Before the psych pop trio took the stage, we caught up with Michael and Tyler of Mini Mansions to talk about life on the road, experiencing a David Lynch night club and where they ate the best burger.
The Deli: How do you prepare for playing a festival?
Michael: We don’t come out with a special set. For us with these kind of festivals, we’re still a small band and we’re trying to gain new fans, so it’s not like we’re trying to play the hits to appease people. We’re just trying to play what we love and hope people love it. It’s nothing really different. Maybe a little bit more jamming.
The Deli: Who are you excited to see today?
Michael: We would love to see Warpaint. We love those girls. But we have to leave. [to play a show in Palm Springs] It’s good we’ve seen them a couple times before. We opened up for them a couple times. And our friend was recording their new record, so our paths cross.
But this band sounds good (referring to Cosmonauts, who were playing the Block Stage)
The Deli: Today is Record Store Day, do you have anything special for it?
Michael: We have all these songs recorded, but we just couldn’t get something together. So many people do special things, which is so awesome for music fans.
The Deli: Do you remember the first record you bought?
Tyler: Love and The Doors. They were my parents and they were all messed up. Unless you were a collector, your parents just left them in the garage to get all mossy.
Michael: I know the first CD I bought was MC Hammer. I’m sure about that. But the first record I ever bought, I remember I was eight or something and going to FedCo and I bought Green Day Dookie and Offspring Smash on cassette tape.
The Deli: You spent a lot of time on the road. What was a highlight of all your touring last year (with Foster the People)?
Michael: Paris. It was weird. We did three shows in London. We did Berlin. They were all ok. But then we go to Paris and did two nights and it was just unbelievable. The fans were just like the best crowd you could ask for. Especially opening for a pop band that’s massive. You could tell they love art and they care.
Tyler: We had great burgers there too. It was one of the best burgers I’ve ever had. And one of the dopest clubbing nights I’ve ever done.
Michael: That was at the David Lynch club. He has this club in Paris called Silencio.
Tyler: It’s just a club at the end of the day, but the interior design was out of control. When you enter, you’re escorted into this hallway and you have to walk slowly with this security guy and once you get inside there’s just a lot of black glass.
The Deli: What’s next for Mini Mansions?
Michael: In a month, we’re doing a short run with Arctic Monkeys. We’re really excited about that. We haven’t toured in a year. So we’re really excited to get out there. We recorded a bunch of new music.
Tyler: We recorded a whole EP. We recorded two new songs of recent. We’ve written essentially 80% of the record already. We spent this year just writing and playing special shows. So when we’re ready we don’t have to go back in the studio and record everything.
The Deli: Do you like touring?
Michael: I love it. If you don’t, you got into the wrong profession. You could stay home too and make music, but if you want to be in a band, you better like the road. Or you figure it out real quickly and make a change.
The Deli: Will you be playing in LA?
Michael: Yeah, we’ll play a show right before we leave for tour. We’re just going to throw something together somewhere really small. A free show or something just for fun because we haven’t played LA in a long time.
– Jacqueline Caruso
Photo Courtesy of Leslie Andrew Ridings