The Maine talk keeping it fresh for 16 years, and being a 'brat' before brat was cool.
Celebrating 16 years and 9 albums, quintessential Arizona rockers The Maine earlier this year announced their return to Australia this September for the Sweet Sixteen tour.With concerts in Perth, Adelaide, Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne, The Maine have promised to throw things right back to 2008 playing fan favourites from their debut 'Can't Stop, Won't Stop' as well as revisiting tunes from all nine albums for a special night reliving memories and making new ones.
Over the years, The Maine have matured both personally and sonically from their inception, without compromising their integrity or losing their sincerity along the way. Fans have had the opportunity to grow up alongside the band, made possible by the band's adamant insistence on meeting every single fan for free after each show on a tour.
The band's ability to continuously flex their creativity and make dynamic records while maintaining their DIY mindset and keeping their authenticity has not gone unnoticed.
Over the course of their career, the band has toured and performed at festivals worldwide, including Soundwave Festival in 2011, as well as headlining their own sold-out festival in their home town.
We caught up with bassist Garrett Nickelsen ahead of their trip down under to chat about keeping it fresh, their 'brat' moment before 'brat' was cool, and what to expect at shows this September.
Seventeen years is a long time, and yourself and your band mates have maintained a really strong bond – which is awesome and beautiful. If you could go back and tell your former selves when you first started one piece of advice to get you through the next 17 years, what would it be?
Be free to explore earlier.
I think in the beginning, you're so afraid of losing the thing that's working that once you figure out that there's no right way to do it, you become free of feeling held back. As soon as we opened that door, like 'you can do whatever you want', I think everything changed; and it would have been awesome for it to have happened even sooner than it did. So yeah, be free to do whatever you want, and don't be afraid.
Is there a quintessential album/ song/ moment that you can pinpoint as one that represents that sentiment?
Our third album 'Pioneer', for sure. That was our like, 'f... it. Just do what you want' record. We were on a major label at the time, and they weren't excited about what we were doing and we kind of doubled down – we recorded nine songs without letting them know and were like, 'This is a record, and we don't care what you think'.
We brought it to them. We had it mixed by one of the biggest mixers you can get. We threw like $10,000 of our own money at it just to be like, 'this is how serious we are about this'. We showed it to our A&R guy at the time, and he was like, 'I don't get it', and we're like, 'Well, we don't care that you don't get it' – and then we recorded 17 more songs without letting them know.
On our second record, we felt constrained a little bit, and it felt like, 'Well what is this if we're not excited?' – and then it was like this freeing moment where so many songs were written at that time and it changed everything for us.
Right after that, we started our label, we put the record out by ourselves and we did four or five records in a row without any record label support. It opened the door and changed everything. You know, some people really liked it, and some people were confused, but over time it's the biggest thing that let us go and still be a band right now.
Putting an album out like 'Pioneer', it could come across, for lack of any other term, kind of a cocky moment?
We were a little cocky though, and I was okay with that. I think we were like, 'F... everything'. It was on our terms, and if no one liked it, it's okay. I mean, if we weren't cocky, we were at least bratty.
Yeah, and in regards to the actual concept of being a pioneer and going against the grain with major record labels and not conforming to the old way that a lot of releases would release, that's a really relevant conversation now. And for you guys, who changed things on album three – considering you've got nine now – it kind of feels like you did pioneer that at the time. Releasing independently and backing yourself creatively – it kind of does feel like you were writing the future even back then.
For sure it was.
I mean we always kind of felt like we were doing our own thing, even when we were on labels – and on labels now I feel like with a majority of the stuff it's like 'Ok, we're gonna do it our way, even though everyone is telling us, that's so dumb don't do it that way.' We're like, 'I don't care. It's fun. It's whatever.'
Like, there's so many bands that we've been surrounded by that just did it the normal way, and they're not a band anymore, or they're coming back and they're doing it now. But there's not very many that have stayed around for 17 years that were in our initial big group of the neon MySpace bands; and yeah, I think we've always done our own thing and that's why it's worked; and some people are into all the records, some people are into some and that's kind of the game we play.
Do many of the songs off ‘Pioneer’ get included in the current set? Have any become a staple?
There's definitely a couple songs – a song called 'Like We Did' that was on that record is probably our most played live song; and it's funny – Pat calls them set list divas; people that get upset when we're not changing the songs enough – they're like 'I think you should change this. I think you should change this, but you can't take 'Like We Did' out of the set.'
So even now, that one is for fans who've been a part of it for so long. That song sticks out as an important one. Then there's another song called 'Misery' that we play every once in awhile that people are really into. It's cool, we took such a big risk – and not every song was perfect and we all know that – but I think you could see the heart in all of it, and people can hear that. So, it wasn't our biggest record, but I think the goal of achieving the 'do what you want' thing is kind of stamped there.
Getting a little more specific into the set list. Obviously, you have nine years of catalogue to pull from. You've said that your drummer will come to the band with a massive list of songs and you'll cut it down from there. Everyone knows at this point that you get the crowd to pick between a few songs each night to change it up. But what are some of your personal favourite songs to play, whether you play them and include them all the time, or whether they're more ones you wish people would request more often?
My favourite songs are always the weird ones to do live.
There's a song called 'Ice Cave', we would play it live and we said we'd never record it, it's only going to be a live thing, and we would do it for years and years; and everyone was like, 'What's that f...ing song? How do I hear that song?'
So finally we recorded it, and I regret that we did. I thought it was such a cool thing. It's like this weird, bluesy tune that whenever we needed a weird song, or if we're playing a festival and want to play this long, weird tune, we'll always put it in the set.
There's another song called 'Kennedy Curse' that we do a different version of live than it is on the record that's fun. I just like the ones that we f... with a little bit. There's also new stuff that just feels great. There's a song 'Dirty, Pretty, Beautiful' that just feels awesome live. It's dancey, and it's like the most pop song we have. Fun as hell. So it's not like all the weird stuff, but it's just the way our band is, we like everything, you know?
How has the resurgence of emo music today and the desire for that nostalgic sound, helped or hindered The Maine?
It was definitely exciting. It was like, 'Oh sh.t, anything can happen at any point' and you have kind of no control over it.
So it was fun to dip toes back into emo for a second, but also people can call us whatever they want, and they can think about us however they want and the fact that, whatever we're associated with, had a moment, or had a moment again is exciting.
Festivals like When We Were Young was such a cool thing to happen. It makes people feel like, 'Oh my god, I actually like that stuff!', but kind of like with everything, we've always had one foot in and one foot out when we do our own thing. Like if you go to an emo night or something, we're not going to have the biggest song of the night like a Paramore or a Mayday or someone. They'll have that.
We've always been in this in-between, but it also hasn't made us want to make a 'Can't Stop' again. Like, that's not exciting. I'm sure that's what Paramore thinks too. Or Fall Out Boy. It's like, 'Cool! People are excited about that old stuff, but we're doing our new thing, and we're a great band and people like our new sh.t too.' So that's also awesome, all of it is cool. I'm just happy that we have had the opportunity to do other things as well.
Talking to your live experience a little bit. Is there anything that you've incorporated into your live show that have been inspired from seeing other artists play live?
One of the most fun parts of the set is when we play an old song called 'Girls Do What They Want'; we saw Green Day in 2009 or 2010 and they brought someone up onstage to play guitar; and we thought, 'This is so f...ing cool'. The fact that some little kid knew how to play 'Brainstew', it's cool.
So during 'Girls Do What They Want', John finds the person he knows doesn't know the words and he brings them up, he teaches them the song, and then sings it; and it's like the highlight of so many of our shows. It's so fun.
We've tried to think of a different song to do it with, because we've done this a lot, but it just fits too well and it's worked every time. It's such a fun close to the end of the set – 'we're all in this together, thanks for coming' moment. It's so sick.
Do you have a moment, considering how long you've been a band, where you've thought 'I can't believe this is happening - damn, I'm doing this?'
The first time I was like, 'Holy sh.t, this feels like something's happening' was probably the first time we played Bamboozle in New Jersey in '08 and it was before our record 'Can't Stop Won't Stop' came out.
Back then it was hard to tell how many people knew about your band, so it could have been 500 people, it could have been 5,000. I have no idea how many people were there, but it felt like, 'Oh, my God, there's so many people that came to watch us'. I have a photo from that show that I have saved on my computer, because I was like, 'this is so f...ing crazy!'
After that, everything kind of got bigger and bigger and bigger, but at that point it was like, we'd done two tours and it was just hard to tell how well we were doing. I still get that feeling whenever we do our festival in Phoenix. That's always like, 'Holy sh.t. So many people from all around the world flew here to come do this. That's wild.'
Even on this last Sweet Sixteen tour, I've felt it almost every night. We've done this for so long, and I'm still getting that feeling, looking over at Pat during a song and the crowd is just going off. So happy and thankful that we still get to do it, and the fact that all of us are in it together, and, you know, we're still fighting for it is great. It's super cool.
With the celebrated music career that you've had so far, having had the freedom to be creative along with all of these amazing live experiences, what excites you about the future of The Maine and is there anything you still would like to try or do that you haven't had a chance to yet?
The future is cool, there's so many good records coming out.
For awhile I was only listening to older stuff, like I was obsessed with The Rolling Stones, so I listened to the Stones for two years straight. Or The Velvet Underground – like the greatest band that's ever happened, ever.
Now there's new sh.t that's coming out that I hear, like there's this guy, Mk.gee. I think his record 'Two Star & The Dream Police' is like the coolest f...ing record I've heard in so long. It reminds me of so many things, but it's also its own thing. When I first heard it I was like, 'This sounds like Tusk from Fleetwood Mac. This is so f...ing cool'; then you dive into the record and it's like this whole other thing that is exciting.
It's getting easier and easier to make music, but it's harder and harder to make unique, new sounding music. That makes me want to try harder and explore new territory and do things that I thought were impossible, or, haven't been done yet.
I don't think we're gonna f...ing make a new wheel or something, but just the fact that I can even think that that's an option is kind of cool; and I'm not trying to bash other bands, but if you've done it for this long, it's hard to feel excited and fresh and like you're doing something that is unexplored. So the fact that all of us have that drive in us still, feels pretty special.
The Maine 2024 Tour Dates
Sun 15 Sep - Magnet House (Perth)Tue 17 Sep - The Gov (Adelaide)
Thu 19 Sep - The Tivoli (Brisbane)
Fri 20 Sep - Liberty Hall (Sydney)
Sun 22 Sep - Forum Melbourne
