Lush UK electronic duo get Straight to the Point...

We managed to lay off the egg nogg enough over Xmas to get it otgether to pull up a chair in front of an open fire & get into the groove with Moscow Youth Cult - a fantastic due who we see going onwards and upwards through 2012. Read on...

MYC songs are lyrically quite abstract, oblique. Where do these come from and what could they mean?

Dan: Well they definitely tell stories but we actively defer from writing love songs, for example, because the world has enough of those. I’m interested in avant-garde poetry and I’m drawn to the idea of texts that subvert preferred readings. By that, I mean we’re more interested in the way words occupy space within music and how they dress the song. Lyrically, MYC is about the imagery and if that resonates with someone else then we’ve succeeded.

What is the most important element in the MYC songwriting process?

Jon: Probably the part where we make stuff sound like it shouldn't sound. Like putting synths in the microwave or drums through My First Computer or whatever. The processing of sound can add a lot - I'd like to think our approach and attention to that really gives it an emotional resonance. Otherwise it's the bit where Dan makes the massive aural mess I send him into a sublime pop song.

How often do you think about death?

Dan: Several times a day. Not always with despair though.

In contemporary music what does 'originality' mean to you? Is it still possible to make new, original works?

Jon: It does feel like we're at a real post-post-post modern juncture - pop music in particular has reached such a saturation point that it's almost impossible to create something 'new' because it already exists in some form or another (no matter how much some self-facilitating media node will tell you otherwise). Instead I think originality can come from the way we assimilate our influences: there are still plenty of innovative, striking ways of doing this and a lot of excitement can come from that. I do think too much weight is put onto the notion of originality in music though: it almost feels it gets mixed up with authenticity- the real power of music comes from hearing that the person it's coming from means it, which in turn can give it a real emotional resonance.

Vintage horror/sci-fi films are a real cornerstone for MYC too - what are your three favourite film soundtracks?

Dan: Bleurgh…er… Brad Fiedel’s theme from ‘Just Before Dawn’ (1981). Anything by Goblin. Anything by John Carpenter (pre-1990s). I’ve not heard a horror soundtrack in this century that matches anything from the 70s/80s. It’s all generic strings or two-dimensional metal. It’s so rubbish and very, very sad.

What are your non-musical inspirations?

Jon: The fuzzy decay of VHS and cassette tape; 70s sci-fi and horror films and their jarring and often unnervingly other-worldly atmospheres - stuff like The Shout, Solaris and Hausu; JG Ballard short stories; Philip K Dick; HP Lovecraft and any weird institutional or religious symbolism that we come across.

Favourite music of 2011?

Jon: Not necessarily stuff that was released in 2011 but music I discovered nevertheless - Future Islands 'In Evening Air' which packs a real emotional, triumphant punch through it's evocative electro pop; some Italo Disco from Koto; John Carpenter soundtracks...

Dan: Same for me – not necessarily released in 2011 but: ‘Redlights’ by Salem, just about anything by Com Truise, ‘Short Road’ by Wax Stag and ‘Video Games’ by Lana Del Ray (sorry for being obvious). Also I can’t stop listening to ‘Try Sleeping with a Broken Heart’ by Alicia Keys - amazing voice, amazing production.

I guess there's a certain diversity and wide breadth of influence to MYC’s sound. Where do you see it developing?

Dan: Lots more experimentation both with sound production and song-writing. Jon and I both love pop as much as we love po-faced electronica. I think the interest lies in creating chaos and then trying to capture and contain that in a three minute pop song: a bit like wrestling with Leviathan or cramming Slimer into one of those Ghostbusters traps. Ultimately I want us to reach the stratosphere and then go into freefall – burning up on re-entry.

What does 2012 hold in store for MYC?

Jon: Our first full-length cultural dispatch - Happiness Machines - which I hope will define a new era in wonky, nostalgio-noise-pop. We're releasing on the very-amazing LoAF Recordings - a real home from home where we're privileged to be alongside some amazing new talent like Enjoyed and NZCA/Lines. A single should precede it in the new year then we'll hopefully be taking to the road playing it at abandoned nuclear bunkers, old people’s homes, graveyards and sterile mega-offices which appear to go on forever. It's going to be totally fucking Mexico.

In the future dystopian society - which will emerge later this year – where music is outlawed and it’s constantly The Olympics, what would MYC do instead?

Dan: Well I like drawing cartoons and Jon is an excellent painter so we’d probably work as drones in the Soma factory.

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