The last few years were an uncertain time for fans of Ratatat. After dropping their excellent fourth album, hospital aptly named LP4, no rx in 2010 and touring heavily, the acclaimed electronic instrumental duo of multi-instrumentalists Evan Mast and Mike Stroud went mostly radio silent on a follow-up. With only whispers of progress and the occasional show for encouragement, many fans were starting to worry that the band’s consistently stellar output had dried up.
That all changed last year as Ratatat burst back on the scene, booking major festival sets at Coachella and Governor’s Ball before announcing a worldwide tour. They also rewarded fans with the release of comeback single “Cream on Chrome” and the announcement of their long-awaited fifth album.
That record, titled Magnifique, was met with a divisive reception among fans. Focusing more on the duo’s defining harmonized guitars than the intricate production of their last two efforts, it is far more in the vein of their second album Classics than LP3 or LP4. Though there are standout singles, including “CoC” and “Abrasive,” the record goes for a smooth, often playful sonic progression instead of banger after banger, making for a product much better consumed all at once than piecemeal. A collection that rewards more and more with each listen, not to mention slots well into Ratatat’s bombastic live show, Magnifique certainly deserves its place in the band’s treasured discography.
Ratatat are hitting the House of Blues tonight, their first time in Boston since 2010, and we caught up with Mast before the show. He told us about the making of the album, the band’s visual presentation and what’s in a title.
Allston Pudding: Magnifique had a longer gestation period than any of your previous albums. Did that extra time spent fleshing the album out cause any tracks to mutate significantly from what you were originally planning?
Evan Mast: Yeah, definitely. There were a number of tracks that, well, maybe we didn’t work on consistently for too long, but started at one point and then continued to work on two years later. Returning to stuff.
I think we were pretty hard on ourselves. We really wanted to make songs that would stand the test of time and that we’d feel good about. We kept coming back to stuff and trying different approaches and versions, and we ended up editing quite a few songs off of the record that we originally thought would be on there.
AP: I was really surprised you guys decided to cover a Springwater song (“I Will Return”) though it actually ended up being my favorite on the album! What about the original track made it feel like something you could adapt to the Ratatat sound?
EM: I think there’s a clear connection there in terms of the palette you’re working with. He was obviously really into the harmonized guitars which we work with quite a bit. When I heard that Springwater record for the first time it I was kind of in shock. Just “holy shit, someone was really dealing with a lot of the same idea that we’re working with 20, 30 years earlier!” That was a huge discovery for us.
AP: What drew you to using slide guitars on this album?
EM: We’ve been into slide guitars for a long time but dove a little further into it working on this record. We discovered people like Alvino Rey and Buddy Merrill, a lot of really amazing slide players from the 50’s and 60’s who were playing slide in a way that wasn’t just a supporting role in country music but as the lead instrument. Making a Hawaiian or even a jazz sound. Discovering that style of music was exciting. There are some really amazing videos you can find online of those guys and it’s a really amazing skill level. We got inspired by that and spent a lot of time figuring out how to make those kinds of sounds.
AP: This is the first album in a while that hasn’t had the “LP Number” designation. Why did you decide on Magnifique instead of continuing that streak?
EM: Well the reason we did LP3 and LP4 is that those two are closely related. They were recorded in close succession, so we wanted to make them similar. This record is totally separate. We’re working with different ideas and different approaches, so it wouldn’t have made sense to keep it in that series.
As for Magnifique, a lot of what we do is very intuitive and it was a word that came around and stuck with us for awhile. That kind of thing happens from time to time, and it seemed appropriate. We tried a couple of different titles on and that was just the one that stuck.
AP: Through the project’s evolution, Ratatat has definitely had a signature sound. When writing new music are you conscious of keeping things familiar while pushing the boundaries, or would you say the music you want to make just has similar sonic touchstones?
EM: When we sit down and make a song there aren’t any rules or anything like that. We kind of just follow what’s most interesting to us, even when we make songs that, to my ear, sound completely different, almost to the point of wondering “can we do this? Is this still Ratatat?” But I feel like with what we do, when we play for people they can always tell that it’s us. So yeah, I think it just comes out naturally that way.
AP: I was a big fan of your early solo work as E*vax, particularly Parking Lot Music. Do you have any interest in exploring that more ambient vibe further?
EM: Yeah. I worked on follow ups to that record periodically over the years. I’ve made a ton more material along those lines but I never really got a complete collection together. I still love that kind of music. I’m a huge Aphex Twin fan and love a lot of ambient stuff so I’d say I’m still interested in that. It comes from a different place than the Ratatat stuff though, so I can’t really imagine going that mellow for a Ratatat record. But I think at some point I’ll return to those sounds for another project.
AP: You’re very involved in the visual design of the shows, right?
EM: Yes. I do all of the videos, though for the first time this tour I worked with a couple of collaborators to do the 3D modeling, which is something I don’t know how to do. I also worked with a laser guy to design that aspect of the show and a lighting guy to design that aspect of the show, then we had a week of programming and rehearsals before we started touring in April. We programmed the cues for the lights and the lasers to make them work with the video. We could certainly have used more than a week for the programming, which felt a little rushed. We could have spent several months working on just that aspect of it!
AP: Some elements of the visual presentation, including lasers and holograms, can’t be accommodated by all stages. Is it at all bothersome having to do a show without those?
EM: Yes, it’s frustrating to not have an element of the show present. We’ve had to do a lot of shows overseas without lasers or without hologram projection or various other parts of our show. That’s problematic because the way that the show is designed, everything is kind of dependent on everything else. When one element steps forward the others step back. The dynamics really work that way so whenever we have to do a show that’s incomplete it feels off. I still think it’ll be a good show, but for us knowing it’s incomplete is frustrating.
AP: Between rock halls, theaters and festival stages, do have a particular type of venue that you prefer to play?
EM: I prefer theaters. I think our show looks best in a theater setting these days. I like having it enclosed; something about that makes it feel a little more connected to the crowd.
Festivals are kind of all over the place. You never really know what’s going to happen at festivals. (chuckles) Sometimes it works out really well and other times it feels a little off.
Another good thing about our club shows is that the people who come to the show are people who are really familiar with the music and they react that way. At a festival you’re getting a lot of people who might have been brought in for another band and just figure they might as well check us out. It’s kind of cool in that you might be making a new fan, but you never get the immediate response that you get at club shows.
AP: You guys had a great string of Ratatat remixes back in the day. Why did you step away from those?
EM: It kind of stopped being fun! (laughs) That’s sort of our barometer for everything. We did two mixtapes worth of stuff and at the time I wanted to learn how to do hip-hop production and that was an easy way to try it out, but it got to the point that I felt pretty comfortable with it and I became way more interested in making instrumental songs, so I put more energy into that.
Ratatat is playing the House of Blues tonight, 1/13. The event is mostly sold out, but upper mezzanine seats can be copped here.