Of course, all concept album’s are usually ego-centric exercises in tedium, but the Atlanta, Georgia, five-piece aren’t likely indie-concept album superheroes. For that, many would look to someone like Bradford Cox or Ed Droste or James Mercer or Ben Gibbard or Robin Peckold, and that tedium would still likely raise its ugly head.
But Andy Hull is a singular figure. Built like a lumberjack and sporting a beard that would make poet-era Jim Morrison, or bed-in-era John Lennon, or even Ulysses S Grant look twice and feel a pang of jealousy, Hull does, however, present a unique case as an artist.
The first Manchester Orchestra album, I’m Like A Virgin Losing A Child was created when Hull was still in his teens, and its follow up Mean Everything To Nothing was incredibly accomplished, and for someone so young to be onto his band’s third album speaks volumes to his character.
It’s a very effusive character that Hull is, as well. Married at an age where most of us are still trying to figure out how to translate the $40 in our wallet into a night of partying and hopefully convincing someone to do things to our dangly bits, raised in the suburban American south and also happy to speak about his spirituality – insofar as Hull believes in God, but not religion – there are few people who present such a singularly intriguing proposition. To put it bluntly, there’s no bullshit about Andy Hull. He’s open, funny, self-depreciative and eminently confident in his band’s ability to write great music.
And Slow Math is all about him.
Well, rather all about his perceptions of his relationship with his wife, with his bandmates, with his god, and with, importantly himself in dealing with all of those factors. It was actually during the recording of Simple Math that the band struck on the idea of giving the album an overarching theme. Indeed, it was just after their visit to Australia in 2009 that that band turned to figuring out how to approach their third record.
“It started then,” Hull nods of that Australian trip, “we started recording songs that we had… something like 100 songs, and we got it down to 27 full band songs that we all really loved. Then the ‘idea’ of Simple Math really formed,” he muses, “the songs really started to dwell around this super-personal stuff, so it was like ‘well, why don’t we actually make this a concept album and do it the right way?'” Hull chuckles.
“So we kind of created this conceptual record about me, and my wife, and my god and my band and my friends, all in these songs.”
The idea Simple Math follows is one of Hull dealing with a set of stories where he tries to unravel the meaning of those interlocking relationships and the way each deals with different situations and the way the resulting emotions are communicated. It’s powerful, but not overpowering.
According to Hull, the decision to roll with that combination of ideas was an easy one. “It all just happens every time,” he says of realising that his inner workings were ripe for an interlocking narrative, “it’s all just progressively getting an idea that you feel like ‘yeah, that’ll work’: it’s all just inspiration.
“And the way inspiration works is amazing to me,” he adds suddenly, explaining how the process of exploring his innermost thoughts impacted his way of examining his life, “it always has been. So the lyrics at the end of the process – and toward the end of the record – ended up being far more different than what was originally written, because I was far more calm, and grateful… and I don’t know… a ‘steady’ place.”
Essentially, in the recording time of Simple Math, Hull found that he’d changed as a person from where he’d began the process: he was able to witness the evolution of himself, even aside from the actual concept of the album, and it’s something that makes it all the more affecting. “Absolutely man, absolutely,” he agrees. “How old are you?”
“27”, is the reply.
“So I’m 24, and would you say, between my age and your age, there’s a difference in the way you look at things, the way you think of things?
“Of course. With maturity comes more knowledge, and you approach life differently.”
“Right!” Hull cheers. “So that’s what’s exciting about records, and the records we’re gonna make. I’m just getting there,” he grins. “This thing,” he adds of Simple Math, “we can’t stop listening to it. This record, well, immediately it should take over, but the number one thought you should have when you listened to it is ‘I wanna hear that again’. That’s badass,” he laughs.
“That’s kind of the best part about the record. So we tried to write a short record, and we were taking songs off that we loved, but they wouldn’t have worked. What we’ve made is hopefully for our fans another great chapter in the catalogue of where we’re heading and what we’re able to do… and put any doubters of it aside. You either like our band, or you don’t like our band,” he adds blithely.
He makes a good point; Manchester Orchestra are a classic example of a band that, if you’re into them, it’s likely that you’re very into them. It plays to their strengths as well – they craft muscular pop, with a hint of punchy, malevolent rock, and on Simply Math, they’ve added a certain grandiosity to their sound. There are more strings, more horns, and a far more expansive approach to their songwriting.
“Nobody ever came in and said ‘that’s a good single’ – ever,” Hull chrips. “We finished it and looked around and were like, ‘oh shit, we forgot’,” he laughs. “Like, ‘We didn’t write an I’ve Got Friends (their conquering single from ’09) … oh shit’,” he chuckles. “We made what we made… and what we made is better than that entirely.
“That’s kinda the whole purpose of what we do,” he continues, “to be more excellent than we were before…. And we’re trying to achieve that in every way. We’re not saying we’ve gone away from nasty, heavy rock at all… it’s just that this is this record right here; that’s all, and we really think that people will be affected by it. We created this thing that we feel is very, very powerful.”
Powerful is something Simple Math certainly is. It’s all-enveloping, and for Hull to put himself, and his inner dialogue, on such display takes an impressive amount of stones.
“People used to ask me the same sort of questions about God as they are about my wife, now,” he laughs. “And questions about god are far harder to answer than questions about my wife, like, I can tell you that ‘we’re all good’ my wife and I. It’s a harder thing to say when it comes to god. Sorry, I’ve got to do an Irish car bomb, give me a sec…”
There’s a “clink” and an “ahhhh”. Wait, an Irish car bomb? As in the drink that’s made up of Guinness, Jameson and Baileys that I was taught about one night… and can subsequently recall nothing else of the rest of that evening?
“Yessir,” is Hull’s reply.
Back to putting himself out there – it must be increasingly strange to be revealing ever more minutiae and his innermost thoughts to his band, let alone the wider world.
“Not really, honestly,” Hull replies. “These are my best friends and I see them every day. We all have homes less than a mile away from each other, and when I went through this stuff, they went through it with me. So they understand what exactly it’s about…they understand far more about Simple Math than they did during Mean Everything To Nothing. You have to realise that the entire record, all of Simple Math, is just the result of all the barbaric emotion of Mean Everything To Nothing: they could serve as counterpoints to each other. I just didn’t know how to phrase it then.”
Again, there’s that idea of personal evolution. That appreciating of subtlety and growing into one’s own ability to reason with, respond and react to life.
“I just wanted to make sure,” Hull nods, “with Mean Everything To Nothing, that there was no question we’d be around. Once we’d established that, this was like, well, we should try a challenge. Challenge ourselves, challenge our listeners, challenge our fans… That was a big part.
“None of that has changed at all,” he adds. “I really hope people like Simple Math, because otherwise no one is going to give a shit about all the other songs we’re working on. I’m apprehensive about it… I’m dying to know, as it’s been done since November, so the only people to hear it have been the people we trust, and they’ve been like ‘wow, there’s a lot there’. That’s what all of them said, and they’d also say ‘It’s all I listen to. Non-stop’… which is what I want to believe: that it’s fantastic,” he laughs, “but I won’t know until it’s out for other people to listen to.”
With Simple Math, and for Manchester Orchestra, that’s still not really the point. The fact that there are bands out there who are so open and brazenly honest about their need, their want, to continue to create art and make music, and push themselves beyond where most of us would want to draw a line, is what makes them so crucial.
“I guess the point is that our band is built on simplicity,” Hull says in conclusion, “and I think there isn’t anything that ‘simple’ about this record. So there are a ton of puzzles pieces, and that’s where our art and direction with that sort of stuff is: simple, but still extravagantly difficult.”
