Children Collide crashed into the Australian music scene back in the mid-noughties when grunge was still a dirty word. Now that they have grown a little older and their sound has grown a little cleaner, they are set to release their sophmore album
Theory of Everything later this month. In the
video for the lead single 'Jelly Legs', we get to see parts of lead singer Johnny Mackay that neither we or he had seen before. Now that we've seen inside his body, we decided to get inside his head when we interviewed him in Melbourne last week.
Georgia Frances King: It's been a few years since you released your debut album
The Long Now. How different was the process of making
Theory of Everything?
Johnny Mckay: We’re a bit more relaxed about it. I don’t know if it was that different, actually. Everyone gets here and does their job. It’s all kind of sorted out before we go in there, really. We did a bit of pre-production where we went through all of the songs and changed some things – sometimes you might try to get to a chorus quicker if you think that it’s going to be a single. Or you chew a bit of fat off. But that’s a good process to go through. Because the last thing that you want to be thinking about when I’m or we’re writing a song is how it’s going to work on radio or whatever. You can hear that with bands sometimes.
GFK: Totally - you can tell when's it's contrived.
JM: Yeah, so it’s best with me just to write the song and let it come out however. It could end up sound like fucking Infected Mushroom, or crossed with Johnny Cash. It could come out with something really different. But at least it’s there. Then we can worry about if it’s going to fit on the record or if the arrangement is right later on.
GFK: On a really basic level, I reckon that you've got the mix right when you unconsciously start tapping or nodding away to a song.
JM: Yeah,
M.I.A. does that to me for some reason. I’ve been standing in an M.I.A. gig, and no one around me was dancing, and I could not stop dancing! [flails arms]
GFK: Well, what do you think of the new album then?
JM: I love it. I fucking love it.
GFK: You’re one of the few, in that case! It’s getting slated. She's going
a little nuts.
JM: Yeah, well everyone loves to slate her. But I think she’s amazing. I love the new album, and I
love ‘
Born Free’.
GFK: So do I. As a redhead though, it affected me in a slightly different way…
JM: (laughs) Oh, the video? Yeah, it’s an amazing video.
GFK: Well, speaking of video clips, the one for
‘Jelly Legs’, the lead single off your upcoming album is, erm, ‘interesting’. At the start, it kind of reminds me of all of those old Rage clips from when I was growing up – grainy girls in their underwear, playing guitars with giant televisions for heads. And then it cuts to the doctor holding that telescopic worm thing… And suddenly it’s up your nose. And then we have a full view of your trachea…
JM: Yeah. I’m not sure if that was a good move or not now… Video Hits won’t play it. It was a bit much. It’s a bit much for some of the more commercial stations to play.
GFK: Well… it’s all natural, I guess?
JM: But it’s not the nicest thing to watch. I watched our manger watch it for the first time, and she was just cringing.
GFK: How did it work? It goes up your nose and—
JM: Up your nose and back down your throat. And when you swallow, you’ve got a metal tube in your throat, and it’s
really disgusting… A lot of people pass out when they’re getting it done. And I nearly passed out! And also, they don’t normally leave anything up there for more than about two minutes, but because I went through the song twice, it was up there for more then eight minutes. So they said that I had the record for their place – I’m sure it’s not the world record though.
GFK: … Ew.
JM: And apparently I have a have a clean bill of health! So there’s no throat cancer, no nodules…
GFK: I saw a pretty weird interview with you on YouTube about how the song premise came to you in a dream about your ex-girlfriend?
JM: About her dying in a bizarre hunting accident with her grandfather? Yeah.
GFK: You must have some weird Freudian wishes for her…
JM: Apparently! [laughs] Or you could just take it as her being ‘dead’ to me. But that whole song really is about that shit feeling that you have when you break up with someone you love, or when you have your heart broken. And we
crushed each other. And then there are those few lines in the chorus that refer to her dying in that hunting accident. [laughs]
GFK: I’m sure she’s going to
love hearing that one.
JM: She’s heard it. We don’t speak anymore.
GFK: I want to talk about that cool tarot card artwork thing you’ve got going on [they have assigned a tarot card to each of the 13 tracks on the album, and will be giving away specialised artwork with each CD].
JM: Yeah, I thought everyone would go for that idea. It’s also about value adding to the physical product, in a way!
GFK: So that people will actually
buy the album?
JM: Yeah! Nice artwork, and we’re going to slot in a random card. So if you buy a record, you get a card. And it’s one of 13. You don’t know what you’re going to get.
GFK: So maybe like Pokemon trading cards, people will buy 13 or more copies of your album so that they can get the full deck?
JM: Maybe! I just like giving people a little something extra.
GFK: Do you feel that by linking the cards to certain songs that you’re pigeonholing them into a certain vibe or interpretation?
JM: Well, no! That’s the point. The point is that the cards can be taken in a million different directions, just like a song. We can link them together conceptually, but they’re still completely open to interpretation. And like a song, if you put it with this group of people or this group of people, or this group of emotions or that situation, it can be interpreted [differently]. Or the complete opposite. Just like a tarot card!
GFK: You have a lot of side projects. Do you have to fill your life with creative outlets so that you stay motivated?
JM: Or the other way around: I’m creatively motivated, so I have to have a lot going on.
GFK: Ahh, okay.
JM: Like, I was talking to my ex-girlfriend the other day, and—
GFK: Not the one that you killed off via song in a freak hunting accident?
JM: [laughs] No no, a different one! Since I’ve been off tour, I don’t know what to do with myself. So I’ve been sitting in my room writing music, but going a bit loopy ‘n’ shit. And she’s going, “I’ve told you!” Because I keep going, “What do normal people do with their lives? How do you keep yourself from being depressed and becoming like a mad scientist?” And she’s like, “Because most people have
hobbies, Johnny!” And I’m like, “But my hobby is my work!” And she’s like, “So you need to get some other hobbies that aren’t music”. So what I’m doing when I haven’t been doing Children Collide is all of this other music by myself. But I think that it’s sending my a bit loopy. I need to use another part of my brain. Maybe I need to learn a language… I think I need to take up painting. Or, umm, fucking accounting or something.
GFK: I hear you. I was thinking of picking up croquet, if you want to join me.
JM: They should put croquet on up on Rooftop [an open-air city view bar in Melbourne with fake grass just above where we were interviewing]. That shit’s actually a really good idea.
GFK: That could be
really dangerous, but ultra fun. Hey, you could do you album launch up there! And turn it into a croquet pitch!
JM: That’s a really good idea!
GFK: And we could get a bunch of CAE people up there to teach us languages at the same time…
JM: Yeah! You can only play croquet in Latin.
Theory of Everything is out on August 27th through Universal. More at
myspace.com/childrencollide