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The Home We Built (2013 Studio Album) | Posted March 23, 2014
Matthew Mole seems surprisingly unfazed by the success of his debut album. In the sing er/songwriter’s native South Africa, ‘The Home We Built’ entered the top of the iTunes chart on its release, making Mole the country’s first artist ever to achieve the feat and leapfrogging the likes of Jay-Z, Imagine Dragons, Robin Thicke, Michael Buble and The Rolling Stones in the process. That the 21 year old took up songwriting for fun just four years ago makes his achievement all the more remarkable.
“I knew there was a bit of hype about the album,” says Mole, modestly. “At my shows, lots of people asked when it was coming out, but I thought that was because it was taking me so long to record.”
In fact, ‘The Home We Built’ was recorded over four months earlier this year, while the dozen songs date back little over two years. Mole couldn’t be further from the typical musician who grew up dreaming of topping the charts. He didn’t hear pop music until he reached high school and even then, he didn’t care much for it. Playing the guitar was a different matter. Since the age of 11, when he was given his first guitar and his dad offered to teach him chords, he has scarcely put the instrument down. Singing he started aged 17, although only because his dad told him singing along might help him play better.
Perhaps because ‘We Home We Built’ was written without any expectation of success, its songs ooze an honesty and openness that has helped them connect with so many fans so quickly. It is an album that draws the listener in instantly, but also reveals its depths over time. Unusually, it is a warm folk record that relies on electronics, that sounds carefully constructed but also effortlessly off-the-cuff and that has abstract lyrics that relate easily to everyday lives.
Importantly, it’s an album on which every moment matters, where the devil’s in the detail and the atmosphere reflects the inspiration for each song. From the dramatic piano, dreamy strings and metronomic beats-driven opener ‘Chapel’ (actually written in a chapel, across the road from Mole’s Cape Town home, because it was the only piano he had access to at the time) to the jaunty, joyous, finger-picked banjo and quirky percussion-backed ‘Take Yours, I’ll Take Mine’ and sumptuous, psychedelic-tinged slowie and album closer ‘We, In You Confide’, ‘The Home We Built’ is a lovingly-crafted, beautifully-produced ode to old-fashioned good values, albeit arrived at by blending traditional folk instruments (acoustic guitar, banjo, ukelele) with eccentric electronics.
“Lyrically, there is a broad theme to the album,” admits Mole. “Which is how I behave and how I relate to other people. It has to do with how my parents brought me up, the values they instilled in me and the person I became because of it. Every song is about real experiences I’ve had, but also the way I’ve reacted to them, because of the way I was raised.”
Mole’s parents definitely didn’t raise him as a potential pop star. The songs to which he learnt to play guitar were churchy, gospel stuff of which he can’t recall a single title. Not that his parents were religious. They were fans of classical music, who had somehow stumbled across cassettes for the car – “They definitely didn’t pay for them,” laughs Mole. Still, as a teen yet to fall for pop, he found the structures intriguing.
It was only when Mole took a college course in music production did he first envisage a future in the spotlight. He had just discovered he could sing, thanks to his class mates persuading him to perform in an end-of-school concert. Looking back, he suspects the song he chose was a sign – it was ‘Swing Life Away’ by Rise Against, an acoustic song by an American punk band; the first acoustic song he’d ever liked, by a band doing something unexpected.
At college, Mole formed an electro-pop duo with his best friend, just for fun and to experiment with electronics. When the course ended, he decided to keep making music in his bedroom. In 2010, he started playing shows, alone, with an acoustic guitar, drum, synths and electronic equipment.
‘The Home We Built’ sometimes has shades of Mumford & Sons and Mole admits he probably took the idea of playing live with a kick drum from them. But his main influences were more obscure. He discovered (Sigur Ros guitarist) Jónsi’s album ‘Go’ and was transfixed.
“The guy is amazing,” says Mole. “He wanted the sounds of animals in his music and you can hear them so clearly. I adore his ideas and arrangements and the way he sings. That album was a big, big influence.”
Mole also fell for New York indie band The Freelance Whales - “They do crazy electronic stuff with banjos and accordions” - and British electronic producer and performer Gold Panda.
“What Gold Panda does with electronics is incredible,” says Mole. “The way I try to programme music in my laptop is very much influenced by his dj’ing technique - manipulating audio sounds and coming up with weird synth-y stuff.”
Last summer, Mole bought a banjo on which he wrote ‘Take Yours, I’ll Take Mine’, a song about finding your place in life. He liked it so much he began adding banjo parts to other songs. Meanwhile, a previous song he had written, ‘You And Your Crown’, had just been named winner of a Converse ‘Get Out Of The Garage’ contest in Cape Town, the prize for which was to travel to London to play a gig at the 100 Club and a recording session at Converse’s studio in Brooklyn.
“You And Your Crown was the first decent song I wrote,” says Mole. “The lyrics sound pretty deep, but they came to me really quickly and the subject matter is sort of cheesy. It’s about being knocked down and getting back up, pushing through with what you want to achieve.”
Mole’s trips to London and New York took place last November, by which time he had written 11 of the 12 songs that appear on the album and was on the verge of inking a deal with Jo’burg-based label Just Music. In Brooklyn, his first time in a proper studio, Mole overhauled one of his old songs, Whale. On his return to Cape Town in December, he wrote the album’s final track, ‘The Wedding Song’, inspired by attending his friends’ wedding and watching how their lives had become intertwined.
Recording began in February this year, with producer Matthew Fink (Shadowclub, Tailor, Nakhane Toure).
“Matthew put a lot of detail in to the songs, which rally added to the atmosphere,” says Mole. “At home, obviously, I had a lot of restrictions, but although the sound became bigger, we tried to keep the intimate, personal nature of how I wrote the songs. Matthew says the album was made in a hi-fi environment with a lo-fi mind set.”
Mole played every instrument besides the strings, including ukulele, banjo, organ, piano, guitars, drums and umpteen percussive instruments. The live string parts were added at the end. ‘The Home We Built’ was finally completed in June, by which time Mole’s fans were growing impatient.
“I’m glad we took our time,” says the singer. “It was definitely worth it. And the wait helped add to the hype. Then the hype got greater when the album went to No.1. But hype is good, I’m enjoying it.”
(Written by Lisa Verrico)
www.justmusic.co.za
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