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Metric perform an acoustic set in The Current studio

Metric – studio session at The Current (music + interview) The Current
  Play Now [20:27]

by Jill Riley

November 28, 2022

After a long time away from Minnesota, Emily Haines and Jimmy Shaw of Metric return to The Current studio for a session hosted by Jill Riley. “At every stage, and in so many different settings, and like, externally, the state of the world, I feel like I've come into this room,” Haines says about The Current studio. “It's like a little time capsule.”

While talking with Jill Riley, Haines and Shaw describe the genesis of their latest album, Formentera, and how the idea emerged from a book about global destinations. Their collective dream — during the height of pandemic lockdowns — centered on going to the Spanish island of Formentera, and this provided a cohesive vision.

Metric perform acoustic versions of songs from Formentera and 2018’s Art of Doubt, and they finish with a song from their 2009 album, Fantasies. Watch and listen to the full session above, and read a transcript below.

Interview Transcript

Edited for clarity.

Jill Riley: Hey I'm Jill Riley from The Current's Morning Show. And I have to say it's very awesome to be back in the studio at Minnesota Public Radio, because I haven't done a live session in this room since February 2020 when Glass Animals was here, and it's been a world of Zoom connections ever since. But today is different. This is awesome, by the way; I'm so happy that you guys are here. Emily Haines and Jimmy Shaw from Metric. 

Emily Haines: Hello.

Jill Riley: Welcome back.

Jimmy Shaw: Thank you.

Emily Haines: I mean, as you know, when I walked in the door, I was just like, "What! I remember this place!" Similar feeling to you. I'm glad this is your first time back with us, so we can feel the feels together. 

Jill Riley: It is. It's great. And I mean, I think of some in-studio performances, and I remember it must have been on the tour for Synthetica; you did a — like on the fifth floor of this building. And I just, I remember how many people; I don't know if we were violating like a fire code thing. But that, I mean, it was busting at the seams. Just everybody wanted to come in and check out the session.

Jimmy Shaw: I think that was the last time we did a headline show in Minneapolis, was on Synthetica, because...

Emily Haines: Possibly, yeah.

Jimmy Shaw: I think we did a couple of like street fair kind of festivals. We did a bunch of like, we were on tour with Imagine Dragons, Smashing Pumpkins, but I don't think we've done an actual headline show here in like, almost 10 years.

Jill Riley: It's been a long time.

Jimmy Shaw: Which is crazy.

Jill Riley: Rock the Garden was pretty great. I remember that year when you guys headlined in Minneapolis and every now and then I'll be going through the channels — which I don't have that many left, because cable — but the local public television station was there and so they had taped your performance. And so every now and then that'll just come up and I'll stop on it and be like, "Oh, that was such a great night." So yes, Metric, you are in town on tour. And we just talked about the new record Formentera, and when I heard the name Formentera, I thought, "I'm not really sure what that is." And thankfully my kid was like, "What does Formentera mean?" And I'm like, "That is a good question, son." And I had a great moment of where I could just say, "I don't know," because I think it's important to say "I don't know" when you don't know. So we looked it up. And I just wonder, I guess, how the location... well, no — you tell me: What is Formentera? And how did it relate to the new record?

Emily Haines: Well, so, Formentera is an actual physical place. It's an island in the Mediterranean off the coast of Spain. It's a picturesque, idyllic paradise, and deep into 2021, which is all I need to say for everyone to know exactly what I'm talking about, and then I can add in Canada, so you can picture the snow to your ears, we were still trying to keep going, be positive, even though we haven't been able to get Josh and Jules across the border, the guys from our band, we haven't been able to play a show, we've had everything canceled, and it's a really scary time. Still, we were like, "We're gonna get through this. We're making music. We're making music for when we all come out the other side."

And on a particularly bleak day, it was like, I remember being like, "I'm losing it; like, I'm not doing well." There was like a bit of a internal mental health situation. And we made the decision to open this book that we had, which was like, one of those dream-destinations books, you know, where it's like, "where to go before you die." Like, we're like, let's just, maybe we'll pick a place every day, and picture that we're there. And so we did that that day, and what came up was Formentera. We thought we'd do it every day, but it never left that page; I think it's still on that page in the studio. And we wrote the song that day.

A woman speaks while two other people listen
Emily Haines of Metric speaks while bandmate Jimmy Shaw and The Current's Jill Riley listen during an interview in The Current studio on Monday, Oct. 17, 2022.
Evan Clark | MPR

And then that whole kind of idea sort of developed around it of the idea of making an imaginary kind of sonic oasis, a place that you can go that is in your mind, you know? Because the reality is the physical place is so far to reach, it might as well be imaginary. And then I started riffing on you know, and kind of making a nod to it in the artwork, with the film Brazil, which is kind of a similar concept where, Terry Gilliam's movie where, you know, you're in this really kind of dystopian reality. And the protagonist, in that case, has this imaginary version of himself that's this heroic person. And, you know, Brazil, the font, and the sound of the song playing and sort of taking him off into another place in his mind. So that's kind of what we anchor the album around.

Jill Riley: Yeah, like, just finding your happy place. 

Emily Haines: Yeah!

Jill Riley: And that's a good one. I just, looking at the pictures of it, I was like, "This place can't be real." 

Emily Haines: Yeah.

Jill Riley: It can't be real. I mean, but you haven't actually been there, have you? 

Emily Haines: I have, actually.

Jill Riley: You have!

Emily Haines: Yeah. And it's everything you'd think. It's absolutely stunning.

Jill Riley: It's beautiful. Just give me all that shoreline.

Emily Haines: Yeah, exactly.

Jill Riley: The water, where the water looks fake.

Emily Haines: Yeah.

Jill Riley: Because it's so beautiful. And it's interesting to hear the description of such a paradise, and then when you hit play on the record, it's like, you know, like this 10-minute opening song. I remember like, going "Wow." And listening to it, it sounds like there's something really like cinematic about it, like almost like it's the opening to a movie. I wonder if like, placing that track, "Doomscroller" at the beginning, I mean, and it sounds dark, but with some lightness in it, but if that was kind of intentional to sort of like set the mood of the record.

Jimmy Shaw: I mean, when we were trying to sequence the record, we really couldn't find another spot for that song. It was going to be — it was either going to set the tone or disrupt a tone, you know? And so we sort of opted for setting the tone, and once we started getting into the sequence that ended up being the record, it kind of ends up telling this narrative of sort of starting in a place of like, a lot of anxiety and stress and turmoil and fear, you know? And throughout the course of the record, especially by the time you get to the song "Formentera," which is about halfway through, you sort of witness this person, you know, Emily, the protagonist, sort of...

Emily Haines: Yes!

Jimmy Shaw: You witness her sort of, like, let go of that anxiety and just sort of relinquish control, which is definitely something that I think a lot of people experienced around that time, was realizing that, you know, we all were under the impression that we were, you know, we had some control over our reality. And then we quickly learned that we had very little control over our reality, so, and that can be a freeing thing, you know, if you're in the right state of mind, and I think that's ultimately kind of what the record is about. It's about starting in a place of anxiety, realizing that you don't have control, and coming to peace with relinquishing that control and finding freedom on the other side.

Jill Riley: Yeah. I'm talking with Metric and we're talking about the new record Formentera. Just talking about the opening track, "Doomscroller." Now, when you were making the record, and you really talk about it in like a way of telling a story, I was just looking at a list recently of, like the top 50 concept records. And I'm looking down the list, and and I've kind of wondered to myself — as somebody who, I don't make records, but I love to listen to them. Did you approach it in that way? I mean, you kind of talked about, like telling a story, you know; do you approach records in that way, in general, or with this one, were you like, "Oh, we're really going to like, set up this sort of, like, storyline"?

Jimmy Shaw: I don't think we necessarily did that, but I think it's quite common for us to get really deep into just sort of a vibe, an energy, whatever you want to call it, and not pay too much attention of the sort of like, the narrative overview, you know? We don't zoom out too often, until we get really close to the end, and then we zoom out, and if we were successful in really staying in a certain vibe and tip, then it usually does have kind of a narrative, and then we can start to see what it is. And then we can kind of finish it and put it together. So it really ends up telling that now.

Emily Haines: Yeah, it's more of a reveal then, which I love that process, actually.

Jimmy Shaw: It revealed itself to us, which is kind of cool.

Emily Haines: It's such a weird feeling, right? Because also it's, we're, you know, super democratic in this kind of consensus of like, if someone doesn't love a song, it's not going on there. Like there's never — that's just not gonna happen. So you kind of don't... you can have your ideas, but there's really no point in getting like pigheaded about anything. Because we all just kind of, It feels like we're all looking at this thing we made and being like, "Oh, weird!" And then in the case of Formentera, everyone had this sort of like psychic consensus moment of like, being, including like the artwork, guys, like, "Oh, my god, that's got to be the title track!" And that's the thing. And we all realized that that was the middle but only... like we hadn't, we'd finished it and hadn't really circled back on it in months. And then when we were doing that zoom-out that Jimmy described, it was like, "Oh! Look at that!"

Jill Riley: I mean, that's spooky how that kind of happens. 

Emily Haines: Yeah, it's a cool process.

Jimmy Shaw: So what was the number-one concept album?

Jill Riley: Number one was Kendrick Lamar. 

Jimmy Shaw: Cool!

Jill Riley: Something, Mad, Mad City... I can't remember the title of it. I can't remember the full title of it. I remember number 50 being Styx, Kilroy Was Here.

Jimmy Shaw: All right.

Jill Riley: And then there were some, you know...

Emily Haines: No Pink Floyd in there?

Jill Riley: There was Pink Floyd, there were some of the old, the old classics and the rock operas. But yeah, there was certainly more contemporary choices.

Jimmy Shaw: We definitely said at some point in this, I definitely said, it was like, "I'm not gonna try and make Dark Side of the Moon again," and then totally did. Oops.

Emily Haines: That's all we've ever been doing.

Jill Riley: This entire time.

Jimmy Shaw: Yeah, pretty much.

Two people play music together in The Current studio
Emily Haines and Jimmy Shaw of Metric performing in The Current studio on Monday, Oct. 17, 2022.
Evan Clark | MPR

Jill Riley: Well, and I think, for your band to be on the same page about something, it seems like a record of this time that we're living in, like, how could you not be on the same page? Like, because no matter what anybody's point of view is, or opinion or experience, like, we all just went through a big thing together. You know, there's really no denying that part. It would be weird to go back in time 10 years and ask somebody, "Have you ever heard the expression 'doom scroller'?"

Emily Haines: Yeah! 

Jill Riley: And what do you think it is?

Emily Haines: Have you ever heard "shelter in place"?

Jill Riley: Right! "Because I have to tell you about the future." But I think that that kind of, you know, when you talk about this place, you know, Formentera and the name of the record, and, you know, kind of it being your ideal, sort of like, happy place and the place that calms you. And then to think of the concept of like, doomscrolling, which I guess I've done a little bit, where I get myself really wound up, like I'm seeking out something. I don't even know if I'm actively seeking out bad news, but I won't stop. Like again, and it's always something, and it's still —and now I have to see what everybody has to say about this. And, you know, fact and opinion like that starts to—

Emily Haines: Blur.

Jill Riley: Blur and melt together. And I wondered, like, did you find yourselves getting into that?

Emily Haines: Yeah.

Jimmy Shaw: For sure.

Emily Haines: Like, it was really problematic for me. Like, you're trying to make sense of everything. You're trying to be a good citizen, be a good person, educate yourself, know what's going on and care about what's happening to other people because you're not a sociopath. But then, when you realize, like, I had, at one point, my hand was like, kind of a claw. Like, it was like, what's happening? Like, that's the extent that I'm just trying to put the pieces together, and feeling like, you know, physically, your body responds to these things — the stress level, the cortisol, or whatever the hell it is, you know — of being like, what do I do about I mean, that list of, you know, lining up the numbers under the names, it's like, it's not just the pandemic, it's so many things. And it's, you can really, as you, it sounds like you've experienced too, you can really get yourself in a knot where it's like, you feel like you're doing the right thing as a member of society, but you're actually completely dysfunctional. Because you know, then you just put the thing down and it's like dark. Like, you know, there's no windows open, you're just like cowering there, what are you going to do with that information? What? You have no empowerment, especially when we were locked down to do anything. So, yeah, I hope that, um, even just naming it and sort of describing it is helping maybe some people be like, "Yeah. Damn. That's what I was doing."

Jill Riley: Yeah, I did that, too. You know, when it comes to the song "All Comes Crashing," it's almost like, you know, you get to that point, and I don't know if you guys went through this, but at a certain point, when a lot of the things that I enjoy doing or the people that I would see, or even just like, coming and doing my job every day, and, and kind of like, um, now that we're like, in the year 2022, I kind of figured out what priorities were a little bit more. And I wish that it wouldn't have been something so big to get me to figure that out. But there's nothing more that I want to do, than, like, I'm waiting for my kid to get off the bus. Like I just, I'm like, "Oh, yeah, like, this is what it's about. It wasn't about all that other stuff." 

Emily Haines: Yeah.

Jill Riley: And I mean, it's, there's something very dark about like thinking, you know, like, I want to just be sitting like, you know, I don't know, somewhere like next to a lake where there are no people around and just like, chillin' with him and my family. And you know, what, you know, whatever is going to happen is going to happen. Like that's who I want to be with at the end.

Emily Haines: I don't think that's dark. And that's, I'm glad you're getting the vibe of the song, because it really is that where you're like, "Oh, wow. Well, if it happened, when it happened, when it happens, you look to your who's beside you. And you're like, right on! You know?

Jill Riley: Yeah.

Emily Haines: Great! That's who I want to be with, you know?

Jill Riley: And maybe it doesn't have to be a big fireball.

Emily Haines: Yeah, exactly.

Jill Riley: Just like any kind of change, maybe. Yeah, when things are hard.  Yeah.

Emily Haines: And I'm glad you got the vibe that it's actually like a super positive, very romantic — maybe not in the conventional, romantic sense — but romantic of like, this is the point of life.

Jimmy Shaw: I've always thought Armageddon would be slow and lame. 

Emily Haines: I think it's... you might be right.

Jill Riley: I just want it to be just quick, like, let's just stick with this.

Emily Haines: Slow-mageddon. 

Jill Riley: I'm talking with Emily Haines and Jimmy Shaw from Metric. What does it feel like to be back on the road. How's the tour?

Emily Haines: Oh, it's so good. The tour has been amazing. Yeah, the crowds are so great. It's like everything's selling out. It's just been really good.

Jill Riley: That's awesome.

Jimmy Shaw: Yeah. It's been a blast.

Three people seated in chairs, enjoying a conversation
The Current's Jill Riley interviews Emily Haines and Jimmy Shaw of Metric in The Current studio on Monday, Oct. 17, 2022.
Evan Clark | MPR

Jill Riley: Coming back to Minneapolis, and St. Paul. We're in St. Paul right now. And I live in St. Paul, so I always want to make sure and say St. Paul, but when you know you're going to be coming back here, which, I just, I feel like Minnesota is kind of like Canada, Jr. Like we're a little extension. I think we're friends.

Emily Haines: Yeah.

Jill Riley: We're pretty friendly. What do you look forward to when you come back around here? 

Emily Haines: Honestly, it's coming here. Because we've been doing this at every stage, and in so many different settings, and like, externally, the state of the world, I feel like I've come into this room. It's like a little time capsule. It's cool.

Jill Riley: Yeah, it's awesome to have you guys back. Hey, before we wrap up our conversation, tell the midday host and music director, Jade, on our station, she was talking about a new documentary called This Is Sparklehorse.

Emily Haines: Oh wow.

Jill Riley: And she mentioned your name.

Emily Haines: Yeah.

Jill Riley: As being a part of it. And I haven't seen the trailer yet, but I heard her mention your name that you're a part of it. So I just wanted to ask you about, like, being asked to be a part of that.

Emily Haines: Yeah. I mean, that was a long time ago. It's only coming out now?

Jill Riley: Yeah.

Emily Haines: So the reason I have a connection to Sparklehorse is that on my first solo album, Knives Don't Have Your Back, I put together this little band called The Soft Skeleton, and the drummer is Scott Minor who is the drummer in Sparklehorse. And so he contributed in that sort of signature sound that I think a lot of us who are fans of Sparklehorse associate with it: that kind of sludgy, slow drum thing that Scott's beautiful signature. So you hear that in moments on Knives Don't Have Your Back. He also played on the follow-up album Choir of the Mind. He played on "Legend of the Wild Horse." But that interview, weirdly we were talking about, the K West Hotel in London, but I think that's — oh, no! What's the other hotel in London that had the... It's that kind of hotel that has like the chair that's like a hand. You know what I mean?

Jimmy Shaw: The Sanderson.

Emily Haines: Yes! So they, it's like one of those hotels that's like, "We're quirky!" It's like, OK. You're just tired, it's like, "Stop with like the disco ball like tennis racket." Like what? Like it doesn't... No. But there was a room there that was, like, filled with kitsch that we filmed my interview segment, but that that's easily 10 years ago.

Jill Riley: OK.  Wow.

Emily Haines: So it took a minute, apparently.

Jill Riley: I guess so.

Emily Haines: I wonder what I was wearing? Well, you're about to find out! Yeah, I think it was like, if it's not already streaming somewhere it was gonna be very soon.  Oh, great, I am glad that's coming out.

Jill Riley: Yeah. Sparklehorse, I remember, I started in college radio in '02 or '03, and the first, I think one of the first interactions I had with the music director, which — his voice did not sound like this, but this is how I remember him — saying, like, "You guys, someone took the entire Sparklehorse discography, and I don't know where it is." And I had no idea, like, I'm like, "Oh, Sparklehorse." And I'm like, "Well, if somebody stole all of them, it must be like, awesome." And yeah, and then, like, coming here and playing that and then, you know, Mark Linkous passing away, and that was, yeah, that was...

Emily Haines: Yeah.

Jimmy Shaw: Those are great records.

Emily Haines: Yeah, really good. Really influential.

Jill Riley: Yeah.

Emily Haines: Yeah.

The Current
Sparklehorse perform "Saturday" during an in-studio performance at The Current in February 2007.

Jill Riley: Okay, well, it's there.

Emily Haines: That's great.

Jill Riley: Can't wait to see what you were wearing.

Emily Haines: Same!

Jill Riley: Emily Haines, Jimmy Shaw, from Metric. Thank you for coming in to The Current and goodbye.

Jimmy Shaw: It's always a pleasure.

Emily Haines: Thanks.

Two people play music together in The Current studio
Emily Haines and Jimmy Shaw of Metric performing in The Current studio on Monday, Oct. 17, 2022.
Evan Clark | MPR

Video Segments

00:00:00 Dark Saturday
00:04:04 All Comes Crashing
00:08:18 Twilight Galaxy
00:12:49 Interview with host Jill Riley

Song 1 is from Metric’s 2018 album, Art of Doubt; song 2 is from their 2022 album, Formentera; and song 3 is from 2009’s Fantasies. All are released on the band’s own Metric Music International label.

Credits

Guests - Emily Haines and Jimmy Shaw of Metric
Host - Jill Riley
Producers - Derrick Stevens and Rachel Frances
Director – Evan Clark
Camera Operators – Evan Clark, Thor Cramer Bornemann
Audio – Eric Xu Romani
Graphics – Natalia Toledo
Digital Producer – Luke Taylor

Metric - official site