The Midnight Juggernauts’ Vincent Vendetta wants to make an angry album. Only trouble is, he’s feeling pretty happy at the moment. “It’s kind of annoying,” he tells M+N from New York, where the band are hanging out briefly ahead of their return to Australia for a performance at Splendour In The Grass festival and a run of shows in support of second album, The Crystal Axis.

Out in late May through the band’s own Siberia imprint, the album is the band’s most live-sounding to date, but its experimental impulses have put some critics off. Regardless, Vendetta says he’s largely been pleased with the response. “We could’ve made Dystopia part two, but then it would have just felt like retreading the same ground,” he says. “Some people will connect with the new album and some people won't, but at least most people get that that we're willing to explore and shake our sound up once in a while.”

Ahead of the Juggernauts’ Australian return, we spoke to Vendetta about life on the road, critical reaction and what the Juggernauts have in store for the next album.

When was the last show and how did it go?
We just played Brooklyn Bowl last night [July 24], which was one of two shows we played in New York. It was fun but one of our keyboards has been acting up so we need to go to Guitar Centre in LA tomorrow to buy a new one. Good crowds.

Are you playing mostly new material now live?
Yeah, we're playing a mix of half old and half new, and a few strange tunes here and there.

How’s the new stuff going down?
When we just finished the album, I'll admit I was a little nervous about playing these new songs as it's quite different to the previous material. We wanted to have a different approach with this album so we knew it could cut our audience down the middle. However, the songs have been going down really well so we're really happy with the response. We like being able to test ourselves and our audiences. The next album may just be harpsichord pop so I'm sure we'll have plenty more opportunities to annoy our audience in the future.

The tour photos you sent M+N left most people salivating. It’s not just cruising around the Mediterranean on boats though, is it?
Well, when we tour we try to make it an enjoyable experience and add in exotic places into our schedule. In between the usual cities of London, Paris, Munich, New York, etc, we definitely try to add more foreign stops along the way. Whether you're in Serbia, Shanghai or Chile, it's fun to have new adventures on the road. However, there's sometimes downsides to those schedules. Occasionally, you might have to play three festivals within three days within three different countries, so you have to learn how to sleep on planes. Also, there's sacrifices you make in being away from home for so long. I've moved out of my house and I'm basically living in hotels and airports. Though in the end the positives greatly outweigh the negatives, and we actually did go cruising in the Mediterranean two weeks ago for a festival in Corsica [Italy].

You’ve got a strong following in Europe. Have you ever been tempted to stay there for an extended period of time?
Yes, it would probably be much easier living in Europe to avoid the constant long-haul flights. I was planning on living in the south of France for a little while after this tour but then Splendour in the Grass and other Australian dates came up, so there's always new commitments which keep you playing shows. In 2008 we had an apartment in Paris for a few months, around the corner from Warren Ellis, and very close to amazing French patisseries. I'd love to find time to do that again. Europe's been good to us, but I'm not sure why there exactly. We do love it there.

Do you enjoy the same following in the states?
We haven't really tested ourselves on a long US tour for a while. We'll often come out and play shows in New York and LA, and do a safe short run where we sell out a mid-size venues like bowery ballroom to around 600 people. But whenever we attempt to do longer run US tours in larger rooms, they always clash with our dates in Europe. So these US dates this week aren't massive tour shows. No stadiums. We're mainly here for press and then we’ll return in October.

Are you pleased with the reaction to The Crystal Axis?
Yeah, I'm happy. We've always had really diverse audiences, so from some sections I was expecting a more hostile response! Music is a subjective thing so you're never going to make everyone happy. All we wanted to do was get together and make some music in line with where our heads are at regardless of whether people are going to follow us or not.

“The next album may just be harpsichord pop so I'm sure we'll have plenty more opportunities to annoy our audience in the future.”

Now that the dust has settled, is there anything you’d change about the record?
Well the record is what it is, and an experiment in regards to certain aspects. Going into this new release, we knew that it would be quite a different animal as firstly it was now the combination of three people, where the first one was mainly two of us. This definitely brought a different energy to the record. Plus, we all had quite diverse backgrounds and ideas which we were bringing to the table. Sometimes you're in sync and sometimes you battle against each other, but that experience made things more interesting for us.

I guess one other thing is that we actually wrote and recorded a hell of a lot of music going into this record, so the final song choice really defines the album. We had a few tracks like ‘Get Connected’, which were slightly more dance-y, but in the end they were left off the album. Possibly it was to distance this album from the indie-dance tag from the last record. I think the record would be a lot bigger and accessible if we left some of that sound there, but for us it was more interesting to move from previous ground and take new paths.

Much has been made of the move towards a more “live sound”. Do you think that’s fair?
Well, the origins of most of the songs were definitely born out of our live recording sessions. We actually did start a lot of the songs out of these winding jam sessions, which made them a little looser. There's no real sequencing as all the synth lines were played down live. However, one thing is that we then added many more layers: Moog and Arp squelches, delay pedal atmospherics, etc. There are way more layers than you’d probably expect under the "live" tag.

The M+N review, in particular, honed in on lyrics. Do you think reviewers make too much of this?
Yeah, it kind of amuses and sometimes frightens me when I hear a song being broken down and analysed under the microscope by reviewers. Music can be such a subjective thing which often comes from an abstract creative space of thoughts, ideas and experiences, and people can interpret these ideas in so many different ways. I guess lots of artists have those personal feelings but you can't be so sensitive about it otherwise you'd never make music at all. You just gotta get used to it and respect it's just one person’s opinion, and in the end it's just a pop song.

I think in the past I'd always write lyrics in riddles, and was happy to keep the ideas abstract. However, for this album I was quite unashamedly willing to spread more optimistic and direct ideas out there. Maybe it was in response to a lot of ’70s pop music I was listening to, and perhaps some other dark things I saw going on. Humans are emotional creatures and it all depends on where the listener is at when they hear a song or a message. Will some people hear a direct line about love and life and think it’s cheesy? Absolutely! However, I know there's also people out there who may have other shit going on in their lives, and in a different frame of mind someone perhaps wants a more hopeful message to grab hold of. It can be really powerful when strangers connect to your music in that way. Who knows, maybe it's one line from a song which one out of 50 people identify with. I saw on YouTube a video of a guy in the UK tattooing the entire lyrics to one of our songs, ‘Nine Lives’, all down his arms. Having a response to your lyrics in that way is really amazing to me, so I've learnt to not be so precious about everything else.

I really love the glam direction of ‘Winds of Fortune’. Is that a direction you’ll be pursuing in the future?
Well thanks! Yeah, I think we're playing that on some TV show in LA tomorrow. We have a few different songs like that which we'd like to release in the near future.

Given the protracted nature of the album are you looking at having another record out soon?
We probably have two albums worth of material ready to go. I'd love to release more pretty soon. It sometimes gets difficult juggling it with our lives, touring and other projects but I'd like to get it together soon.

We're writing all the time. Even when we're on the road or during our downtime we're just always writing music. The next album will probably have another direction again. I like the idea of each new album having a different character. There'll be a thread of continuity between each release, but they will definitely have their own personality. I'd like the next album to be angry, but I'm feeling happy at the moment which is kind of annoying.

It’s admirable that you’ve put The Crystal Axis out through your own libel Siberia again. How important is the DIY aesthetic?
It feels natural to us to be taking the DIY path. We just enjoy being involved with all aspects of creating a record. We had some offers to release on majors, and we personally like a lot of the people who work at those labels, but we're just comfortable doing things this way. Plus with the industry changing so much it's important being in control of your ship.

You guys are doing Splendour. Are you comfortable with this “festival band” status?
Well, we noticed that Splendour put us up last, "headlining" the Mixup stage opposite The Strokes on Saturday night. For a lot of our recent shows we've liked mixing it up with more low key moments, for better or worse. Though in those prime festival spots I suppose there's also an expectation to do more of a party set. I guess we're just deciding how to balance those worlds. In the end I definitely appreciate that they are willing to let us play at all.

Noticed you’re doing the [1500-capacity] Forum [Theatre] in Melbourne in August. You’ve come a long way from [defunct Melbourne venue] Honky Tonks! Is there any apprehension about packing it out?
Well, we've sold out the Forum before, but at the back of my mind I think that this could be a really embarrassing moment if only 50 people turn up. If only 50 people turn up, then I'd imagine it could be an amazing gig if we were still playing at Honkytonks.

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‘THE CRYSTAL AXIS’ ALBUM TOUR

Thursday, August 12
The Gov, Adelaide, SA

Saturday, August 14
The Capitol, Perth, WA

Thursday, August 19
The Forum, Melbourne, VIC

Friday, August 20
The Forum, Sydney, NSW

Saturday, August 21
The Hi-Fi, Brisbane, QLD

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