Interpol have announced their new album ‘This Mirror Weighs A Ton’ by releasing the Massive Attack-inspired title track and punchy single ‘See Out Loud’. Check them both out below as frontman Paul Banks tells NME about how they put together one of the most “important” records of their career.
After announcing their signing to Partisan records (home to IDLES, Geese and PJ Harvey), the NYC indie icons have now shared that their ninth album and the follow-up to 2022’s acclaimed ‘The Other Side Of Make-Believe‘ will arrive on Friday August 28.
Produced by Andrew Wyatt [ROSALÍA, Charli XCX] and mixed by Dave Fridmann [Sleater-Kinney, MGMT], ‘This Mirror Weighs A Ton’ could be the band’s most full-bodied work to date, utilising “strings, woodwinds, layered vocal harmonies, acoustic guitar and experimental sound design” to their signature sense of atmosphere and inescapable rhythms.
“This is really a no-skip record for me,” Banks told NME when we met in a London hotel in Soho. “I think we did some great work.”
Having had two children since the last album, Banks – now 48 – explained how and why he “felt like it was really important for this to be a great record”, with that sense of reflection captured in the title track.
“I was in a headspace either about how we felt about the rest of the record of post-parenthood, but I took it really seriously and wanted to make sure I came away really proud of the work,” Banks told NME. “Every song is different, but I guess there’s a spirit of striving for elation and a striving for enlightenment and clarity. There’s a lot of taking stock and honest assessments, hence the title. It’s about striving and reflection.”
Speaking about the more experimental sonic palette of the song, he shared: “It’s a different type of bass sound and I don’t think anyone would argue the Massive Attack comparison. You can thank Brad [Truax, bassist] for that. It just felt good.
“There’s a really precious simplicity to it. It became the titular track not because we felt that song was so important, but just that lyric. We have a bit of a history with turning a lyric into the title like with [2002 debut album] ‘Turn On The Bright Lights’, and it just needs to suit it. We really love the vibe and it introduces some new sounds and feelings. It paves the way for this record not being what you expect. That lyric does speak to what the themes are on the record.”
The album also comes previewed by the anthemic ‘See Out Loud’, one of two new songs the band have been playing at recent shows. The song leans into the more pulsing and rhythmic vibe of their albums ‘Antics’ and ‘El Pintor’. While Banks takes the lead, guitarist Daniel Kessler lends a rare vocal over a synthy interlude – only the third time he’s done so after the classic ‘PDA’ on the band’s 2002 ‘PDA’ and the fan favourite early version of B-side ‘Song Seven’.
“It feels quite ‘classic Interpol’, right?” said Banks. “That was one we were working on for a really long time. It has a classic Interpol bassline. The lyric [‘Say something magical, save something for me‘] is about striving for elation and the revelation that can come from the abandon that nightlife can sometimes bring. There are often parallel themes for me, so it’s ostensibly a party song but there are layers to what the lyrics are interpreted to be. On the surface it’s just ‘at the clerb’ or some place at 5am with neon clouds.
“I tried to get Dan to sing on the last record too, but we couldn’t get it together to make it feel necessary. I felt like this song is a lot of fun. Dan sings really well and has a really interesting character to his voice and a posture as a singer. He has his own lineage that informs that and it’s a nice counterbalance to me, we just don’t do it much. Any time we’ve done, it’s been really cool and fun.”
He added: “A lot of songs on this album have killer outros, and that’s one of them. We had some enjoyment not limiting ourselves to what we think a song structure should be and just let the songs be what they wanted to be.”
Check out the rest of our interview below, where Banks told NME about the changed chemistry of the band as a five-piece, how fatherhood has changed him, and their standing as New York City indie legends.
NME: Hello Paul. The last time we spoke you told us you’d moved to Berlin. What kind of impact does that have on what you do?
Paul Banks: “That’s interesting. A lot of this record we wrote when we were in New York, and then I do a lot of lyric-writing in Berlin; refining a lot of the nebulous ideas that we jammed. I always loved Berlin. In the early days of the band touring, I always felt like it was just one of the most fashionable cities, I felt like it had a Mad Max quality where the hipsters just seemed really edgy. Now I’m not really plugged in to that Berghain-y hipster aspect of it and where I live is more young families, but it still gives me that urban injection. It still feels like enough of a cultural hub that I get the inspiration of fashion and young people. Then New York City has this really unique pressure cooker quality to it where the density does something creatively to you.”
And you’re a father now. That must shape the way you view the world and your work?
“It’s a two-sided thing. On the one hand, I think I became a father at a really good time in my life. I’m a relatively old dad [48] but having pursued my dreams avidly for a long while, rather than trying to have a family while I was in the early stages of trying to pursue something that I needed to put 100 per cent of my attention into. I was super not ready earlier on in life.
“In the one way, what matters to me now is that they’re healthy and happy. If that is accomplished then I don’t really care what goes on. That’s the success and recognition I need: their smiling faces. It makes the career feel lighter and less important by comparison. That being said, the career feels more important than ever in the sense that if I’m going to bother being away from my family and bother doing anything, then I better do it really fucking well and make it really worthwhile. I need to justify the effort and the energy, or just fuck it.
“It makes me have a different perspective of how important the music is, but then it also makes me take it more seriously than I ever did before because I want to be the best professional, the best bandmate, the best adult that I can be.”
Did that inject a certain compulsion into this record?
“I think it did. I think it made me just write a little harder. It also helped me work on relationships in the band. I realised that I don’t want any petty gripes weighing me down. How would that look to my children? ‘Dad complains a lot’ or ‘dad doesn’t like his job because he’s always bummed about it’. It really made me realise that if I’m going to be in this band and work with people then I need to be happy about and just be a mature fucking person. You get to revel in your childishness a lot when you’re an artist, and it was a good counterbalance for me to grow up a little in my interpersonal relationships.”
The press shots for this album feature Interpol’s live bassist Brad Truax and keyboardist Brandon Curtis [also of The Secret Machines]. Why the decision to present the band like this?
“Brad’s on the record. He wrote and recorded the basslines, so that’s a pretty new thing that I retired from the bass [after the departure of Carlos D in 2011]. I passed the mantle. Brandon’s not on the record, but our producer Andrew [Wyatt] played keys and synths on this. What you’re hearing when you hear the record is a five-piece, even if it’s Andrew and not Brandon. When you see us live, it’s five of us. I don’t like showing up in cities to play shows and seeing these photos everywhere that don’t reflect these two guys that are in the trenches with us every day.
“This feels more like the reality – this gang – and I’d rather the inclusion than the exclusion.”
What did producer Andrew Wyatt bring to the table?
“Andrew Wyatt was in Miike Snow, and he produced the song ‘Wild Season’ I did with RZA and Florence Welch years ago [on the Banks & Steelz album ‘Anything But Words’]. I’ve known him for a long time, he’s been good friends with out bass player Brad for a long time, he became good friends with Daniel and he’s a fucking genius producer.
“It was this instance where we thought, ‘Let’s work with a producer on this record, and let’s work with our friend who’s based in New York City’. Three out of four of us who were going to be playing know and love him, so let’s have it be him.”
This was also the first time the band have recorded in New York City in 10 years. Does that bring a certain comfort and confidence?
“I liked writing in New York City a lot. We worked in studio called Gonzo’s on St Mark’s, then we recorded it in Andrew’s place downtown. There is this sense of responsibility to the place and the weight and responsibility of the place. Even Gonzo’s was in the building that used to be this iconic music and video store called Kim’s Video in the late ‘90s. Brad used to work there. We were dead in the centre of a lot of music culture in New York City. That has a focussing effect and a ‘go time’ feeling to make it count. That’s a characteristic of this entire record. We just felt, ‘Let’s make this one count. Let’s do the job’.”
When we spoke in 2024, you said the album was heading in a high energy rock direction. Did you stick to that?
“I think it was that the last record was written during the pandemic and I was writing vocals in my bedroom to an isolated Daniel guitar track. This time I said, ‘I need us to be loud in a room together’. It was louder from the beginning. I do think there are more rockers on this one than the last one, although I wouldn’t necessarily say it’s a ‘heavy’ record or overly rocking. It was just written in that live space where I could shout over the drums again.”
Do you feel that celebrating the 20th anniversary of ‘Antics’ on tour and reliving that album in such depth bled into this album in any way?
“Not consciously. If I were ever to feel like approaching a microphone, I’d never have thought, ‘Oh, I should do it like I used to do it’. I know that wouldn’t be fun. I finally figured out that whatever talent you have is maybe a finite reserve. I don’t think you get more talented as you go along in your career as an artist, you just refine your process.
“That means a lot. It means that you can get to the pure creativity that’s in you faster with second-guessing it or getting your ego’s greasy fingerprints all over it. You get to it faster and you question it less. That’s one thing I know when I’m writing: what feels right now, now what I think I should be doing. That’s what I followed on this one. I don’t think ‘Antics’ had any place there at all.”
The album also features ‘Iron City’, a song that seems to turn up the unusual atmosphere of your last record as you sing: “Alone in Central Park when nothing seems to happen, all my thoughts invaded, memories degraded”. Is that another ode to trying to find yourself in New York?
“That song is more a conversation between the human narrator and the future artificial intelligence that’s running things. Will this matriarchal tech be benevolent or angry? It switches between singing to it and it singing to us.”
Do you fear AI?
“No. AI replacing art can only base itself on what we’ve made, so without new stuff it will devolve into a simulacra and have no bearing on the human experience. We need to be feeding it new real stuff for it to be doing anything of real note. There’s always been shit art that’s purposefully formulaic, now there will just be a computer trying to play the formula. When people get bored of the formula, you’re going to need a person to make the next leap and then the AI can mimic that.
“It’ll be human creativity that’s always ahead of the curve. It’s the young artists’ job to work in reaction to the status quo, so they’ll always be breaking new ground that the computer won’t have the human side to make something that feels essential. In a military space is where it’s all a bit sketchier.”
You’ve also been playing the real banger ‘Wings On Fire‘. What can you tell us about that?
“That’s a fun romp. It’s a lot of fun to play. That’s the fulfilment of what we were aiming to do on this one, in being more rocking and raucous.”
After 30 years as a band and making this record you’re most proud of, how do you feel about Interpol’s standing in the culture?
“I get a little seduced by the algorithm and see a lot of posts about people just discovering ‘Turn On The Bright Lights’ and our band. I feel that it’s exciting to me that the next generation are discovering the band. I’m genuinely privileged that there’s any appreciation for what we do all these years later. I feel really humbled and honoured and you couldn’t ask for any more, especially as we never played the game to have commercial success. We just do what we do. It’s really nice to have people respond.
“A real hallmark of our work was authenticity, and it makes to me that it would speak to the next generation. In a world of lots of pop music – and I don’t hate all of it, there’s a lot of good pop music – but in the landscape that we’re in, authenticity in rock music is hard to come by. Authentic rock music is another tier, where do you find that? I’m happy and humbled that people are finding that.”
Interpol release ‘This Mirror Weighs A Ton’ on Friday August 31 via Partisan. Check out the full tracklist below and visit here to pre-order.
‘This Mirror Weighs a Ton’
‘See Out Loud’
‘Iron City’
‘Wounded Soldier’
‘Wings On Fire’
‘Ever The Actor’
‘So Rides The Reindeer’
‘Darling Thoughts’
‘Wake Up’
‘Enemy’
‘Bird and The Serpent’
‘Sudden’
The band hook up with Deftones in August, supporting them at London’s All Points East x Outbreak on line-up also includes IDLES, Amyl & The Sniffers, AFI, Esdeekid, JPEGMAFIA, Deafheaven and Mannequin Pussy.
In Autumn they will kick off their co-headline tour with Bloc Party, playing across the UK and Europe. Those dates include two nights at the new British Airways ARC venue in London. Visit here for tickets to all upcoming dates.