Two Door Cinema Club: “Indie stopped moving forward”

When my colleague asked, “Would anyone like to talk to Two Door Cinema Club?” I don’t think she expected me to rip my headphones off, lean over my desk and blurt out, “Are you fucking kidding, yes.” Bands like Two Door, Foster the People and Foals shaped the soundtrack of my younger years. I even picked Two Door’s “The World Is Watching” from Beacon as the track for the first video I ever edited. I work as a videographer now, so that moment was a pretty big deal. Their music has a personal place in my heart.

With Sydney and Melbourne sitting in their top five listener cities, it makes perfect sense that the Irish band would want to return for their upcoming tour in December. This visit, however, feels a little different — they’re bringing along fellow indie favorite Declan McKenna. Australia often ends up missing out on big tours, with festivals postponed or cancelled and major acts pulling out at the last minute, so seeing two strong acts touring together here feels genuinely exciting.

When I sat down with bassist Kevin Baird, he hinted at the idea of a mash-up between “Brazil” and “What You Know” and shared why Two Door “swiped right” on Declan. He also spoke openly about the Australian music scene he loves, why indie needs to grow and change, and yes, we confirmed that Juicy Couture will always be cool.

Here’s our chat.

Abbey Sheather, Junkee: You guys came to Australia for the first time in 2010, which was 14 years ago. What do you remember about that trip?

Kevin Baird, TDCC: God, we were just talking about it the other day, because I think Sam and myself both had our 21st birthdays on that trip. We went to, what is that place? The World Bar? 

Oh, okay yes. 

I think it was one of those things where Australia was really early as a place that started popping up [with] people commenting on our, at the time MySpace or Facebook, ‘come to Adelaide, come to Brisbane.’ That was one of the first places outside of Europe we were noticing that. So it was a massive thing for us to go for the first time. I think we played Splendour in the Grass. Yeah, I remember we had a great time. Maybe too good of a time.

So why Declan McKenna? And why Australia for a collab tour?

I don't think we've ever done a collab tour before. There's a really boring, depressing side of it, and then there's a really nice, maybe more palatable side of it. Australia is really far away for us. Economically, for most artists, it's quite hard to make it work. Boring stuff like the exchange rate is not great at the moment when it comes to Australian dollars.

Now we’re getting into finance, wow.

I know, right. You've got to be CEOs in your own business, right? We wanted to go to Australia, we haven’t been in five years. It's either you do a package or you do some festivals and do some side shows. And I think we've done a lot of the festival thing, we kind of wanted to take the pressure off and not go down that route, we just wanted to do our own shows. 

We were brainstorming lots of different ideas, and Declan was one of the ideas that came up. It's one of those things where there's lots of irons in the fire and it's a bit like speed dating, it's a bit like Tinder. Everyone's swiping like, ‘Ooh, do I want to do that package with Two Door?’ So thankfully we all agreed to take it past the first date. We're fans of Declan and his music, we haven't met him yet in person, but heard great things about him, his crew, his band. It just seemed like a really nice fit. 

Our whole thing is, maybe to our detriment, we try not to let evil get in the way of anything. I don't think we ever try to go somewhere and puff our chests out and be like, ‘Oh, look at us.’ Maybe that's just an Irish thing, I don't know. But, we're a bit uncomfortable with that and I guess with Declan it's been the same. It's like, ‘Does this work for you? Yep, this works for us. How do we make this work? How do we make sure that everyone has the best possible outcome?’ It's just been easy so far. I mean, there will probably be some big drama, you know. I'm not getting my individual dressing room with my puppies in there because of Declan. But we'll deal with that when that rises.

What do you find interesting and exciting about the current state of indie music? 

What do I find interesting and exciting?

[After 20 seconds of silence…] You can say nothing if you want.

I don't think I'm massively excited by a lot of guitar music or indie. I’m pointing the finger at all of us. I think we have become sore losers. A little bit like, ‘Oh, we used to be the most popular genre, we used to be on the radio. Blur, Oasis… we were [at] the top of the charts.’ We almost have a bit of a chip on our shoulder sometimes that we're not in that position anymore. And we expect, whether it be radio stations, festivals, whoever, to look past the data of what the majority enjoy and expect them to continually come to us. But there have been some amazing exceptions to that. 

For example, a great Australian band doing something different [is] Royel Otis. They're a good example of people with guitars making this sort of music, but doing it in a way that is universal and more accessible to lots of people. 

If you think of any other genre, whether it be hip hop or dance or whatever, they've evolved. We stopped evolving. Tastes are cyclical. There will be peaks and troughs. Sometimes we have to be willing to offer something new and different if we want new and different people to care. I also really like Angie McMahon, another Australian artist. She's great. 

Oh yeah, another one — I keep naming Australian bands — is Parcels. They’re a great example of everything a band should be. Surface level, the music is obviously great, but just how they approach everything is new and original. Obviously, in the music there's lots of familiar sounds and textures but it just feels like a dance record that's funk. It's not dated, it feels modern. 

What about pop music? 

Some of the more mainstream artists, like Chappell Roan are not, in my opinion, breaking any moulds musically. The songs are great. It’s amazing what they're doing to be a different kind of pop star. The hilarious thing is, Sabrina Carpenter's up for best new artist Grammy and this is her fifth album or something. So they have the confidence, they have the security within themselves to be like, ‘No, this is who I'm going to be.’ With Chappell Roan, I think she's been great at just being herself. And the music's great, obviously. 

Maybe with younger people, things are different for them. It's easier for them to [say], ‘This is okay, this isn’t okay, these are my feelings.’ But when we were starting out, there were things you never do, you never say. Those are all gone. We'd be worried about putting our song on a video game because we'd be like, ‘Oh no we sold out.’ 

The lamest thing you could’ve done was wear a shirt with a logo on it. If you wore a shirt that said Gucci, I know Gucci's not as cool anymore, but if you wore a shirt that said, like, fucking, I don't know, Juicy Couture across the front, that would be the lamest thing in the world. 

No it’s so in.

Now, it's the coolest thing. I probably really aged myself there by telling that story. But also my example of what young people wear is probably so off. I'm not even that old.

No, you're right. I own Juicy, I think it's in. You're on the money there.

And you're cool. So, yeah, I got it right. 

Keep on Smiling — you wrote that album during the back end of Covid and credited a tongue-in-cheek positivity as an influence for the music. Has that positivity continued with what you guys are currently writing now?

Yeah, I think it's been quite rare that we've ever been that far away from that sort of thought process and style when we've been writing. Ten years ago, we were super depressed and overworked. We were leaning towards things that were less tongue-in-cheek and less playful. But now, we've got some stuff in the bag and we're super happy. It's different, for sure. But under the same broad umbrella. It's upbeat, it's playful, tongue-in-cheek. 

I'm very excited to hear any of the new music that you have coming out. Can you tease anything about it or a potential album?

We were talking about maybe releasing some music this year, but then we decided not to. We decided we're going to Asia and then Australia, and then we're going to take some time off and ‘work on ourselves’ and work on some new music at the same time. We'll definitely be back at some point, we'll be back as soon as we're able. We're already planning it, but it's not going to be this year.

Can you tease anything about what you'll be doing with Declan on stage? Is there a potential collab in the works?

I hope he doesn't get any ideas from collaborating with Sabrina Carpenter on his current US tour.

You could be doing a little musical number together. Think of the outfits.

Yeah, exactly. That would be great if we did ‘Espresso’ or something. To be honest, we haven't really talked about it. We've been on the most mammoth American tour this year. We just finished that one last week, so everyone has been laser focussed on that. Next week, or the week after, we'll start really getting into what we're going to do in Asia and Australia. But, if Declan's watching this, sure, why not. We could do some mash up of ‘Brazil’ and ‘What You Know’. You never know. Declan will have to wait around for the night. He might already be at the bar. 

Or he could be at Luna Park.

Yeah, he could be anywhere. Or he could be in bed. 

You can grab tickets to see Two Door Cinema Club touring with Declan McKenna across Australia here.

pssst. If you love charli xcx and wanna hear more about the brat phenomenon and where she goes from here, listen to our new podcast: Welcome to XCX World