When it comes to scene staples, Citizen are as close to being the poster boys as you can get.
That doesn’t mean they haven’t mixed things up along the way. With a discography covering every shade of alternative music and a desire to always do what feels right for them over what may be the flavour of the month, being so deep into their journey but still picking up new fanatics along the way should never be understated.
And with their latest opus ‘Halcyon Blues’, they have let life guide them where it needs them to go once again. As beautifully gloomy as it is wonderfully fresh, it is a collection of songs that demonstrate how sitting in how you are feeling is sometimes all you can do, and a reminder that you aren’t alone in your melancholic pursuits.
To find out more about this new Citizen era, Rock Sound caught up with vocalist Mat Kerekes, and found out how being open about the past and not letting the present get on top of him is signalling special things for the future.
Rock Sound: How are you feeling about what ‘Halcyon Blues’ has ended up being, not just as a Citizen record but also as a part of your life as it is now?
Mat: You know, like any other Citizen record, it’s just a snapshot. A snapshot. And hopefully as you get older you become wiser, right? It’s been a year since we recorded it, and it’s been a year and a half/two years since some of the songs were written. So it feels like I’m coming from the future right now. I’m presenting these life experiences that once meant something different. Sometimes you feel like your world is crashing down and you write music about that, and then now it’s finally being released; I’m so far past that point. It’s kind of funny to have it feel so new while it’s old. But I’m super excited, and I love the songs, and I feel very proud of them, and I’m really happy that they seem to be getting a good reception.
RS: So, looking back, what were the things that kept on cropping up for you as you set about writing these songs? What were the main emotions you feel like you were feeling?
Mat: I think a big thing that I have struggled with in my life is pride. Because without pride, it’s kind of spineless. With too much pride, it’s self-destructive. I’ve always really struggled to balance that. I’ve shot myself in the foot many times by being too stubborn and too, ‘This is who I am’, and then I’ve shot myself in the foot by being too compromising and too, ‘Okay, I need to understand this’, and okay. You get to a point where you lose yourself in that.
So, I was going through some big life changes. Nothing unique, shit that everybody goes through. But the dilemma in my life was, ‘Okay I don’t feel I don’t feel like myself, and that’s because I am being too understanding,’ and then I’m being too compromising. Then the overcorrection happens: now I’m too mean, and then everything is destroyed. None of these things felt new, but it was just what was happening.
RS: A lot of Citizen over the years has been defined by that pendulum swinging for you. What changes is how you approach and deal with what you are facing.
Mat: On early Citizen, I was very unapologetic, direct, and whiny. But right or wrong, everybody feels that way, and throughout Citizen’s career, I went into this mode where I started to think. ‘I should be more nuanced in the way I say things’. I should try to convey the message in a way that doesn’t, I guess, pigeonhole a song. And I think with this record, it felt right to wear my heart on my sleeve yet again like I used to. It wasn’t really conscious. It was just like I was writing so much music, and that’s just how it ended up being. It felt like I was back a decade ago, writing music and really expressing myself on the surface, not trying to think about how others would perceive it.
RS: That said, you have celebrated and returned to your debut album ‘Youth’ over the past couple of years. What did playing all of those songs, but also seeing the mix of reactions in the crowds you were playing to, feel like?
Mat: I have definitely recognised that we are in a fortunate position, where we can utilise our career however we choose, and it always seems to work out. If you go online and you read this and that, you’re always going to be compared to what you were first known for, and that doesn’t bother me. If we never wrote another song ever that anybody cared about, we had that album that people did. We won the lottery with that, in my opinion. Amazingly, we can experiment and do something new to us, and it’s well received. And the energy people are giving us is something we have talked about. We play the fan favourites, and the room is loud, and the room is singing, and that’s amazing. Then we play the lesser-known songs that are more energetic, and the room is physically crazier. It’s such a cool thing to be able to have that. Things that have once frustrated me about Citizen when I was younger now pump me up, yeah, because you realise how cool it is.
RS: With all of that, what sort of state of mind would you say you were in around the making of this record?
Mat: I feel best when I’m just confident. When there’s no noise affecting my perception of myself. And while writing ‘Halcyon Blues’, I was in my living room demoing everything on my own computer. I wasn’t on the internet. I wasn’t listening to other music. I was only listening to the songs I was writing, for months and months, and it really felt like being 16 just making shit because I loved it. You would write songs, burn them on a CD, then go in your car and listen to them, and then the CD would be lost a week later, and it didn’t matter because you were having fun making music and learning how to record. Everything was so new and fresh and exciting, and writing this new record felt like that. I mean, I moved home, I got divorced, so I’m alone in this house, bachelor pad, and there were no rules. I don’t gotta talk to anybody. I’m just making music all day and all night. Nothing mattered besides that music, and I feel like it’s communicated through the music now.
RS: Being in a situation like that, it can also go two ways when it comes down to creativity. But knowing that the band is there for you to exorcise whatever it is that comes out of those life-changing moments must continue to be quite the solace.
Mat: Music, for me, no matter what, is just this emotional release. On the last Citizen record, my life was awesome. I was having a great time, and it just shows through the music. It was fun. It’s energetic. And then when life wasn’t so good, the music changes because music is, not to be cheesy, therapy, right? You lose yourself in it. Melancholy music goes a lot further because it does help you in those times. I love everything Citizen has done. There are a few things you could have handled differently, but people have always come back to Citizen for that specific emotional release. That melancholy feels right for the band. That feeling is in everything. Love, sadness, heartbreak, loss. And in every form of media that people hold close to them, it’s a universal language. Everybody relates to it, and everybody grasps onto it.
RS: Coming from such a solitary place, it must also feel encouraging and gratifying to realise this is why you keep making records and keep coming back to Citizen. It’s addictive, but so is feeling like you’re not the only one who feels like this.
Mat: Yeah, the grass is always greener; even if you have it good, you know? It’s that one thing about life that I hate. Even if you got everything you’ve ever wanted, you’re never satisfied, and I struggle with that. But saying that, it’s all in your mind, and I can’t even believe there was a time that I ever resented music, or being in a band. To be able to go on tour and have people come to your shows and they value what you do, and to ever take that for granted is such a crime. I feel like I’m doing something worth a shit.
