Real Estate (Interview)

Real Estate arose at a time when summery beach pop was all the rage. While most bands were eventually swept away by a tidal wave, the New Jersey foursome managed to stand their ground over the malicious forces of early hype. Days, their sophomore release, is mainly a continuation of their classic pop sound with a higher fidelity than their debut; its lackadaisical mood is laced with richly melodic hooks that impress in a subtle, unassuming way.

By way of a transatlantic phone call, Matthew Mondanile took some time from their promotional tour across the UK to speak to No Ripcord about the band's production technique, their nurtured collaborative dynamics, and the concept of timelessness in music. 

When comparing your self-titled debut to Days, the production quality has a fuller, higher fidelity. Was that what the band was aiming for from the start?

From the beginning, we were trying to get a studio to document the songs well. It was recorded in New Paltz, NY with Kevin McMahon, who also recorded for the Walkmen and Titus Andronicus. He did a great job recording the record and not making it sound too hi-fi, but well representing the songs sonically.

A handful of songs in Days, like All the Same and Younger than Yesterday, have been played in a live setting before their studio versions. Were these two songs a starting point in terms of assembling its overall ambiance?

At first, we had recorded about twelve or thirteen songs, but we wanted to round out just ten songs. They were all written about the same time.

With all your individual side projects, what drives all of you to come back to this particular project out of all the others?

Martin [Courtney] writes most of the songs, but he doesn’t come up with all the guitar parts. I come up with those most of the time and Alex [Bleeker] comes up with the bass parts and harmonies, so it’s kind of a collaborative thing.  It isn’t going to really going sound the same unless it’s all of us together. Once Martin plays a few chords, I’ll just come up with a quick part. It’s not a long process; we work really quickly and intuitively.

Real Estate seems to fully embrace the concept of working hard and making a living. Why is it so damning for indie bands to act so coy about disclosing their financial interests, as if they’d lose any artistic authenticity?

I can understand why artists don’t want to share their opinions or attitude recording or touring. From our end, we’ve just trying to work our hardest at the end of the day. And it’s just fun.

Seeing as Days continues to embrace the sounds of eighties jangle pop, what aspect of that sound appeals to the band as a whole? Your classic approach to songwriting really feels timeless.

I have no idea [laughs]. If people find it timeless, that’s cool. But I feel like it’s traditional songwriting, and we’re just trying to make it accessible and as full-sounding as possible. I don’t know what makes it timeless per se because, in my opinion, most music is timeless. Art itself is timeless. I think if you look back at our music, you’ll have trouble pointing from what time it is exactly. It points to different elements from different eras, so that might be a way of making it sound timeless.

The songwriting in Days provokes a feeling of uncertainty, of waiting for events to happen at their natural pace. At the same time, it’s awfully simple and interconnected.

Well, Martin writes most of the lyrics and I write most of the melodies. For him, and me we’ve become more comfortable with each other over the years. He’s matured as a lyricist. That’s good. He’s more literate and reflective and uses a lot of metaphors. (At this point, Matt stops and staggers).

Ok, so…

Um, I don’t know. (laughs) I guess I could go further with that, but I kind of get lost in that whole thing. I think it’s just the fact that we’ve been playing together for years and we’re just getting more and more comfortable with it. We’ve been playing music now more than ever.

That’s an acceptable answer.

Ok, thanks man. Awesome.

Days is available now through Domino music. Read Benjamin Jones' review for No Ripcord here.