Rather than take advantage of the air conditioning inside the Shaky Knees media tent, Clemens, Philipp, and myself strolled around outside the Atlanta Civic Center, looking for a prime spot to enjoy the sunshine and get to know more about Milky Chance.
We landed on what was strange placement for an inflatable love seat, on it’s own little island, with music from the Boulevard Stage playing in the background as the soundtrack for our interview. In our close quarters (no complaints here), Clemens peaked over my scribbled down questions, eyes widening and a big smile forming, “Oh I like that! That’s good! You have it written all down.”
They’re very friendly and laid back. There’s a charismatic demeanor there that translates through to their music, and has no doubt been a large factor in their wide appeal and growing success. Referencing their top five artist picks for the festival, it turns out those picks were mostly from Rob, their tour manager.
I see you, Rob.
They won’t get a chance to see any of the bands they are excited to be with at the festival – “Avett Brothers, James Blake, Tame Impala,” Clemens listed off. After “Stolen Dance” went viral on Youtube, these 22 year-old best friends from Kassel, Germany, became highly demanded all over the world. Just today in Atlanta they have two shows booked.
“Sucks being an artist,” Phillip joked as we chatted about their schedule for the rest of the day.
We love that feeling of traveling, waking up in a new place, seeing new people and things. All new impressions, but on the other side it has a lot of effect on you, and takes you away from people that you would like to spend time with. It gives you a lot of impression which can be overwhelming and tiring, but the balance of it makes it such a unique experience.
It’s no surprise that alongside their first major American tour and European festival dates, they’re looking forward to a break coming up in August.
You can’t really enjoy it without knowing that there’s no break. It’s all a lot of fun and really cool, but it’s also kind of exhausting. It’s good to have an aim that you can reach. Like ‘at this point I can chill.’
I applaud them for being so honest with me. So many artists come off like their life is the tour and the travel, but it’s very leveling and truthful to connect on the realization that we’re all in this daily grind together. Only we have the audience of a couple cubical-mates, rather than sold out crowds.
Milky Chance plays to crowds all over the globe, but despite cultural differences, they claim that the crowds really don’t differ too much.
Maybe there is a small difference, but it really depends on the daily mood and surroundings. Sometimes there’s just a little magic in the air, and you don’t know where it comes from. In the end it’s all human.
Even during the rare occasion where a crowd isn’t vibing the way they would prefer, Clemens and Philipp rely on their natural chemistry and years of learning how to connect together onstage to concentrate and pull through with a memorable performance.
I think we have a basic intimacy because we used to play music together for a really long time. The basic is us being on stage together playing music, but of course the magic and the magical feeling of sharing music with people comes from the audience. There is a basic thing that’s making music together that’s already giving a feeling that is fulfilling. The people really get into it, and give emotions back.
You would think that as best friends since high school, the duo would at least have a couple pet peeves to share, but they surprisingly pass on the chance to rag on each other.
It works pretty well actually. There are weaknesses or parts of our characters that we’re aware of, and we respect that and each other’s space.
Honing in more so on the actual music of Milky Chance, I had to know, “In ten years, how would you feel if your audiences were still expecting to hear ‘Stolen Dance’ played?”
In ten years…maybe we’ll get another big hit on the second album. It actually would be pretty cool if people still want to hear our music in ten years. We would definitely be playing it different by then. It wouldn’t be exactly the same.
They don’t yet know exactly where they see their style of music progressing, but I’m sure we will find out soon enough. Oh, don’t remix their songs by the way.
One day we listened to all covers and remixes, laying in a bed in a hotel, going through all the stuff. It was more acoustic covers that we thought were cool. We’re not big fans of remixes. It’s very hard to make a good remix in general I think.
Especially on that album the songs already are a remixed pattern. They have this four beat thing so people making another beat in it that’s exactly the same pattern just different sounds doesn’t really give it change or a difference that makes it exciting or something new or something else. It’s not cool. It’s not very creative.
They do however enjoy covers, and are working on getting a James Brown song show ready. It’s just in the jamming stages as of now, but maybe, if you’re lucky, you’ll catch them performing a guilty pleasure pop song instead.
We did a cover of Taylor Swift in Austrailia. (We’ve played) Hozier…Miley Cyrus. (We covered) Wrecking Ball….but we made a reggae ball out of it. We did a reggae version. It’s fun covering super poppy songs, and rearrange them. It’s a lot of fun for me. It’s what we used to do a lot.
We wrapped up our pow wow, somehow leading into a recap of NBA scores and a discussion of how they could make a basketball goal attached to their bus work. Make it happen, Rob.
Fast forward a couple of hours to watching them blow away the packed in Boulevard Stage alongside bandmate, Antonio, and I can honestly say it was one of the best performances I saw all weekend. The sky’s truly the limit for Milky Chance.
Keep your eye out for the boys’ promised return to the states. Catch them live if you can, and be sure to give their debut album, Sadnecessary, a listen. It’s available for purchase now on iTunes.
Connect with Milky Chance:
https://www.facebook.com/milkychancemusic
https://twitter.com/MilkyChance
https://soundcloud.com/milkychance
Photo Cred: aLIVE Coverage
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