Young The Giant came roaring out of lockdown with American Bollywood, the best album of their career. This summer, they’re hitting the road with Milky Chance for their first proper tour since the pandemic. We spoke to frontman Sameer Gadhia about the new record, his satellite radio project Point Of Origin, and how to write a smash hit song in only ten minutes.
CC: Thank you so much for making the time. What’s the vibe like for you and the band on a day like this, just a few hours before the tour kicks off?
Sameer Gadhia: There’s a bit of excitement and a bit of jitters. But we live for these moments, when you’re kinda walking a tightrope, not really sure how it’s gonna go. And it’s the first real time that we’re taking American Bollywood out on tour.
CC: You’ve said that American Bollywood was “carved through worldwide turbulence and the displacement of normality.” Is it fair to say that turbulence and displacement have actually been good for your creative process?
SG: Yes, you know, I think in spite of the turbulence and strife that everybody has lived through, it was a fruitful time for the band. And (the pandemic) forced us to get out of the rat race. We were so used to touring, putting out a record, touring, putting out a record and so on, that I hadn’t been home for more than three weeks at a time throughout my career. When you’re made to stay off the road for that long, you’re forced to deal with all the stuff that’s still jiggling around in there, as opposed to running away from it. And when you face those hard truths, that’s when you write your best stuff.
CC: American Bollywood is definitely some of your best stuff, and it’s your most personal work as a lyricist. You’re writing about identity and mental health and generational trauma. Did it feel risky to write from such a personal place?
SG: Yeah, I think it did. I think there’s an allure of wanting to be completely transparent with the listener, but then there’s an inevitable momentum and crash when you can’t separate yourself from what you’ve shared. And that was hard for me to deal with, especially once it came out, because this material is so personal. But I was convinced, and I’m still convinced that when something comes from the heart, that’s when it really hits people. Even if somebody is just a casual listener, that person can tell when something is fake and contrived, and I want to give the realest version of myself.
I’m still convinced that when something comes from the heart, that’s when it really hits people.
Sameer Gadhia
CC: And on this record, you’re bringing Indian musical influence and Indian mythology to rock and roll in a way that, for example, Freddie Mercury never did. Would you say you had to pay your dues and tour your ass off just to get to this place where you can marry the two?
SG: I think so. But over the course of the band’s career, once we started meeting producers and writers who turned us on to a bunch of new musicians, it opened up this floodgate, and I realized there was a narrative of South Asian diaspora music that has lived in rock and roll for decades, beyond sitar and tabla and fusion. There are rock artists, Radiohead for example, who use Eastern scales. It’s in the spiritualism of psychedelic music. It’s even baked into pop music, and the little vocal flips that some pop artists use. I realized that I didn’t have to connect two very different things; it’s more like it’s already connected.
CC: You wrote a piece for Rolling Stone two years ago, and you beautifully articulated a really tricky issue. You said: “Now that ‘wokeness’ is a desirable commodity, we are fetishized by executives wanting to absolve their sins, or benefit from the incentivized marketing structure.” Do you feel like in the two years since you wrote that, the whole concept of wokeness has become even more of a commodity?
SG: Yeah, I think it has. The conclusion that I made in that article was that this (commoditization) is a necessary evil on the road to progress. People are seeing through this stuff perpetrated by these big corporations, but I hope that there continues to be a genuine movement in spite of all that. I’m gonna do what I can with Point of Origin and with the band, as opposed to saying, “pay attention to me because I’m an artist of color.” It’s like, no, pay attention because I’m an artist, and because the system has not really allowed our story to be told before.
CC: I think you hit on the key word, which is progress. The audience can see a big difference between somebody doing something progressive very sincerely, like Point of Origin, versus, for example, a beer company using wokeness as a commodity.
SG: Totally, totally.
CC: I remember hearing your song Repeat during the lockdowns. And some of those lyrics took on brand new context in that particular time and place. Have any of your songs taken on new meaning for you over the past few years?
SG: I think every song, when it has enough critical mass, does take on additional meaning through people adding something of their own. And we’ve been lucky enough to have a few of our own songs make it into the ether. One example is My Body, from the first record. We wrote that song with no higher intention, and some of it was gibberish at the time. It was written in maybe ten minutes. Originally, the lyrics were just subconscious things that came out, but that song has taken on meaning for the diasbled fans out there who are trying to live through their physical confines. I’ve had a lot of people come up and talk about that song in particular. And those kinds of encounters are amazing for me. As a lyricist and a songwriter, you become aware of this magic trick: Most of the reason and meaning comes from the people who are thinking on the lyrics just as much or more than you are.
CC: I actually think you’re being too humble when you say those subconscious lyrics are gibberish, because I think the subconscious expression is often the most universal.
SG: I feel like the best songwriting is not about thinking, it’s a feeling. The best lyrics are usually just a feeling that comes out. And (writing My Body) was a moment of trusting that feeling, and channeling whatever was out there.
SG: I feel like the best songwriting is not about thinking, it’s a feeling. The best lyrics are usually just a feeling that comes out. And (writing My Body) was a moment of trusting that feeling, and channeling whatever was out there.
As a lyricist and a songwriter, you become aware of this magic trick: Most of the reason and meaning comes from the people who are thinking on the lyrics just as much or more than you are.
-Sameer Gadhia
CC: Do you still write from the subconscious, in that same way?
SG: Yeah, on this record, we did that a couple times. On The Walk Home, for example. And as you go further in your career and take yourself more seriously, sometimes it gets harder to trust that gut and that intuition. But most definitely, there are moments of that on this record.
CC: So do you have any particular hack for getting into that headspace that allows a great song to come together?
SG: I don’t think there’s a fast trick. I think it’s about getting your ego out of the way, and instead of thinking too hard about what you want to say, just letting the emotions and melodies come, and not being afraid to be simple.
CC: It’s amazing to hear that you wrote My Body in ten minutes. There are so many cool anecdotes like that, where we find out as fans that some of the greatest songs in history have been written in ten minutes.
SG: Most of our songs that have kinda reached that level (of popularity) were those same songs that only took ten minutes to write. And I think it’s not just about the ten minutes, but the hours and hours of work and the shitty songs that you start looking through, in order to get to those ten minutes. (laughs) I still most definitely believe in the ten minute song.
Young The Giant’s new album American Bollywood is available now. Catch them on tour this summer with Milky Chance.