Mother Mother are excited to tackle the beast on tour for their brand new fifth album and major label debut Very Good Bad Things.”
“It’s a bit of a beast. It’s bigger and bolder and badder than ever before,” said vocalist / keyboardist Jasmin Parkin.
The band plays Average Joes, Dec. 2 with USS.
The five piece, Juno nominated Vancouver based indie pop band includes Ryan Guldemond, his sister Molly Guldemond, Jasmin Parkin, Jeremy Page and Ali Siadat. They rose to indie acclaim with their first two albums Touch Up (2007) and O My Heart (2008) while the nation took notice. Their next two albums Eureka (2011) and The Sticks (2012) delivered the Top 5 radio hits “The Stand”, “Bit By Bit” and “Let’s Fall In Love,” making the band the second most aired alternative act in Canada in 2012 and 2013.
They are excited to be supported by Universal Records.
“We’re still in the honeymoon stages of the relationship, but it’s been incredible actually. We’ve never had a team like this to support us,” she continued.
She noted producer Gavin Brown, who has produced the Tragically Hip and Metric, gave the new record a more of a rock edge.
“ There are lots of little sounds and vocal harmonies on it. It’s still got a lot of synth on it, but there are rock undertones,” she said adding the band didn’t feel much pressure for recording their major label debut.
“We didn’t feel too much pressure. We wanted to go in and make the best album that the songs would allow,” she continued adding Ryan Guldemond wrote the lyrics for the album as usual.
“ Lyrics are Ryan’s domain. He builds the bare bones and we build around them,” she said adding the band builds their music around them.
While she plays keyboards on the album, she noted vocals are her primary contribution.
“ Vocals is what I went to school for. I love playing piano, but vocals are my first love. They are a challenge, but they are good challenge. They’re how I get to express myself,” she continued noting the band work a lot on vocal harmonies.
“ Oh yes. That’s how the band started. Ryan, Molly and me spend a lot of time together in a room working on the vocals,” she said.
While the band has the new album out, they choose songs from all five albums for their live show.
“We create a set that caters to everyone. We’ll plays songs from the new album, but we feel it would be a disservice to the fans not to play the songs that made them fall in love with the band in the first place,” she said adding they are still playing much of the new album including the latest single “ Get Out the Way,” as well as “Monkey Tree, “Reaper Man,” and the title track “Very Good Bad Things.”
“ We’re playing 20 songs in the set so unfortunately someone will go home disappointed,” she observed adding people are responding to the new music.
“I feel like people really like the new single ‘Get Out the Way.”’ Even if they didn’t like it the first time they heard it on the radio, it is starting to grow on them,” she said.
“ And people are really liking ‘Reaper Man’ too.”
She said the band is excited to return to Lethbridge.
“Audiences have always been really supportive of us in Lethbridge. I remember playing the old firehall a few years ago. on this tiny little stage. We loved it. But we’re excited to play Average Joes again,” she said.
The band has released a couple of videos for the album already including an unusual one for ‘Monkey Tree.” featuring the band wearing paper maché masks of various animals and contorting themselves into unusual positions.
“Yes it is very weird. But the music itself is pretty weird so the video reflects that,” she said adding videos are a collaborative process — for the most part.
“Essentially the director will decide what the video looks like and will send us treatment and we’ll look them over. We’ll get three or four of them from different directors,” she said.
“There’s us dressed up in costumes and contortionists. It was directed by this hyper creative director and we told her to just go for it and she did, she said adding they didn’t get to keep any of the masks or costumes.
“ There's this really amazing hand crafted origami fox mask. Someone did a lot of work on it, so it probably went back to them because you never know when you’ll need a hand crafted origami fox mask,” she chuckled.
Some of their videos, like the video for their 2012 hit ‘Let’s Fall in Love’ are a lot more serious.
“That one was quite collaborative. Ryan and the director wanted a Raging Bull feel to it. a lot of people didn’t like it, she said adding the graphic fight scene.
“It’s about relationships and how people can get tired of each other in them about how there can be a lot of anger and how they can come to hate each other and how there can be a lot of bitterness toward ex each other. You see it in married couples bickering. You may have experienced it,” she observed.
“It’s not supposed to be a real fight. it takes place in a daydream,” she said adding the song is more about how couples can inflict long standing emotional damage on each other.
Mother Mother and USS play Average Joes at 9 p.m., Dec. 2. Tickets cost $35 in advance.
