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NPR’s Scott Simon talks to Matt Shultz, frontman for the band Cage the Elephant, about reassessing one’s actuality and his band’s new album, “Neon Tablet”.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “METAVERSE”)
CAGE THE ELEPHANT: (Singing) Metaverse fallout, there’s actually no rush now.
SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
When Cage the Elephant shaped in 2006, there was no Spotify, no TikTok music stars. Individuals nonetheless purchased what they referred to as CDs. Good (ph) rock additionally dominated then, and with its sixth report, “Neon Tablet,” the band revisits that sound on the early aughts.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “METAVERSE”)
CAGE THE ELEPHANT: (Singing) Whenever you received no perspective. Day by day spent removed from my household. Double test, checked out, I am half asleep. What the hell? Oh, effectively, that is life. What the hell? I maintain operating and operating.
SIMON: Matt Shultz is the lead singer of the Kentucky band. He joins us now from Nashville. Mr. Shultz, thanks a lot for being with us.
MATT SHULTZ: Thanks for having me.
SIMON: Properly, let me ask you about that riff. What is the metaverse to you?
SHULTZ: It is an attention-grabbing track. It is one of many first songs the place we have opened up the music to collaborate on. And there is an artist out of New York who goes by Danny Switchblade. He put collectively a mixture tape and despatched it over. And lyrically, it is sort of like this – I do not know if I would say a coming-of-age, nevertheless it’s a track of being on this journey and discovering your self inside that despite any turbulent instances in between.
SIMON: Properly, then let’s get to the title monitor on this album, “Neon Tablet.”
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “NEON PILL”)
CAGE THE ELEPHANT: (Singing) It is a hit-and-run, oh no, double-crossed by a neon tablet. Like a loaded gun, my love, I misplaced management of the wheel. Double-crossed by a neon tablet.
SIMON: I received to ask while you sang, I misplaced management of the wheel, you imply, you misplaced management of the wheel?
SHULTZ: Yeah. I had been prescribed a medicine – or maybe it was the pairing of medicines – brought on me to enter psychosis. And I used to be in psychosis for someplace round 4 years, unknowingly. I imply, most – many people who find themselves in psychosis do not know. There is no actual rational considering happening. Nevertheless it was terrifying. That track, truly, I wrote a couple of yr earlier than my arrest in New York and hospitalization.
SIMON: We must always clarify you had been arrested on a gun cost in New York.
SHULTZ: Yeah. So I wrote it as a result of I used to be satisfied somebody was truly tampering with my medicine and making an attempt to poison me. It’s totally unhappy as a result of it is so near the reality however not fairly there. It is virtually like I knew one thing was improper and that it was the medicine, however I could not fairly put my finger on it.
And I am very remorseful for what occurred, however whereas in psychosis, it exasperates any paranoias, can convey on delusions. And so, for myself, there was some extraordinarily intricate narratives that I believed that had no foundation in actuality. And it was terrifying. It was actually like being in a horror movie nonstop and being unable to flee from it.
SIMON: How a lot of this album was written throughout your time in psychosis?
SHULTZ: I imply, the vast majority of the music was written over that four-year time period. One of many extra fascinating features to the report was going again to the fabric, reengaging with it as soon as I had gotten effectively into my restoration. And for myself, making an attempt to decipher and interpret the lyrics that, on the time once I was writing them, had a really profound which means to me – however that that which means had no foundation in actuality. And so in lots of the songs, what I needed to do was search for the sentiment or the emotional expression that was – that I used to be making an attempt to speak at the moment after which work off of that.
SIMON: Let’s pay attention to a different track on this album, if we may, “Out Loud.”
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “OUT LOUD”)
CAGE THE ELEPHANT: (Singing) Clipped these wings, and I got here again residence. Tried my greatest simply to hold on. Stick-and-poke tattoos meant nothin’ to me, so far as east to west and never a reminiscence. Man, I actually tousled now. Too afraid to say it out loud. I can barely breathe. Who am I tryin’ to be? I am nonetheless tryin’ to determine it out. Am I too proud to say it out loud?
SIMON: Why do you place such deeply private ideas and even mortifying ideas into a chunk of music you need folks to listen to?
SHULTZ: Whereas it’s a very communal factor that we follow, it is also a factor that is to be accomplished that is very a lot for the person, as effectively. And I do not suppose if I hadn’t been as trustworthy as I used to be within the music, I’d be the place I’m right now. I believe it was essential.
SIMON: And while you discuss going again residence – sing about going again residence, is it a spot? Is it a mind set? What’s it?
SHULTZ: My father handed away in the course of the pandemic. We had been lucky sufficient, blessed sufficient to know that his passing was coming, and we had been in a position to have some actually lovely time to spend with one another there on the finish. And he had shared a narrative with me.
When he was in his younger 20s, he was working in building for his father, and so they had gotten in a really dangerous dispute. And he instructed his father he’d by no means converse with him once more and that evening hitchhiked to Florida after which lived in Florida for a couple of yr and did not converse to his father in any respect. And whereas he was in Florida, he wrote a track to his father as, like, an apology. He was very lonely, and so he wrote a track, hitchhiked again to Kentucky. And earlier than even talking, performed the track for his father.
And I used to be actually moved by it and needed to…
SIMON: Yeah.
SHULTZ: …Write a track about that. And it very a lot mirrors what occurred to me. And it’s extremely a lot part of me. It is in all probability extra about me and what was taking place with me than my father. I imply, I even say within the track, am I too proud to say it out loud?
(SOUNDBITE OF CAGE THE ELEPHANT SONG, “OUT LOUD”)
SIMON: Cage the Elephant’s final two albums every gained greatest rock album on the Grammys. What modifications with a band’s success?
SHULTZ: I really feel like we have been very blessed to not get into a spot the place we’re writing to achieve accolades or awards or something like that. It is clearly an amazing blessing and really welcome if it does occur. However after we’re writing the music, we have been in a position to keep a posture that is very way more for capturing one thing that is actual and genuine and pushing very onerous for that.
(SOUNDBITE OF CAGE THE ELEPHANT SONG, “BALL AND CHAIN”)
SIMON: Along with entertaining, enthralling and incomes cash, do you hope this album can imply one thing to folks?
SHULTZ: I imply, in some methods, it is just about all I’ve. I hope that my life is an encouragement to others. And I undoubtedly hope the music speaks to folks in a manner that it spoke to me once I actually wanted to precise some deep issues.
(SOUNDBITE OF CAGE THE ELEPHANT SONG, “BALL AND CHAIN”)
SIMON: Matt Shultz is the lead singer of Cage the Elephant – their new album, “Neon Tablet, ” out now. Mr. Shultz, thanks a lot for being with us.
SHULTZ: Thanks for having me. I actually respect it.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “BALL AND CHAIN”)
CAGE THE ELEPHANT: (Singing) Keys to the ball and chain.
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