We looked into Mgmt before we decided to pick them for our music video, we wanted to get a feel for what type of atmosphere the band produce so we would know what we would have to recreate in our video and other areas such as the cd cover. This is some of the things that our study found.
Firstly, we looked at a number of different sites to do with the band and tried to find reviews and general opinions on the band so that we knew how they come across in the general public.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MGMT
MGMT is an American band based in Brooklyn, New York, founded by Ben Goldwasser and Andrew VanWyngarden. After the release of their first album, the members of their live band, Matthew Asti, James Richardson and Will Berman joined the core band in the studio. Formed at Wesleyan University and originally with Cantora Records, they signed with Columbia Records and Red Ink in 2006.
On October 5, 2007 Spin.com named MGMT "Artist of the Day". On November 14, 2007, Rolling Stone pegged MGMT as a top 10 "Artist to Watch" in 2008. The band was named 9th in the BBC's Sound of 2008 top 10 poll.They were also named as Last.fm's most played new artist of 2008 in their Best of 2008 lists.
Their first album as MGMT, Oracular Spectacular, debuted at number 12 on the UK album chart and number six on the Australian ARIA Charts, and hit number one on the Billboard Top Heatseekers chart. It has also been named the 18th best album of the decade by Rolling Stone magazine. It was named the best album of 2008 by NME. MGMT also appeared prominently in Australia's Triple J Hottest 100 2008, coming in 2nd with "Electric Feel", 5th with "Kids" and 18th with "Time to Pretend".
MGMT was nominated for the 2010 Grammy Award for Best New Artist, and their track "Kids" was nominated for Best Pop Performance By a Duo or Group with Vocals. These are the first Grammy nominations for the band. At the 2009 Grammy Awards, the Justice remix of "Electric Feel" won the Grammy for Best Remixed Recording, Non-Classical.
Their second album, Congratulations, was released on April 13, 2010.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/mar/22/mgmt-review -
"Hope you liked some of our new stuff," said MGMT's singer/guitarist, Andrew VanWyngarden, at the end of this show. There was a pause – then he asked shyly: "DO you like it? It means a lot to us."
VanWyngarden wasn't trying to generate the applause that automatically follows when a rock star deigns to ask the audience's opinion of new material – he actually wanted reassurance. His Brooklyn-based electro duo, one of 2008's big left-field successes, are preparing to test the loyalty of the million people who bought their Grammy-winning debut, Oracular Spectacular, by bringing out a follow-up, Congratulations, that contains "no hits, no singles", and promises to be closer in feel to the band's live show.
On stage, VanWyngarden and keyboardist Ben Goldwasser forget they're a pop band and start experimenting with key changes and effects in a way that exposes them as stoner musos. The reasoning seems to be that if a track sounds good on record, it will sound even better stretched to 10 minutes, and garlanded with psychedelic guitar figures. But this sole British show – a tour follows in September – suggested the new album won't be as hard to digest as MGMT claim.
The songs were complex and hard to pigeonhole, with tempo changes and genre-switching tomfoolery as standard, but they weren't prog-rock ambles. Wasserman produced Mellotron and harpsichord effects that conjured up Donovan and the Incredible String Band; Flash Delirium sustained interest by threading a synthesised flute through asymmetrical tempo shifts; It's Working made harpsichord and bongos feel like a natural combination.
There's also been a rethink about presentation: out with the lengthy jams, in with a rigorous trimming of excess. They squeezed 12 songs into an hour without feeling rushed. On stage, MGMT have become the art rockers to beat.
Then we found a review of the album in which the song we was intending to use was found on, 'Oracular Spectacular'
http://www.bbc.co.uk/music/reviews/nv3n
''We make pop music, but pop music that isn't comfortable'', declares MGMT leader Andrew Vanwyngarden. You can say that again. Talk about eclectic. This Brooklyn duo have got more tricks up their sleeve than Pete Doherty has court appearances. But first some background: For those unfamiliar with New York's latest synth-sters basically all you need to know is that both Vanwyngarden and keyboardist Ben Goldwasser first bonded over their love for My Bloody Valentine and Spacemen 3 at Connecticut's Wesleyan University back in 2002. Since then they have signed a whopping record deal with Columbia thanks to legendary U2 producer Steve Lillywhite and they're currently making huge waves across the States. Their debut album, Oracular Spectacular, has been constructed or in their case de-constructed by The Flaming Lips producer Dave Fridmann and their lyrics are inspired by The Mayan Prophecies and conspiracy websites.
Now back to the issue of uncomfortable pop music. Undoubtedly there are times when Vanwyngarden and Goldwasser stretch the boundaries of pop to breaking point on Oracular. But synth-drenched opener Time To Pretend ain't one of them. If anything MGMT's spine tingling lead off track couldn't be easier on the ear if it tried, as the pair poke fun at rock star dreams about marrying models, scoring drugs, "living fast and dying young".
Next up is Weekend Wars, a psychedelic pop ditty smattered with acoustic strings and Vanwyngarden’s Jagger-esque vocals. Elsewhere, Electric Feel comes on like Prince holding a gun to the heads of French funksters Daft Punk while Vanwyngarden and Goldwasser seductively croon: “Ooh girl, shock me like an electric eel/Baby girl/Turn me on with your electric feel”.
Then comes the uncomfortable second half. Gone are the synth driven bass lines and disco beats and in come surf guitars and quivering vocals. Not that this is necessarily a bad thing. Indeed this works to MGMT's advantage at times particularly on the galloping 4th Dimensional Transition. But when the Brooklyn wizards delve into space folk territory (The Handshake, Future Reflections) towards the end of the album, their uncomfortable pop template sounds forced.
Even so in Oracular Spectacular MGMT have delivered a debut which is both intriguing and exciting if a little uncomfortable.
These reviews show an upcoming and very positivly reviewed band, a band that is starting to break into the national limelight and so our idea to do a song from their first album is a good one, because the album is classed as one of the best albums of recent years. Next we wanted to look into the band itself and how they dress and act.
This shows a very futuristic but at the same time caveman feel to it, as though it is a fantasty type of world. It shows the band members in fancy dress and so it shows that they like to get involved in all this imaginary doings.
This shows the band having a bit of a laugh and so shows their humourous side to things as it is showing them messing around next to the water. The image really shows their hippy and pyschadelic style of things which you can feel in their music, we was thinking about trying to bring these aspects of a trippy and very imaginative theme into our ideas.
This image especially shows off the hippy style that MGMT put across as it shows off the band in full hippy attire and with their guitars and fancy dress that really brings all of the previous themes we have thought about together. Overall, we have looked at some of these images to do with MGMT and feel that the general factors which we have taken from them are the facts that
= The band are very hippy and this is shown in their images.
= The band have a sense of humour and like to show this in small ways.
= The band like to dress up and use very imaginative ideas and costumes.
This means that in our video we are thinking of using all of these ideas especially these ideas of fantasy and dressing up in costumes.
