TRACK BY TRACK: Middle Kids Take Us Through Their Latest Album 'Today We're The Greatest'

Bad Neighbours

This song is about childhood trauma and trying to heal. I have often felt like I cannot break free from defining moments in my past and it is easy to think that the wounds will never heal. Tim [Fitz, bass] actually wrote a lot of these lyrics, it was like he was helping me speak some of it out. Up until this song I haven’t been able to be so raw, so it’s a vulnerable moment on the record. I often think about swimming underwater and that is very peaceful. It’s soft and fluid, no hard edges. 

Cellophane (Brain)

I remember making a diorama in primary school for an under-the-ocean scene using cellophane. I loved the way cellophane looked, but I hated the way it crunched and creased in my hands. It’s one of those weird things I remember sometimes, mainly cringing at the way that it sounded when it was handled. 

One of the biggest battles we face in life goes on in our mind. When I consciously started taking note of what was going on in my brain it was usually ANXIOUS and NEGATIVE. About myself, about others, about life anything really. And no matter what I did - get stuff, ate pizza, went out, got new friends, traveled, got skinnier - if my mind was a minefield of fear and sadness, nothing else could shift my overall sense of myself or life to feel positive. But to change one's thinking is incredibly hard. It’s an inner journey with little extrinsic reward or accountability. I’m not even sure if cellophane is an exact metaphor for my mind and thoughts, but it feels connected to me.

R U 4 Me?

Tim and I wrote this together in LA and it was the first time we ever built a song together from the beginning. We recorded a fleshed-out demo of the song one afternoon in a writing studio. We needed a microphone to record and one of the guys from Foster The People had left his gear in the studio, so we borrowed it. The distorted yelling and wailing in the background of the chorus and the laugh before the guitar solo were all from the writing session, and they capture us as we were in the spirit of the song. A little manic, a little wild, a little joyful. Sometimes it is those moments of spontaneous emotion that get captured and bring a lot of energy to a song. When our label heard the demo, they said, "Okay you can record an album now."

There’s a fingers-tapping on the snare sound also from the original writing session, which is like a little anxious heart under the whole thing. There’s also a fun bit right at the end where we asked Harry [Day, drums] to do all these classical percussion things, like smash two cymbals together, or we tuned some tom drums like timpanis. It makes it feel orchestral and nostalgic.

Questions

This song was found in Blueys Beach, NSW. I stayed in a beach house for a week to do some writing and this was the only song I liked. When Tim and I were working on it he started playing that bass line in the verse, which to me was a breakthrough for the song. Questions is about people being around each other and not being close. There can be a weird lethargy around it as well. People who are in intimate relationships can stop asking questions of each other or stop pushing into areas because they are uncomfortable and confusing. On top of this, sometimes it can feel pointless to have real conversations because you wonder, "Can we even be honest with each other when most of the time we are not honest with ourselves?"

Lost In Los Angeles

This song was written when I was taking a shower and I was enjoying hearing “lost in Los Angeles” reverberate in the bathroom. Tim added the banjo, which was an important addition, placing the song in a sad folk realm, which was cool. We also liked the idea of banjo in a song about LA; it feels a little bit off.

LA in this song is just an archetype for chasing a big, exciting life. I used to think I needed that. Lots of people and experiences and drugs and no sleep and shiny things. But it just made me tired and lonely. Not that those things are bad in and of themselves, but clinging to them for meaning can end up making me feel like a wind sock, hopelessly flailing in the wind.

Golden Star

One night inspiration struck and I started writing this song, but couldn’t find a guitar in the studio. All I had was a bass guitar, so built this song on two bass guitars. It sounds kinda cool with them playing together, occupying similar frequencies, moving in and around each other. The vocal part at the end is so many layers of me just singing like a whale. It finishes with a recording Tim did of rain and birds in our old house in Sydney. He put it on bandcamp as Sydney Rain And Birds, and at some point in the studio it came up and Lars [Stalfors, Today We're The Greatest's Producer] was like, "You should put Sydney Rain And Birds at the end of Golden Star". It was kind of a joke, but here we are.

Summer Hill

I wrote this song many, many years ago and just never knew what to do with it. One day on a day off from tour we were all jamming on it and wrote the bridge, which got me interested in the song again after I had given up on it. Tim is playing the scissors on this track. Our friend Kyle was recording some parts and somehow they ended up recording scissors, and hitting a briefcase.

It’s about our IDENTITY. Where we come from and where we are going. We need to know where we have come from. Not in full, we often cannot know this, but we need to investigate. Regardless, we will end up living in reaction against our origins or choosing things because of our origins. Our families have a big impact on us in this way. 

Some People Stay In Our Hearts Forever

This song is like a big cry into the abyss. I feel bad about the way I have treated people in the past, mainly in previous romantic relationships. It was like I had a black hole inside of me and that I would just throw people in there hoping it would fill it up, but it never did. And so then I’d bail. So yeah, now sometimes I just wanna run through the streets and say, "I’M SORRY, I’M SORRY".

Run With You

I guess this is looking at the different ways we can run. One way is to run away from things and that being a black energy moving us, always looking backward. But another way is to run with someone or something; moving together through life on a journey. EMPATHY is what this song is about, trying to understand someone. I have found that I get more understanding of a person if I walk with them and spend time with them. That is something special you can give to someone in friendship - to walk with them over a long period of time. It expands your life and theirs, but often takes time.

The sound at the end of this song is a recording of the ultrasound heartbeat of our baby boy when we was only 20 weeks in utero.

I Don't Care

We wrote this song with Martin [Doherty] from CHVRCHES. Tim created a loop with cut-ups of my voice which is that "duh duh duh duh" synthy sounding thing in the intro. We wanted the verse to be more melodious, lyrical and emotional to juxtapose the repetitive shouty chorus. 

I can get frustrated by this new era of social pressure that exists online. There’s so many people telling me what to do, what to think, what to say and along with that there is a threat that if I don’t align, I will be ostracised. It is important to THINK and READ and LISTEN in order to learn and grow, but from there you’ve just got to do what seems right to you. And we have to be ok with the fact that it might not be the cool thing.

Stacking Chairs

This song is about MARRIAGE. I don’t often write about Tim, but I did in this song. I never thought I was going to get married - I didn’t think I would be able to love someone, well, forever. I was scared that I would feel trapped and suffocated or alternatively leave or be left with a pile of ash and rubble. Going on the journey of marriage with Tim has been profound. It is very liberating having someone see you in your entirety and stay. Tim embodies that kind of stacking chairs love - he’s not just about the party, he’s around afterward when I’m tired and ugly and loves me in those moments. And so I decided I wanted that and am believing that I can do that for him too.

Today We're The Greatest

We wrote this with Tommy English in LA. The song was really built upon this beautiful muted upright piano I was playing. It took us a while to finish this song as we really loved it and wanted to get it right. The outro we wrote in the studio as we were recording it. This is a simple song of people being TINY and our lives being FLEETING, but in that we are EPIC and GREAT. It’s finding the beauty and majesty of the every day. Therein lies life and meaning

LIFE IS GORY AND BORING SOMETIMES: it’s both hectic and mundane and we have to accept both.