Broods on the Monstrous Nature of the Music Industry and the Power of Reinvention

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Life is pretty peachy for Broods. Well, sort of. The New Zealand-born brother-sister musical duo consisting of Caleb and Georgia Nott just released their highly anticipated third studio album, Don’t Feed The Pop Monster, last Friday, and next month, they’ll embark on a tour across the U.S. But the news follows on the heels of a rocky and tumultuous few years. After the 2014 release of their debut album, Evergreen (which includes breakthrough singles like “Bridges” and “Mother & Father”), their 2016 sophomore album, Conscious, and tours with the likes of Ellie Goulding, Charli XCX, Tove Lo, and most recently Taylor Swift, the eclectic, electro-pop band were dropped from Capitol Records. “We probably should have given up,” Caleb tells CR. After bouts of soul-searching and self-reflection, a writing stint in the Nicaraguan jungle, and a trip to Nashville, the Notts were picked up by Neon Gold, a division of Atlantic Records. The music industry’s dark and occasionally cruel underbelly is on full display in Don’t Feed The Pop Monster, but it also touches upon life’s ups (“Peaches”) and downs (“Too Proud”). At its core, the duo explains, it’s the most honest depiction of Broods yet. Below, the band talks the power of reinvention, the stigma of anxiety and depression, and what they have in store this year.

A lot’s happened since you released Evergreen, your debut album, five years ago. The fickle nature of the music industry has clearly seeped into Don’t Feed The Pop Monster through both the lyrics and the album’s title. What has your journey been like since 2014, and in what ways has it impacted this album?
Georgia: “It’s been pretty life-changing. I think everybody goes through like a life-changing something-or-other around our age, but…it was crazy. We had to learn a lot as we went, and I think having time this round to take two years to write the album rather than five weeks like we did with Evergreen really helped us sit back and think about who we really wanted to be as a band and what we wanted to say. I think it’s so important to dictate who you are rather than allowing other people to decide for you. And we were kind of letting other people decide for us for a long time—that’s where the darkness in Don’t Feed The Pop Monster comes from. Like, don’t feed the thing that’s basically just there to eat you.”

Caleb: “It’s not going to eat you, it’s going to chew you up and then spit you back out.”

Georgia: “I thank god we’re in it together because—fuck—it would just be outrageously unbearable otherwise.”

You recently said that you almost felt like giving up, and that Don’t Feed The Pop Monster was executed with very limited resources as you were label-less at the time. What motivated you to push through?
Georgia: “I think when we finally felt like we were onto something, that was just enough to keep us thinking, Yeah, this is worth it. Everybody goes through periods of self-doubt—those days when you don’t feel like you have the capacity to prove anything to anybody. We went through a lot of days like that. But again, having each other to lean on for support [was crucial]. I kept saying to Caleb, ‘It’s not over until we say it’s over. At the end of the day, it’s up to us whether or not we give up. No one else gets to decide.’ In a world where you don’t get to choose much at all, you’ve got to hold onto those things. And we did.”

In some ways, Don’t Feed The Pop Monster feels a bit like a reinvention of Broods—not just through the album’s sound, but through your style and aesthetic, as well.
Caleb:I feel like we’re only just truly unlocking ourselves as humans. When you’re in your mid-twenties, I think you have this moment when you’re like, Oh, what I thought I was—or what I thought I should be—is actually not that.

Georgia: “One thing we’ve really learned is the power of self-awareness and making sure you’re not letting things that are out of your control completely consume you. And that’s exactly what we decided to do with this album. We took a bunch of shit that felt so erratic and scary and gave ourselves control by making this album.”

Caleb: “This time, we picked the songs that we thought were saying what we needed to say rather than deliberately not including certain tracks because we didn’t feel like they were going to be big pop hits.”

Georgia: “We depicted it in the most honest way. We have the ability to completely take all the shit we feel when we’re down and make it into something that helps people, and I think that’s the most beautiful thing we can do for the world at the moment. I know it sound super cheesy, but I do think that this is what were put here to do, and going through that period of feeling that maybe we aren’t going get to do it anymore made us realize, like, No, fuck. We have to. Otherwise, who are we?

Why did you decide to release “Peach” first? In what ways does it encapsulate the general feel of the album?
Caleb: “It’s about how many ups and downs and in-betweens we’ve had. It’s about kind of just soaking yourself in—well, not so much soaking yourself in—but experiencing those feelings.”

Georgia: “And just letting things happen. It’s OK to be anxious. It’s OK to feel down. It’s not OK to just not deal with it, though. The music industry is exhausting sometimes. It kind of chips away at your self-confidence. But then there are times where…”

Caleb: “It just feels so glorious.”

The track “Too Proud” is a deeply personal account about anxiety and depression. Given the stigma of mental illness, was it difficult or cathartic to write?
Georgia: “It was on the back of one of the most extended lows that we’d ever had.”

Caleb: “I felt useless for months and months and months. I felt like nothing I was producing or making was of any significance to anybody apart from myself. It was a period of time where I felt like I was making the best stuff that I’ve ever made, but I wasn’t getting that same feedback from anybody else apart from Georgia and a couple of close friends. My ego took a huge hit—a massive hit—since the last record. Which I think it needed to take. “Too Proud” is more of a reflection of where I’d been. I got out. And I want to acknowledge that talking to people is so, so important.”

Georgia: “It’s so essential. I think being “too proud” is supposed to be something that is admired. But it shouldn’t. Vulnerability and speaking up about things that don’t feel right within you makes you stronger. If you keep it in, it just continues to weigh you down. It’s like carrying rocks around in your fucking chest all the time. You have to give them away or you sink.”

In recent interviews, you’ve been pretty candid about the power of therapy.
Georgia: “We think that everybody should go to therapy, whether or not you feel like you need help.”

Caleb: “I still go if I’m feeling good because I come out of it feeling better. I’m more self-assured and confident in myself and my abilities. Outside of that, the people that we take on tour are all people we can talk to. And that’s really important to us.”

Georgia: “It’s the human experience—not one human’s experience. Everybody feels like shit. I feel like shit, too.”

Caleb: “Having an open dialogue about mental health has totally helped us take on life a little more fearlessly, especially because our careers are not stable. We’re flying around everywhere, we’re always jet-lagged and tired and confused. It’s not a safe career.”

Georgia: “It’s high risk. But higher reward.”

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