Photo by Ira Chernova
Cage The Elephant spent the first three albums of its career in a hurry to grow musically and figure out how to put their stamp on the rock scene. But with the band’s fourth album, Tell Me I’m Pretty, that mindset changed, and ironically this helped Cage The Elephant recapture a bit of the freewheeling feeling of the musical freedom of the group’s formative years, according to guitarist Brad Shultz.
“It kind of brought me back to that first record when we were those kids in Bowling Green, Ky., just making records for the hell of it and having a great time,” Brad Shultz said of the recording process. “Not that we didn’t have a great experience making each record—there were great times—but I think there was also pressure, especially with [the 2013 album] Melophobia, that we put on ourselves because we wanted to grow so bad, and we wanted to see results before we actually went through the growth. We didn’t realize that growth goes unseen until the finished product is there, if that makes any sense. At the end of Melophobia, we kind of realized that and we kind of stopped pushing so hard for growth because it’s going to happen naturally,” he said.
Sure enough, growth did happen, to the point that the highly enjoyable Tell Me I’m Pretty feels like the most focused album yet from Cage The Elephant. It’s also anything but a rehash of the three albums that came before it.
Although the band’s 2008 self-titled debut and 2011’s Thank You, Happy Birthday, were both hits and gave the band a trio of chart-topping alternative rock singles: “Back Against the Wall,” “Shake Me Down” and “In One Ear,” they were both musical works-in-progress. Melophobia, though, was a watershed album for Cage The Elephant, displaying a more original slant to the band’s music. The Grammy-nominated album spawned two No. 1 alternative rock singles—“Come a Little Closer” and “Cigarette Daydreams.” And the experience of making Melophobia also generated creative momentum that carried right through the making of Tell Me I’m Pretty.
“We went through a great deal of growth on Melophobia,” Shultz said. “I think on Melophobia, our whole objective was to rediscover or just refresh what our voice is within songwriting, because I think we were heavily influenced on our second record, and that was all part of the growing experience from the first record. And you kind of learn things throughout each record.”
Tell Me I’m Pretty has a distinctly different personality from Melophobia. Where that 2013 album had a decidedly modern character, the latest album has a more classic, even vintage garage-rock feel. There’s a big dose of 1960’s pop in “Cold Cold Cold” (the opening guitar line recalls The Hollies’ “Bus Stop,” and the drum sound and fuzz guitar are very ’60s-ish). There’s certainly a vintage touch in the groovy feel of “Mess Around” (a chart-topping single on multiple rock formats), and in the surfy-playfully creepy and catchy-synthy signature melody line of “That’s Right.”
Shultz, however, says the band didn’t set out to make a purposefully retro record, noting they were simply trying to write music that fit the emotions of the lyrics. But he thinks the band (working with producer Dan Auerbach of The Black Keys) tapped into a ’60s rock ethos in making Tell Me I’m Pretty, working to make each part count by evoking a feeling and highlighting musical elements that listeners could lock onto each time they played a song.
Fans can expect to hear a healthy number of the songs from Tell Me I’m Pretty in Cage The Elephant’s live set as the band rolls out a show with a bit more production than on past tours.
“We are carrying a little bit bigger production than we have in the past,” Shultz said. “But more importantly, the thing we’re excited about is playing all the new stuff for people. It’s refreshing to see people connecting with the songs and this record.”
Cage The Elephant headline The Rave in The Eagles Ballroom, 2401 W. Wisconsin Ave., on Wednesday, June 8 at 7 p.m. with Portugal. The Man and Morning Teleportation. For further information, please visit therave.com or call 414-342-7283.
