Posted: by The Alt Editing Staff
Public Opinion makes loud but earnest music that takes inspiration from ’90s alt-rock with a punk kick. Their much-anticipated debut LP Painted On Smile is out on September 6th. The Alternative spoke with frontman Kevin Hart on this achievement, the making of the album, and the roster of producers who made it shine.
We’re just ahead of your debut LP release and a tour into the heart of the Midwest, how are you feeling?
I am very excited. We recorded these songs to what amounts to be a very long time ago now, and there’s just a handful of pickups along the way, the way that these things kind of start and stop. And it’s almost surreal, like I don’t really believe it’s gonna actually be coming out. ‘Cuz even before we went into record, these songs have lived in my head for like a year. Or had a demo versions, or anything like that. But that whole process leading up to this has taken forever, not taken forever in a negative way but that’s just how these things kinda go. That finally seeing the finish line coming and then everyone being able to consume it and enjoy it like I have enjoyed making it and then listening back to it, it’s really, really, really exciting for me. And then getting to go play some shows which is really exciting for me too. We’re playing some of our favorite home-away-from-home cities, seeing a lot of friends and getting to celebrate the culmination of a thing. Which I’ve been looking forward to for a very long time.
Are you going anywhere you haven’t been before?
KEVIN: We are technically playing Muskegon, Michigan, instead of Grand Rapids, the show got moved like 30 minutes away. But besides that, no, we’ve played all these cities before and we all feel really at home at all these places.
Can you tell the story of how this record came together?
Sure. Just from the top here, we put our first record Modern Convenience, and then we started playing a bunch of shows, went on tours, doing our thing, then we recorded a couple singles, we put out a song with the band Rex Tycoon, and then we also did a two-song single a half a year before that. And it felt like it was time to create something that was a complete package, that actually encapsulated the whole thing. So what started off as “let’s write some songs” eventually became something with some semblance of an album. I was talking to a friend about this, where a lot of bands will take influence from nineties groups, whether it’s Third Eye Blind, or Hum, or Failure or whatever, and will take influence sonically from some of the bigger songs of the album, they’ll take pop hooks with that nineties alt-rock tint to it, or college rock, or something like that, and what we thought would be important is that a lot of those records have huge dynamics, like the fourth song on that self-titled Third Eye Blind record is an acoustic song, it’s one of their biggest songs and it’s important to have ups and downs and make it flow. We are a rock band, and I like to present that we are a rock band, but we are also capable [of doing more]. There are two acoustic songs on the record. We have been a band that has written songs before and it was exciting to write a full complete package and present it all at once. Like for instance the two songs that we put out, “Heaven Sent” and “Dry Clean Only,” that we’d recorded with Taylor Young, who did this record, and Ian Shelton [of Militarie Gun], who also did this record, was us going, “well, we’re playing a lot of shows, we should probably get some new music out, these are two songs that we have that are pretty good, let’s go and record them, so that way we have something to keep playing shows with,” and now we have created, not an opus, but we’ve created a complete unit here, which is very, very exciting.
Do you write the lyrics or the music first?
I write all of the music first, 100%. There will be melody ideas for vocals, but as far as officially getting it written down, it’s not until I get in to record demo vocals that I’m certain what the lyrics will be. So some of those songs existed on instruments for a year before I wrote lyrics for them.
There are a lot of different moods and sounds swirling around on this record, so I recognize this is a challenging question. If you could put the primary sentiment or vibe of the record into three words, how would you describe it?
I think the easiest one would be “introspective rock music.” A lot of the music that I really like impacts me the most if I’m either listening to it by myself on headphones or in a car by myself. And it’s music that makes you think how it applies to your own life, and that can either be lyricism or it can just be like what does this guitar make you think of, or whatever it happens to be. And I like to imagine that that’s what this record does for people, is that they’ll be able to either think of the lyrics, and just reflect it back to their own experience and what it makes them feel. I’d like to imagine it makes you self-reflect and be introspective.
There have been a lot of different descriptions of Public Opinion’s genre, like hardcore, first-wave punk, even garage proto-punk, and this album contains a bunch of different micro-genres, especially the big change to mellow acoustics in those two songs. What drew you to this mix, and what was it like charting this new course?
It’s scary to try a new thing. There was no proof that I was going to be good at it, there was no proof that anyone was going to like it, there was no proof that these were good choices that I would be remotely capable of accomplishing. But I was challenged by Ian, who produced the record, really on, like “dude, you got to try new things!” Public Opinion has a “sound” to it, and it’s my writing style and my vocal style, and it’s still going to have that in the DNA. It’s still going to be a unifying thing, where it will still sound like Public Opinion. It was exciting to try these things, like you said there are a lot of influences on the band, from first-wave early punk material like The Jam or something like that, then there are things like Bloc Party and The Strokes and that early-2000s thing. And then obviously the nineties alt-rock, every person knows Third Eye Blind, every person knows Counting Crows songs. It was nice that I didn’t have to limit myself to the box of “this song is good, but it doesn’t sound like Public Opinion,” and then I got to just accept no, this is the music I’m writing, this is for Public Opinion so therefore this is what Public Opinion is.
What was it like working with Ian?
Great! I met Ian going to hardcore shows when we were both teenagers, so I’ve known him forever. So when I started doing this band, he was a really early supporter, and we would just send phone demos back and forth, of Public Opinion or whatever band I was doing at the time, and he would send me Regional Justice Center or Militarie Gun demos. This goes on to this day, he sent me Militarie Gun demos yesterday. That’s our relationship, a creative thing where we’re not handcuffed to one another. Obviously I’m not in any of his bands, and he isn’t playing in my band, but to be able to work with someone I’ve known for so long is really exciting. And he’s got really good ideas on songwriting, he’s got really good ideas on vocal melody, and I of course don’t agree with him 100% so those ideas don’t make it, because that’s any work experience. You can be working together and be copacetic for the most part, but that doesn’t mean that 100% of everybody’s ideas are going to make it to the table, it’s only one song and there are only so many ideas that can enter the song. But working with him is really enjoyable, it’s why I keep doing it. This is the third or fourth session that we’ve done together, that he’s helped produce music for me in a professional thing instead of just a consulting capacity, where I send him something and he’s like, “what if you extended this part?” From us just being casually friends and talking about music works to him sitting in the studio with me and Taylor while I’m recording. I like him a lot, I hope I get to do another record with him and Taylor.
Tell me about Taylor, too!
He and Ian both produced the MSPaint record, but Taylor is in a bunch of hardcore bands. He used to be in this band Nails, he is in Twitching Tongues, he’s in a band called God’s Hate, he’s in a band called Dead Body, I’m sure thirty other bands that I’m forgetting right now. So Taylor’s background is super aggressive music, and he’s also in bands that I liked when I was a younger person. As a younger man I went to see Nails, I went to see Twitching Tongues. So I was intimidated by it, of course, he’s known for metal. My band is not metal. I was very nervous. But I also knew he was capable of getting sounds that aren’t necessarily that. He did a Self Defense Family record that I really like, he obviously did the Militarie Gun stuff. So I knew he wasn’t a one-dimensional guy. He’s an audio brainiac, he really knows his way around sounds and tones and everything in a way I can’t really imagine, even if his specialty is not the thing that I do. He’s also, like, so funny and a good time to hang out with. You are at ease immediately. Any hesitancies or anything like that that myself or any of the band members had going into it, because he is like a name guy in super aggressive music, he was able to pull out of you basically immediately, which is awesome. I was very intimidated going into work with him, he wound up being awesome and he wound up making my records much better than they would have had I recorded them myself.
Is this the dream, for you?
Oh, goodness. I’d like to imagine that I can keep creating records for the rest of my life, but I don’t know if Public Opinion, or rock music or anything like that is necessarily it. I’m very interested in pursuing this as long as it will let me pursue it. But also, I don’t know. Life is long, I like to create music but I also like to make coffee, I also like to read books, or watch whatever. There are so many different things that I’m interested in.
Could you share what you’re reading?
KEVIN: I did just get a collection of short stories that I haven’t been able to find a physical copy of, by Kurt Vonnegut, it’s a thing my dad and I share. It’s an interesting Kurt Vonnegut called Sucker’s Portfolio that was at the library yesterday that I’m pretty excited about. That’s what I’m in the middle of right now.
Returning to the songs on this album, some of them, like “Passes Me By,” are such vulnerable and really earnest songs, a kind of song that isn’t really common in the hardcore or punk canon. Was it a difficult process to develop these songs, and to be vulnerable like this?
Yes. On the one hand, oh my god, that song was very scary to open up and be that honest about how I feel about things, especially knowing that there are people in my life who may hear it and know what I’m talking about and it might make them uncomfortable, that’s scary. You don’t want to just be putting things out into the world that unintentionally upset people, but I also think it’s important, when you’re creating something that you’re spending all this time on, it’s important to be honest and if you’re able to have a cathartic experience and share something with them. Not everyone has the opportunity to do that, so acknowledging that hey, this might be an opportunity to grow, or to not move on, but to consider all things and then see how it changes your viewpoint. And I think that, especially on this record more than any record we’ve done, is really about opening up and being honest about things, and enjoying the ability to create something that means a lot to me. I think there is an amount of music in punk or hardcore that can be very vulnerable, though sometimes you do have to sift through either malaise or over-the-top flowery language to get to the idea that’s trying to be evoked. But I think that I was pretty surface-level with the subject matter especially on that song.
I want to talk about “Scene Missing,” and what that song means to you.
KOf course that’s another very scary one, because I’m used to hiding behind electric guitars and drums. So just acoustic guitar and being reflective on the person that… when we were all younger we thought we were going to be something when we were older, and almost none of us do that. It could be something like you thought you were going to be an astronaut and it turns out you’re a history teacher. But you also think you’re going to not make mistakes like you did when you were a young person. You think you’d grow past the human things that I think people associate with adolescence that carries with you through life. Like you’re still sometimes going to do the wrong thing, even if you don’t intend that, so I think that’s really reflective on what it is to acknowledge that, and grow beyond that. Sometimes people hurt people, and it’s not always intentional, and acknowledging that is still important, even if it wasn’t intentional.
Do you consider this record to be a recovery album, or do you think “Missing Scenes” is a recovery song, or something else completely?
Do you mean recovery in a redemption, or recovery in a literal going through the process of recovery from an addict’s standpoint?
Either.
I don’t know if it’s a recovery album as much as I wrote it all and I’m going through what I’d like to imagine is some semblance of not a redemption arc, that sounds like I’m in Batman, but going through something that’s a betterment, towards a betterment of oneself. And that’s my life, that’s how it’s been for however many years I’ve been trying to move my shit in the right direction. And writing a record that has a lot of lyrics that exist inside of my brain, the same brain that’s going through all this positive work, and trying to grow, and trying to do better, and so I think that comes across to varying degrees of very obvious. There are other songs on the record where I’m dealing with sobriety, where I’m dealing with mental health problems, and it’s less crystal-clear than this song. But I think the whole thing is reflective, and trying to make it positive.
On a lighter note, do you have a favorite musical moment on this upcoming album?
I’m really into album closers, I think album closers are maybe a lost art in the era of streaming. 90% of your fan base is not going to get to the last song on the album, which I think is fine, that’s the way of the world, I’m not upset about it, I’m accepting of these terms. However, I celebrate when album closers are very clearly the finale, and when we wrote this record I wanted to make sure that I did that. So the last song “Wear and Tear” is my favorite Public Opinion song that we’ve ever written. It was written intentionally, “hey, this is the last one, no one’s going to listen to this,” but I’m really really excited that it turned out. I think it’s awesome, I think there’s a couple scary choices, like we discussed, but I’m still really really proud of how that one came out. And I know it’s probably never going to get the love that I think it should, but I’ve accepted it and that’s okay. But I do think that’s the best song we ever wrote, the last song on the record.
Is there anything else you want people to know about this record or this project?
We’re playing a lot of shows, leaving for tour next week as we’re recording this, to go through the Midwest and then very shortly we’re announcing a tour that goes through the Northeast and then down the East Coast for two and a half weeks in November. And then everywhere else we’ll be getting to not too long after the New Year. So if you like this record and you want to see it, you will have ample opportunity to do so.
Painted On Smile is out tomorrow on Convulse.
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Elizabeth Piasecki Phelan | @ONEFEIISWOOP
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