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NPR’s Ayesha Rascoe speaks with Matt Lowell, frontman of the band Lo Moon, in regards to the group’s new album, “I Want You Approach Extra Than Luck.”
AYESHA RASCOE, HOST:
Musician Matt Lowell feels a variety of nostalgia for his highschool, so he returned to rural northeastern Connecticut throughout the pandemic.
MATT LOWELL: I had this excessive want to return to the place that I found my voice.
RASCOE: The Pomfret Faculty is a boarding college that is been round for the reason that late 1800s, with a number of the unique buildings nonetheless standing.
LOWELL: After I obtained into the chapel, I imply, I actually simply put my telephone down and determined that I used to be going to spend a number of hours there and simply see what occurred and recorded all the pieces. I imply, I recorded something that I sang or performed on the guitar and despatched it round to the band, and it positively – it sparked one thing.
RASCOE: That spark grew into a brand new album referred to as “I Want You Approach Extra Than Luck.”
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “BORROWED HILLS”)
LO MOON: (Singing) Boys of the order poison the water. They go it round. Boys of the order poison the water. They snort as they drown. I have to get out, get out of this city.
RASCOE: I spoke with Matt Lowell a number of days in the past. Earlier than we obtained too deep into speaking about his band’s new album, although, I needed to set the file straight.
I’ve been to Connecticut and gotten Connecticut pizza. You are somebody from New York, however you’ve gotten these ties to Connecticut. What’s the greatest pizza to you?
LOWELL: I do not know. New York pizza takes it for me.
RASCOE: (Laughter).
LOWELL: It simply – it does. It does. Within the quiet nook of Connecticut – which is the place I went to highschool, in northeastern Connecticut – the pizza was simply actually dangerous.
RASCOE: OK.
LOWELL: Like, actually thick dough and a lot grease.
RASCOE: OK.
LOWELL: Simply approach an excessive amount of grease.
RASCOE: That did not give you the results you want, so you are going to keep on with the New York pizza. What does Connecticut imply to you?
LOWELL: Nicely, you recognize, it is a – it was a spot for discovery for me. It was the place I spent my adolescence. You recognize, it began as a college that I went to as a result of I used to be recruited to play hockey there. After which hastily, 9/11 occurred, and I used to be residing on this campus. My world was simply turned the wrong way up. My household was in New York.
And it actually impressed me to try to put a poem that I had written referred to as “A Metropolis Cries Its Tears” to music, after which I carried out it in entrance of my total college at that chapel. That was the second that modified your complete course of my life, and likewise that music was one other music that I wrote December 2020 within the chapel. I simply stored singing this line, I hear the voice of my father. And I wrapped the entire music “Connecticut” round that one line.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “CONNECTICUT”)
LO MOON: (Singing) I hear the voice of my father with no shadow of doubt. There is no extra hope within the water. I am unable to imagine we have run out.
RASCOE: With these traces, like, what was that about? What have been you making an attempt to convey?
LOWELL: Nicely, I believe I used to be again on this place to type of rediscover the surprise that I had once I was at that age, which was about enjoying music and simply – and expressing myself.
RASCOE: The listening to of the voice of your father – I imply, that does not must be your literal father or something like that, however what did that symbolize for you?
LOWELL: Yeah, I believe it simply symbolized consolation. And once you’re misplaced, you recognize – I believe all of us do that – would not matter if it is your precise father, such as you stated, or figurative. It is like, you are truly on the lookout for some other place for solutions. And if I hear the voice of my precise father, there is a consolation about that.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “CONNECTICUT”)
LO MOON: (Singing) Now I’ve obtained nothing to lose. I’ve obtained nothing to show. I’ve obtained nothing to lose ‘trigger it is simply an phantasm.
RASCOE: You recognize, I am listening to a number of the – some affect, perhaps, of, like, Peter Gabriel in these tracks. Is that only a synthesizer, or is he one in all your influences?
LOWELL: No, he is one in all my influences. I completely love Peter Gabriel. And I bear in mind the primary time my dad performed me “So” by Peter Gabriel. It was, like, one in all his favourite information when it got here out and altered my life. He is a genius.
RASCOE: I do know that you simply wish to learn. I hear that F. Scott Fitzgerald and J.D. Salinger are a few of your favourite authors. The title of your album, “I Want You Approach Extra Than Luck,” that is one thing that you simply got here up with – from – whilst you have been studying?
LOWELL: So there is a graduation speech given by the creator David Foster Wallace, and the transcript of it’s referred to as “This Is Water.”
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
DAVID FOSTER WALLACE: There are these two younger fish swimming alongside, and so they occur to satisfy an older fish swimming the opposite approach, who nods at them and says, morning, boys. How’s the water? And the 2 younger fish swim on for a bit. And that finally one in all them appears over on the different and goes, what the hell is water?
(LAUGHTER)
LOWELL: And it is principally in regards to the training of life, that the – your training does occur in colleges, and it does occur when – you recognize, when your lecturers are instructing you about no matter it’s you are studying. However the training of life is simply residing life and making errors and studying about what it means to exist on this world.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
WALLACE: …Which has nearly nothing to do with information and all the pieces to do with easy consciousness – consciousness of what’s so actual and important, so hidden in plain sight throughout us on a regular basis, that we’ve to maintain reminding ourselves time and again, that is water.
LOWELL: The final line of that speech – he says, I want you far more than luck. And I have been obsessive about that line for the reason that day I learn it, and I might been making an attempt to write down a music with that line. And eventually, with “Water,” it – I awoke, and I used to be like, oh, that is the road for this music.
(SOUNDBITE OF LO MOON SONG, “WATER”)
LOWELL: And I simply cherished it as an album title. I simply thought it stated a lot about precisely what I am making an attempt to precise is there was a second in time in my life the place I used to be in a spot like Connecticut for my training. However you be taught that your training is a lifelong pursuit, and that is actually your training, resides your life.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “WATER”)
LO MOON: (Singing) Goodbye. I want you far more than luck. Goodbye. I want you far more than luck.
RASCOE: That is Matt Lowell of the band Lo Moon. Thanks a lot for becoming a member of us.
LOWELL: Thanks.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “WATER”)
LO MOON: (Singing) I do not want my innocence simply so I can lose it once more. Soaking in…
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