By Olivia Hough and Vivian Dobbie-Glazier
The DMA’S are back. Their fourth studio album, ‘How Many Dreams?’, is set to be released on the 31st of March and they have a huge 16-date Australian tour lined up starting in September later this year.
With all this excitement brewing and new music dropping, we sat down with guitarist Matt Mason from the DMA’S to have a deep dive about the new album and talk about all things from crafting setlists to Olympic sports.
Since 2014 the DMA’S have transformed and shifted sonically in each new release. With a dedicated fan base and extensive discography we wanted to know what it was like being an artist and a part of a group that’s grown and changed over the last decade.
DOBBIE-GLAZIER:
Is there [a sound or band that] you’re tired of being compared to as an artist, after going through all this changing development as a music group?
MASON:
I feel like the fact that we have changed a bit over the years means that we’re getting compared to other people less than less?
Very early on, we were compared to other bands, but I feel like that was because people didn’t really know us that well and they were just being a bit lazy. The comparisons seemed to have stopped after all the music that we’ve released, we’ve [developed] a unique sound. So there’s less to compare us to, which is great, I think.
Their new single ‘Something We Are Overcoming’ showcases a new sense of growth and a celebration of nostalgia from the sound that fans are familiar with. It feels like their music has graduated from what was started on ‘The Glow’ to even bigger stages, bigger crowds and bigger build ups.
HOUGH:
So it’s a very anthem-like, ‘ravey’ song. We’re wondering, when you guys are in the recording studio, when you’re writing and getting your music together, if you’re envisioning performing it for a festival?
MASON:
[‘How Many Dreams?’] is the first time we’ve recorded an album and gone into the studio with how we were going to perform it live [and how] we sort of imagined how it was going to be experienced live.
It was evident that this focus on the live performance was influenced by the lack of that experience over the last few years, alongside a hunger from crowds to mosh and scream together again. Mason’s excitement for the DMA’S upcoming live performances was infectious.
MASON:
Because to us, it is the most important thing these days. I definitely took it for granted. So now it’s the main focus of almost everything that we do.
A new release that we are excited to hear live is ‘Olympia’ with its reminisce of dramatic rock ballads and intoxicating riffs. We wanted to know what inspired Mason to write the lyrics of a song that seems to yearn for an escape and a place to go when it’s all too much. And yet, we found his response refreshing and ultimately real.
MASON:
It was during the Olympic Games. I never really watched it [before]. I think it was because it was during lockdown, I was just watching it at home, sort of stuck inside. And I kind of got a bit obsessed with it.
But also like the venue, there’s a few venues called Olympia, like there’s one in Paris and there’s one in Dublin.
This part of Mason’s answer was intriguing. The spark coming from an amalgamation of different places and environments. It showed that not every piece of writing necessarily has to come from this place of turmoil or grandiose conception. The recipe for ‘Olympia’s’ catchiness was hiding and waiting in Mason’s immediate environment.
MASON:
Yeah, I’m not that great at writing lyrics. So they’re often a melting pot of a few random things I often do at the last minute. So when I get asked about what songs mean, I never really even remember what I was feeling at the time.
After a pause, in a moment of pure curiosity… absolutely dying to know…
DOBBIE-GLAZIER:
You said you were watching the Olympic Games. Did you have a favourite sport?
MASON:
I think it was weightlifting. If they pick it up, they win. You know it was easy for me to follow. Because it’s so simple.
In a very smooth-not strange segway from weightlifting back to Mason’s music career, we were keen to understand the preparation for such a large tour. We wondered how a band with years of releasing music creates a setlist? What do they omit? What do they include and why?
MASON:
Yeah, that’s a funny one we’re actually going into the studio next week to begin rehearsals for the set, and we’re gonna start getting [the set list] all ready.
We’re actually less concerned about adding in new songs, but more concerned with adding in old songs, like, that’s what’s on everyone’s mind. It’s the songs that we’re on the setlist, like four years ago, that we’re going to bring back.
I went to see the Arctic Monkeys the other day, we supported them, and we stuck around to watch them afterwards, and I didn’t realise how many of their songs I knew. It was just hearing super old songs, the whole crowd, everyone just went crazy, you know? And I think it’s super important. Sometimes people just want to hear your really old shit. More so than the new shit.
HOUGH:
Yeah, I think I’d go a bit feral hearing ‘Melbourne’ or ‘Delete’ live.
MASON:
Yeah, that’s what I mean, we’ll probably always play ‘Delete’.
Writing this together now, Hough notices that according to her Spotify history, the first time she ever listened to a DMA’S song was the first of June 2017. The song, ‘Delete’ ended up sound tracking her adolescence and is a hallmark of songs she grew up listening to. To hear that the DMA’S would continue playing the song warmed her damn heart.
MASON:
Melbourne is a good one, you know, that’s a song that we could put on [the setlist]. My Mum is always telling me that people are always complaining on the Facebook Fan Club about the fact that we don’t play [our first album live much anymore]… There’s a few songs that are just constantly brought up in the fan club that people really want to see… so I think we’re going to ask my Mum what everyone’s saying.
Each new iteration of a DMA’S era brings in a change to the visual identity of the music and album. This is something that can’t be ignored with the lead up to ‘How Many Dreams?’. The focus in typography crafting the artwork for the lead singles and album is so visually striking and makes the music feel alive, so much so that it was impossible not to ask about.
HOUGH:
We wanted to know if you guys are involved in the [graphic design] and what the process of developing the artwork for the album is?
MASON:
We love all of the album art design. Our contact is Matt de Jong (@go_dejong) and he came and met us in the studio when we were recording in London a while ago now. We spent a couple hours just sitting with him.
He’s done a few Tyler, the Creator albums and he’s done a few Interpol ones. He’s super, super talented and done some amazing work and we just loved everything that he did. So we weren’t really that involved.
We’ve always been blessed with having good artists on board. Our friend, Joanna Frank did a lot of our last stuff [The Glow]. Just super lucky knowing good visual artists. If you have a good relationship with good visual artists as a musician it’s a great thing.
Their upcoming Australian tour in September felt like a good place to pivot back too. The overwhelming nature of visiting so many cities to perform to fans from all around the world. Yet each new album release is stronger than the last. We wanted to investigate what those routines and steps are in album making alongside touring.
DOBBIE-GLAZIER:
After this tour run for this album finishes and you guys possibly get to work on another album, what is the process of returning to a place of creativity when album making after being on the road for a long time? What’s the sort of process of getting into that?
MASON:
We’re always recording. You know I’m in my little music studio right now. I was just sort of coming up with a few little things before. I have a little portable studio that I take on the road with me and we set it up on the tour bus or in hotel rooms. Always recording and even on tour. So it never really stops.
But usually how it works is we’ll go off and do our own thing and then when it comes to coming up with small ideas, little song titles and melodies before album time. We’ll put all of these demos in a big SoundCloud folder and then we’ll pick from that and then get together and fine tune those ideas. The ideas are always flowing but organising those ideas kind of comes in with the three of us just a couple months before it’s crunch time for the album.
HOUGH:
I could imagine you’d be performing live and performing your older stuff on a setlist would send you back into what it was like five years ago and how that would influence your work going back to that place.
MASON:
What you’re listening to at the time often influences a lot of the music that you write. So you write when you’re on tour. You’re running into old friends when you’re on tour and running into people that you haven’t seen for a couple years. That can take you back creatively as well for sure.
HOUGH:
Yeah it really solidifies that brand and those sounds that you hear.
MASON:
Yeah. I really hadn’t thought of that before. But that’s totally true.
As we got closer to the end of the interview, we couldn’t help but try to squeeze out any sort of information about where Mason and the DMA’S could be heading with their sound next. Each new single release is always an exciting experience. Curiosity got the better of us. What could we possibly be hearing post ‘How Many Dreams?’ when a future album rolled in?
HOUGH:
On a personal level do you have direction of other genres or anything you want to see from your own band in the future?
MASON:
I really want to make an album like our first album. We’d kind of put the least amount of effort into it. We recorded it at home in Johnny’s bedroom and you can hear people in the background talking. It was very messy in a way but super creatively free.
I really want to make a record sonically like that and then hopefully it will carry on the emotional sort of feeling we got from that carefree attitude.
DOBBIE-GLAZIER:
It makes complete sense. Just bringing all this stuff you learned and taking it back to then and recontextualising it to now.
MASON:
I know that’s what a lot of fans want. A lot of the time there’s talk about ‘oh I wish they would just make their first album again’. People think they want their favourite artists to make the same album over and over again. There’s a bit of truth in that but I feel like if artists did that, people would get sick of it.
For our fellow readers who are also creatives, this one was for you guys…
DOBBIE-GLAZIER:
Something I’ve always found interesting in the creative process as well is hitting a wall or a slump. What is the sort of process in overcoming that?
HOUGH:
Because we’re always in a slump. Like this is personal advice to us.
MASON:
You know, often just buying a new instrument can be really inspirational or borrowing an instrument if you don’t want to buy one. If you can trade an instrument with one your friend has. Just swap it for a week. Because a new instrument can inspire you in so many ways, it doesn’t have to be totally different, it just has to feel a little bit different. It can just bring all these sorts of new kind of musical ideas to you. I know that’s just like a specific music thing. So I don’t know if that’s going to help everybody.
DOBBIE-GLAZIER:
It definitely does, you can apply that to other stuff as well.
MASON:
It just has to be a tiny change in your environment, I suppose. Or just like the feeling under your fingers. I don’t know what a good analogy would be for like music journalists. Maybe try a different keyboard or a different pair of headphones. Just small changes can go a long way.
Mason is a man who has been a part of creative success as DMA’S continue with a strong music career. It was inspiring to speak to someone who has ‘made it big’. However, his humble and polite character was refreshing.
Earlier in the month, Catalyst Magazine released our first print edition of the year around the theme of pleasure. So Naturally we had to ask…
HOUGH:
So, what brings you pleasure?
MASON:
I live with my partner, and we’re on a bit of a health kick at the moment. So not much. I don’t really know… cooking, I guess. I’ve been doing a lot of writing sessions. I do a lot of hiking and things like that. Just like outdoorsy, healthy shit these days.
We feel truly lucky and grateful that Mason was able to spend some time with us and answer our questions. And we are eagerly counting down the days until their new album ‘How Many Dreams?’ is released on March 31st. You can pre-order or save in advance here! And the DMA’S will tour Australia starting in September and tickets are available here!
Written by,
Olivia Hough (Editor)
Vivian Dobbie-Glazier (Entertainment Officer and Designer)
Header Image and Album Covers via Mushroom Group Media