Illustration: Pat Thomas

The Lemon Twigs are exactly the sort of band that we love. Their rich and dense music skates the knife edge of pomposity with wild originality; every gesture feels steeped in all of musical history at once. We were excited to talk to Michael D’Addario about how, much as it might not seem it, they are just like us.

Deluxe: I wanted to start off by talking to you about the recording of your new LP Songs For The General Public, recorded - as I understand - between Sonora Studios in Los Angeles, Electric Lady in New York City and back home in Long Island. What did all of those buildings bring to the mix?

MD: I think we would have gladly just done it at home, but it became a little bit of a limitation not having all of the equipment that we wanted to use. Also working out of our parents house wasn’t quite the right fit and we wanted to feel a little bit more official, so we went out over to Los Angeles. We did some work over there, like two weeks of work in the first month, in and out depending on the availability and then we ended up coming back home as - ironically - we ended up missing it. But we again had the limitations of needing to do stuff like going through reverb or recording a vocal, so we went into Electric Ladyland to process the entire LP through their gear.

D: Heavy kit benefit.

MD: Yeah, that was what we wanted, we didn’t have a plate… we have like one Neumann whereas they have like a bunch of old kit that’s incredible sounding. You know, at our house we have everything we NEED, it’s just not of the highest quality.

D: When people talk about plate reverbs, I always have experienced it in the digital age, so more filters and modules and stuff, but the plate reverb is like a massive tray right?

MD: Yeah. It’s a big rectangle.

D: (laughing) I think I get kind of excited about seeing that stuff working.

MD: I guess? I am pretty used to it.

D: When you went into the studio, did you feel like you had the record ready in your heads? How much did you take in?

MD: We take the songs, but I think a lot of it happens when you’re there. You have a general idea, but most of it happens right there. Brian has more of a dream maybe of what is going to be there before he puts his hand on an instrument, but I like to find it, I like to experiment, maybe it works, maybe it doesn’t?

D: What does that look like, is it a whole bunch of performance?

MD: Yeah, basically, I just like to keep recording… you use a lot of tape though.

D: Do you feel the pressures of having to treat it like a job…

MD: Monetarily?

D: Yes, like, you’ve punched in at the studio?

MD: I have felt that, maybe more with the videos? The budgets are so small, you have to really stretch it, you know? For a long time, it was an impossibility to work on film, but it’s not, it’s really not, you just need to be smarter with the production.

D: You come from a film background, so how important is the visual identity - artwork, sleeve, videos - of the band to you?

MD: I dunno, I think of it all as one slideshow you know? It’s all just there to support the mood of the music. I have a lot of images stored, I watch lot of films, way more than I listen to music. You can take things from other mediums.

D: Do you have anxiety about consuming art too much in advance of writing and recording, what if you end up writing a sequence that sounds pretty good only to realise you’ve kind of re-worked… ‘Freebird’ or something?

MD: Well, I’m not really worried about that. I think if I wrote ‘Freebird’ or whatever I am self-aware enough to realise it. I’d be happy I guess, start again? I really enjoy watching and listening to… media? You know, all of it. I listen to a lot of music that has a lot of surface level music, stuff with real surface-level beauty… The same for movies too.

D: In terms of the production?

MD: All of it. The lyrics too, you know? Like songs about living a happy time and partying.

D: So, more gratifying?

MD: Well, yeah, but I like moody music too. I just really don’t like it when people try to be smart, I really don’t. I just stop paying attention.

D: What has been a particular influence of late, or maybe with the LP specifically?

MD: Lately? I’ve been listening to a lot of that rapper La Chat from Memphis. Also, Bladee from Sweden.

D: How do you go about finding stuff?

MD: YouTube.

D: Really! Okay.

MD: When I was a teenager I’d buy tons of stuff, loads of records. I’d then use the internet to devour their whole discography or whatever. I’d get into people based on a cool cover or a play on the stereo. I was pretty obsessed with old things as a teenager, but now I am not obsessed with old things. Nowadays you can’t really find what I am looking for in the crates, so to speak.

D: What was your first record shopping experience?

MD: Oh god, I dunno. I bought all sorts of stuff when I was 12 or 13 as we had a record player and inherited all my dad’s old records, but I wasn’t really conscious about any of it until I was like, 15? I had a girlfriend who got me into records. It would have been in LA, I would have been about that age, but I don’t remember it that clearly. I am not an exhaustive collector.

D: If you were wanting to go out and flip racks, where is your local?

MD: There is a store called Human Head in Brooklyn. It’s a good place, that’s 100% the New York place. The Manhattan stores are all kind of too expensive. I used to always do it on the road, it was like… A compulsive way to spend time? Buying clothes and records… Oh man, that’s just such a common thing. You know? That’s THE common thing? You really want to put that in an article? (laughing) that’s just what everyone does.

D: (laughing) which stores did you really hit though?

MD: Ohhhhh I don’t know?

D: (laughing) It can be for a bad reason?

MD: I guess I have a bad memory for the specifics.

D: What would you look for in a record shop?

MD: Well, I hate it when you go in and a store is just a “shop”, like, it just has all the new records out of the factory, or expensive reissues… that, you know? I would always want to go to a record store that feels like a real store, somewhere where you can find anything or… something?

D: Do you feel like those sorts of shops still play an important role? They’re still part of the landscape?

MD: You’re asking the wrong guy, I don’t buy anything, I am just listening to Trap music and you can’t buy it. I don’t like “indie” music, I don’t really like any of that stuff that would be considered to be my contemporaries. Not even just the stuff that we get compared to. It’s even the same bands that we share bills with, I just find I have less and less interest in it. If I could buy trap music, I would buy Trap music.

D: I guess that’s the fascinating thing with Trap music, outside of bubbles there is just no connection to physicality, it really is primarily a digital artform.

MD: Maybe they do, I don’t know, but if it was made entirely on a computer, why shouldn’t I listen to it entirely on a computer? If it was tailored to be sounding all warm and recorded on tape or whatever, then I guess it requires that whole “lossless” thing.

““You see; The Twigz are more popular than you, they are greater than your favorite band, they are a phenomenon.””

D: I guess that surprises me a little as the intricacy of what you have recorded as The Lemon Twigs is so… Complex?

MD: I couldn’t be less of an audiophile, I just love sound a lot and I am interested in how sounds trigger emotions. I’m not an audiophile. I listen to stuff on my iPhone speaker all the time; I am very much the same with films. In High School and Middle School - before I knew about The Criterion Collection or whatever, I always watched movies illegally in TERRIBLE quality… It was just about the film, old movies and important movies and even dumb movies that I just wanted to see. I think I have seen pretty much all of Dustin Hoffman’s movies, but I’ve hardly ever seen one that wasn’t in lousy quality.

D: (Laughing) I like that we’ve been talking about discovery though… Well, not record shops actually. So how do I win you back? How would I use my shop to catch young you’s attention and sell you The Lemon Twigs?

MD: You should just use all the quotes that we had made up for the album. That will really make people interested, that’s all that you need.

D: (Reading) “You see; the Twigz are more popular than you, they are greater than your favourite band, they are a phenomenon.”

MD: Exactly, those wise words are Sam France of Foxygen. Just a picture of us with a killer quote like that and plaster it all over the place.

D: Well, I did offer I guess… so I suppose I best get printing up that quote nice and big on a banner.

MD: Yes! Exactly, that’s great. (Laughing) we did one that had a picture of us and just said “The Lemon twigs are just like you… And me”. Very mysterious.

RECORD SHOP MENTIONS:
www.humanheadnyc.com

Jenny Cobden