for people to hear, we’d always be able to bring a crowd. Which is really hard to do in New York.

I’m really proud of the album in a lot of ways but it’s always really hard to capture the live energy or spirit of a band on record. I think the record’s great too, it’s just a different kind of experience. We recorded it in bit and pieces so we had to learn how to translate the different ways we play our songs live into a studio environment.

Is that why you chose to self-produce?

A little bit, yeah. I think our sound is kinda fragile in terms of the fact that if it’s pushed or pulled in any one direction too much, we’d lose the thing that makes us unique. Also, I think we knew we were going through a learning process and we didn’t want anyone to taint how we were learning or deal with anyone else’s agenda for our sound. I wouldn’t be as opposed to working with a producer now that we’ve kinda set up our sound. And I think if we keep being a band we have plenty of records to make with different producers.

So how long did Manifest! take to write and record in total?

It started from the day we started. Samantha had already demo-ed a bunch of the songs months before we were a band. Two songs are exactly as they were from one month after the first band practise ever – the performances, the mixes, everything. And one song was written the very last day we could be in the studio.

We had an album’s worth of material a couple of months into being a band, and it may almost have been easier if we’d recorded it then. Because when people started reacting to our music, we became really busy and I think there was some pressure from that. We’d be on tour for two weeks and then go into the studio for a week, and we had a lot of meetings with record labels in the States and we’d be making videos... It took us a while to feel comfortable in the studio and figure out what we wanted to do.

What were your key musical reference points?

It runs the gamut, because we really like a lot of funky stuff, R&B and old, classic pop, like The Jackson Five or vintage Madonna. But then we also like really punky stuff and weird stuff and really lo-fi stuff. So it was like trying to create a world where you could mix Ariel Pink with Mariah Carey... with Tom Tom Club and Bow Wow Wow... (Laughs)

And where did you guys find lyrical inspiration?

Samantha writes every lyric and what I love is that there are 12 songs on this album and it’s really 12 different points of view. If you have 12 songs on a record and nine are about heartbreak and all from the same perspective, it gets tedious and becomes something you can only listen to in certain situations, like when you’re having a break-up yourself.

The album considers human relationships and human interactions but a lot of the songs are a little darker, with deeper, more existentialist themes, like about dying and spirituality. To me, even one or two of the break-up songs aren’t really about a break-up: they’re more about the emotions that swell up when you’re going through that kind of crossroads.

If you had to pick out your personal favourite track on the album, which would it be and why?

It kinda varies but at the moment it’s probably ‘A Thing Like This’. At the time, that song was the most different from anything we had done before. We all really like smooth stuff, like Sade, so we wanted a song like that, just our version of “yacht rock”. It was fun writing it too. Sam had the vocal melody and her lyrics and we all composed the music together. It went through a lot of shapes and forms: I think we could get another song or two out of all the musical ideas we discarded before we got to the finished version. But then there are other tracks I love too, like ‘Friend Crush’.

What would you say is the ideal environment to listen to the album in?

I don’t know, I think it could go anywhere! There are definitely party tracks on it and then there are one or two that are a little sadder and a little darker. I hope people can listen to it in a bunch of scenarios. I want it to be a record you can pump in your car when you’re going places, like on summer road trips. Put it on and let it grow on you, and then you’ll find what songs suit what moods.

There’s a lot of anticipation for the album in the UK, do you feel nervous about its release?

No! Honestly, I feel the opposite of nervous; I’m just excited for it to come out! I can’t lie to you, this is meant to be our album tour but we pushed the album release back because we weren’t happy with things. I mean, this is our first album and we wanted to make sure it was something we could all live with, y’know?

None of us were expecting to get the attention we’ve been getting and, for me, the album is the thing I was most looking forward to. It will just be really nice to go out and perform in front of a crowd that might have had an opportunity to hear most of the songs we’re gonna play beforehand. And honestly, hype and buzz is all just fleeting and if it’s gonna go away when we put the album out, I’d rather just get it over with and figure out what else we can do with our sound and move on.

What are your ambitions ultimately for the band?

We wanna enjoy what we’re doing and I just want to keep making really good records that we’re happy with, and aren’t like the records being made by our peers. And, for me, a big thing is to keep putting out records quicker than the industry norm is today. We’d put out an album every eight or nine months if we could, we always have enough material.

Have you got the next album ready, then?

No, but we’re already trying to figure out plans to work on material on the road. Plus we have half an album’s worth of material left over from the first album, either in finished or unfinished form; stuff we liked, it’s just that you can only fit so much material on a record, y’know? (Laughs) If we had three weeks off tomorrow we could go into the studio and record all of our next album right then, but we have six or seven weeks of straight touring...

You covered ‘My Boo’ by Ghost Town DJ’s: if you could have anyone cover any of your songs, who would you choose and what would they cover?

Hmm, jeez... Speaking for me, it would be cool to hear Sade do ‘A Thing Like This’ because it’s got a smooth vibe. Actually, if Michael Jackson was still alive, I’d want to hear him sing it. Because in the studio we definitely wanted to capture a bit of the Jackson Five magic, and I think he would kill it. (Laughs)

Do you keep up to date with new music, and can you tell us your favourite album of the last year?

I was keeping up before, but for the past six months I’ve been very, very poor... (Laughs) Don’t feel too sorry for me but, y’know, we’re a new band... I get free music from friends’ bands, but there’s been a handful of albums from the past few months that I’ve still not picked up out of poverty. I still don’t have the current Atlas Sound record: I hear it’s one of his best records, and I’m a huge fan of Bradford Cox and Deerhunter.

I like the new Beach House record, and Doldrums are amazing too. Actually, what am I talking about?! My favourite album of 2012 so far – by a mile – is Visions by Grimes. I listen to that all the time. If anything surpasses it, it will have been a very awesome year.

Maybe it’ll be Manifest! that surpasses it!

(Laughs) Well that wouldn’t work for me because I’ve already played on it, lived it, played the shows: it’s too much a part of me for me to enjoy like I can someone else’s record. Hopefully Widowspeak and Beach Fossils will have new albums out this year and if so, without even hearing them, they’ll probably be two of my favourites of the year. (Laughs)