laughing alongside Angus in their shared home’s studio
space. “I’m a pretty blunt person, and there were a lot of
times where I was either trying to help enforce some organizational
tools to keep us on track, or pointing to things we
had to finish. And maybe it wasn’t helping with Matt’s stress or
what he was dealing with, but it was a unique situation, and as
a supportive partner, I had to be encouraging. There were just
so many beautiful songs that I thought were among Matt’s
best work, and just tried to maintain that support to be there
when we were in ‘go mode’ to really finish stuff off.”
“I don’t think any other partner would’ve stuck it out
through the whole thing, and been so supportive,” Angus
tacks on. “I’m not sure if we would’ve made it out on the
other side without Kirty.”
When they landed back in Canada, the individual members
had to self-quarantine for two weeks, and it wasn’t hard
for the creatively-starved sextet to recognize the silver linings
of their circumstances. “It was like, ‘Holy crap. There are no
excuses,’” Kirty recalls. “It was an open-ended, concentrated
amount of time where we couldn’t do anything else. We
were basically locked in a closet with a pile of songs that were
almost done,” and in this case, the metaphorical closet is
actually a pretty well-stocked home studio.
As they got to work, their initial pool of songs was split
into two distinct collections. The first, which would become
Pick It Up, was lyrically rooted in these very experiences –
songs about fighting personal demons, the fear of having
little control over so much in the world, about breaking out
of a depression thanks to self-determination and some good
friends.
Of course, the self-isolation lasted longer than two
weeks, but like Angus and Kirty, the other members also had
their own basic recording set-ups at the ready, and in a twist
of good fortune, McKinlay had actually recorded most of his
drum parts in a proper studio in the days leading up to the
departure for California. That meant that, by the end of their
mandated quarantine, Pick It Up was pretty much done.
“It was this wild, immediate thing,” Angus explains. “We
knew what needed to be finished, and Kevin, Lisa, and Jeff
took the tracks as they were, and there were times where I’d
be working on one thing, and Kevin was Voice Memo-ing
ideas on Messenger, and we’d find something we loved, he’d
record it in his home studio, send it over, I’d pop it in, and it
was almost more efficient than it would usually be [laughs].”
Kirty takes over: “Normally, we might jam something out
in the room live, which is really fun and collaborative and a
great way to come up with parts, but with this record, there
was this magic where each individual member had more independent
time with their parts and more space to methodically
work through their own creative processes. So much of what
we got had that magical spark in it; there were so many times
where we were just floored, like, ‘This is perfect.’”
In fact, both recall tearing up when hearing one of Black’s
particular guitar lines, after which Angus jokes: “I don’t know
if I’ve ever had a cry over a .WAV file…”
After handling most of the tracking themselves, the band
passed the reins to Marcus Paquin. The Montreal-based
producer/engineer, who boasts credits on projects by Arcade
Fire, The National, Stars, and Sarah Harmer, was back-andforth
with the band via intensive, sometimes all-night Zoom
sessions over another two-week span to finalize the mix.
“Doing everything in isolation just makes you think
outside the box and get creative with it,” Kirty offers, initially
referring to their experience with Paquin, but then applying it
to the record-making process as a whole. “It’s forced everyone
in every industry to get creative with what they have, and
so many cool things are going to come out of that.”
“Yeah, for better or for worse,” Angus tacks on, “human
beings have proven themselves these past few months as
being insanely adaptable; I can’t believe how adaptable we
are as a species.”
As far as they see it, Fast Romantics didn’t make a career-defining
record despite the circumstances; in a lot of ways, they
made it because of the circumstances, and that will have a
lasting impact on their future outlook and operations.
“Nobody is more eager than the six of us to get back
into a room and start jamming for that visceral creative experience,”
Angus admits. “But I feel more positive and creative
than I ever have, and I think that’s a result of this process. It
re-energized us and reset us in this way, and I don’t know
exactly why, but at this point, I think that block might be gone
forever.”
Revisiting his pendulum metaphor, Angus says he expects
things to swing back for their next LP, where they’ll likely
take over a commercial studio for some concentrated stints
of work as they did with American Love between Toronto and
Brooklyn. “Because there is something to be said for buckling
down on a set time limit and having to rely a bit more on
spontaneity,” Angus argues. “But that’s not to say that being
methodical means you aren’t spontaneous; the freedom to
be methodical in your own space creates an environment for
more spontaneity that we didn’t realize before. There’s really
no pressure, so cool and crazy things can come out.”
Once again, Kirty builds on that: “You breathe a bit, and
then you create your own spontaneity in your own time frame.
Every member of the band has parts of this process they really
loved and want to go back to, so we’ll see exactly how that
plays out the next time around.”
Thanks to their kick of creativity through the pandemic,
Pick It Up’s successor is already in the bag, so it shouldn’t be
long before we find out.
Andrew King is the Editor-in-Chief of Canadian Musician.
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