MSPAINT emerged from Hattiesburg, Mississippi with a sound all their own and have defined their nascent career with the collaborative efforts that have gone into their releases to date. Their early output was produced by Taylor Young, leading to a collaboration with Militarie Gun, and their new EP, No Separation, was co-produced by Julian Cashwan Pratt and Harlan Steed of Show Me the Body, who encouraged them to not wait to put out a full-length while focusing on touring and strike while the proverbial iron is hot. We asked Ian Shelton of Militarie Gun if he’d be game to chat with the band about their fast rise in the hardcore punk scene and he was quick to oblige.
Ian Shelton: All right. I’m an interviewer now. I’m very professional. This is going to go well. My first question—and it really is emphasized by how late everybody was to get on to the zoom call. How does it feel to be big time?
Deedee (vocalist): Is that what that is? When punctuality becomes absent you’re like, ‘These guys are serious. They must be locked in’ (laughter).
IS: I mean, when I met you guys you were, you know … just hillbillies, living in the middle of nowhere, and now you guys are no longer punctual. Just tell me, how does it feel to make it and be big time?
Randy Riley (bass): That can’t be your first real question, Ian.
IS: From meeting you guys at Convulse Fest to now, there’s a huge difference in your reality. Before, you were almost not perceived of, at all. And now you’re very perceived. What do you think the difference is from when I first met you guys to this new EP (No Separation, out now on Convulse Records)? What’s going on your in your world?
RR: Do we wanna just start off with the part wherein you are a major part of that?
DD: Well, I think the reality of it is that to do it, we had to leave the usual comfort of every two weeks where there’s always a paycheck. There’s more of a structured schedule to how you live. And now that it’s come full-circle to where we did that for a year and some change—where we just did the band—and traveled and did that shit. But now we’re working again and having time off more and using our time to do normal shit again, which to me has been nice. But it’s also interesting for me—thinking about the way you posed the question—We are a lot more casual with the shit that we normally would have been tweaked out on in some ways. I feel like the only thing that that I really can say a hundred percent is that … even when we did the album with Taylor (Young, producer on their 2023 album Post American, as well as albums by Regional Justice Center and Militarie Gun) it never crossed my mind. But this recording … It’s not gonna be like millions, but at least a hundred people are gonna want to hear this. Without a question. At least fifty for sure that are excited. It’s something that I don’t feel like we ever really considered before.
And then this recording being with people that we met along the way touring, we didn’t really have enough time to do 10 songs. We’re not the band that can jam the shit at sound check and be like, “hell yeah.” There’s so many things that have to occur before it’s valid, at least as far as the band works. I feel like it is a little bit more predictable than it was the first time doing an album, and Taylor being the only person that we’ve recorded with, besides ourselves. We didn’t have a ton of experience coming into it. The weird thing was thinking about when we were doing something cool, I was like, ‘That one nerd in fucking Detroit is gonna love this.’
IS: Being from a smaller city, do you guys think it’s different around home? Are you guys perceived different in Hattiesburg?
Quinn Mackey (drums): Maybe the Post Malone pic. Someone saw me at the gas station, and they’re like, “Are you that guy that took a pic with Post Malone?” That’s all he said (laughter).
RR: It got to a certain degree here where it wasn’t like ‘cool album,’ or ‘I listen to your shit when I work out.” It was like, “So, what was he like?” But I think that people are actually paying attention. I remember our first time doing mainland Europe, we were in France and people were saying “Hattiesburg World,” and I know for a fact they don’t know where that is.
IS: You guys are toilers. I know it. I’ve seen the madness in real life. I’ve said the story before … We’re working on the song “Delete It.” I left the room for maybe fifteen minutes to take a phone call, and I came back, and I was hearing a completely different song. And I said, “What song is this?” And you’re like, “Oh, it’s the one we were working on.” I was like, “Hit undo until we get back there.” Why did this EP take so long to come out? I mean, you guys were trying to play four of these songs on the Scowl tour. Where did time go?
Nicholaus Panella (synth): We’ve gotten better about that. Mainly, I’ve gotten better about that. The writing process has gotten a lot faster, I think. Early on, with some of the success we were experiencing, personally, I was having a little bit of an identity crisis. It’s like, ‘What the fuck do I do with it?” I think we all were kind of kind of experiencing that. This is a once-in-a-lifetime sort of opportunity. How do you stay true to who you are and what you’re interested in musically, but also create something that people like—and those things don’t have to be mutually exclusive. We all grew up in an environment where, in a lot of small ways, it was sort of like, “Fuck the listener.”
MSPAINT was an interesting change of pace for all of us, because it represented the moment where we turned that around completely and started working through, “Hey, what if we actually connected to people?’ And that’s become the goal of the band. The artistic and creative process has gotten a lot quicker and more streamlined. Recording with other people taught us a lot of things about, “How do we get to our sound quicker?” I think we’ve learned a lot from recording with Taylor and Show Me the Body as far as how that process actually looks.
RR: The timeline aspect is simply that we were just touring, and we are trying to take this as far as we can and make sure that we get every ounce of juice out of Post American being an album that people seemed to pay attention to. It took this moment of us meeting the dudes from Show Me the Body and being like, “These are some demos that we have worked up. These are ones that are close to being done, and that we’re trying out live just to see what it feels like. And we’re maybe just gonna save it for an LP.” The advice that we got—which was extremely helpful—was, “Dude, just release what you have time to release. If you have five songs right now, just do that because touring on Post American and limiting yourself as far as what you have time to do in terms of writing and recording, that’s affecting that.” It could have been a longer wait had we not like decided to just play our hand. And here’s what we got.
IS: Yeah, just strange because you were so committed to that plan two years ago. To hear that it took you two years to have someone affirm it is kind of crazy. Quinn, you’re watching everyone spiral out all the time. You’re kind of the calm in the storm of MSPAINT, in my opinion. Do you ever sit there like, “What the hell was going on?” What’s your step in the process of going with the flow, but also having to watch the madness?
QM: I feel like I’m a tinkerer, too, because me and Nick have been working together a long time. Sometimes I do wish we could move a little quicker, but I feel like we’re reaching for something that we don’t even know we’re reaching for. It just takes a while to get to it. But I don’t know. They were all laughing, so maybe they don’t agree that I’m the chill one.
DD: Nick and Quinn have a dynamic where Quinn’s gonna get first ears on whatever, either a full song or just a part, and they’ll work on it. I’m not that way. That is probably on the farthest other end of the spectrum of how I’ve always and still do music outside of the parameters of this band. I feel the emotion and the emotion has completed the song for me. The chemistry is different. They can work the same way together, but sometimes there’s a demo where it’s like, “Check out this song,” and I’ll be listening to it, and I’m like, ‘What is this?’ Or it’ll be something that is really good, but it’s still weird. And I’m in the band, you know? I’m an active member of the band, being like, “I have to put words to this?!?”
IS: Do you feel like in those cases you try to ground the song by adding a center to it?
DD: It truly can depend. Sometimes there’s vocals on a song, and then a month later, the vocals are over something that’s different. But I think that the process that’s getting more honed in is also that me and Nick, and Randy, too, are all very guitar-brained. But I think that to answer your question is, the reason it took so long is because we’re figuring out what the fuck we’re doing. And we’re also figuring out the things that we’ve been missing from the beginning because we didn’t know what it was because it’s not a chorus pedal. It’s not like you’re strumming something, and you’re like, “What does this need?” And you just go in your closet and pull out a guitar pedal. Because you’re right. We were talking about this very soon after the album.
IS: I mean, I knew (the track) “Angel.” I don’t think it changed much from what I had heard to the version I hear two years later.
QM: It’s the details. It’s the details that changed (laughter).
DD: We’re not erasing it all completely, but we do have to go back and rebuild after every new thing that we figure out, and it can be frustrating. But it is also the sort of source of the gas, you know? It’s like when Nick’s fucking with something, and he turns the knob one way different, and everything changes. You don’t really have the template of what feels right, but as far as serving the song, sometimes it is just having to dive into it, even if it brings you all the way back to the beginning. That’s the thing that we’ve like homed in more on, is knowing when to chase it, and knowing when to be like, “It really just needs a modular, bubbly synth part, and we’re locked in.”
IS: The other day, you had Anthony Fantano (music critic, The Needle Drop) talk about you guys. He compared the song to Rush, and I could definitely see Rush as an influence on MSPAINT.
DD: Stop. That’s crazy!
IS: That part is a Rush part! There’s not a single person who hears that and doesn’t think Rush. The question is, are there things you’re trying to convey that you think most people are glossing over?
NP: I remember reading a comment on Stereogum or something like that that said that we had a distinct Stevie Wonder quality to us. I thought, “That’s weird, but that’s also very true,” because when I was in high school, I spent a lot of time playing Stevie Wonder songs. To hear someone say that comes out in our music, with the, like, posi vibes. It’s weird to go back to that time in my life and think, “Oh, does MSPAINT come from Songs Key of Life? Is that what it is?” I’m OK with that one.
RR: Stevie Wonder preferred over the Rush comparison.
QM: I think the Rush was intentional, but really the first two or three seconds, you’re like, this is like “Tom Sawyer” right here.
RR: Yeah, I messaged Julian (Cashwan Pratt, Show Me the Body). All the people that we worked on this with for a week had the access to the early demos. We showed our friends and family these songs, and for it to go through this many layers of the onion, and no one being like, “Hey, that’s what this is?” And then I find out later, is kind of so silly.
IS: It’s only one of the biggest songs of all time (laughter).
DD: I can confidently say, every other band I’ve done, if someone came up and was like, “Y’all sound like Motörhead,” I’d be like hell yes, you know. But with this band, it’s almost like there’s not a right answer. It could be Limp Bizkit; it could be fucking Beethoven.
IS: Yeah, you had Maximum Rocknroll dissing you guys. That has to be one of the most hack reviewers of all time. I hope whoever did that has quit music journalism. (The review said, “It’s hard to take stock of the music because the vocals just make everything sound like open mic night with some Limp Bizkit fans tearing it up.”)
RR: I mean, you would know though, as someone who has played with Limp Bizkit (laughter).
DD: Pretty sure he wrote for Maximum Rocknroll in 2014.
IS: We are doing this with the competing Bay Area publication, so we’re supposed to do that. We’ve been contractually obligated to talk shit on Maximum Rocknroll by New Noise.
DD: I actually always enjoyed their reviews. I’m just speaking from my heart, and I was sad when I couldn’t get a copy of it. I had some of them shits up on my wall, so they can talk shit on my band. It’s not for everybody. I feel like some people do compare us to other bands as a slight. But it’ll be something sick where they’ll be like, “They sound like fucking P.O.D. or some bullshit,” and I’m like … “a couple tracks,” you know?
IS: A musician I really like, I sent him Militarie Gun demos and he said, “You sound like that bad f-word from Modest Mouse.” They were attempting to slight me, but they said that I sounded like one of my favorite bands, so I was like, “That’s amazing. I love that.”
DD: Or even if it’s not one of your favorite bands, whether or not you like a band like P.O.D. or Limp Bizkit, somebody … That’s their favorite band.
IS: A lot of people in the world—more people than are in the punk scene in the entire world—would say P.O.D. is their favorite band.
DD: One hundred percent, and five of them are my neighbors (laughter).
IS: Does Deedee ever come with lyrics that everyone else is like, “I don’t know, Big Dog?” Does that ever happen?
RR: I truly am digging. I can’t really point to like any. Deedee has always been a really good and, like, purposeful lyricist.
DD: There has been times where they’ve been like, “Yo, could we get in on this,” and it’s not a protective thing, because I’m not against collabing on it. But for me, there’s definitely times where I’ve been like, ‘I’m really gonna get to say this.’
IS: Have you questioned yourself, or are there lyrics that you now regret?
DD: There’s not lyrics I regret. There’s some things that I’ve straight lifted that I feel like eventually as other things get popular, people will notice. It’s something I worry about. I’m way better at following a vision and starring in a role than I am of completely coming in and taking the reins on something. I want to get to a place where, like with this EP, it’s way less veils and flowery sort of language.
IS: Less cool guy indifference, it is actually opening up to the audience to a degree.
DD: Yeah, or it’s saying things that, kind of what Nick was saying at the beginning about the kind of “anti-listener” vibes of being like, “This catchy part is gonna be a bunch of words that no one ever says, even myself,” so it’s almost impossible to sing anything but the caveman part. The only parts of the set that people really sing are “Hardwired” and “Burn All the Flags” because those are the only parts that start on a fucking downbeat and start on a fucking actual syllable that your mouth can do that phonetically makes sense. There’s this sort of a thing I do where I pick up on shit that people say around me, and that gets in, and the goal is to sort of not even notice it. I think the reason that a lot of people in bands I’ve been with have been chill with the lyrics I do is because it’s a lot of shit that they’re saying. I’m not going to be in a band with people and sing a song that they wouldn’t also sing.
IS: I feel like as we’ve all gotten older, we’ve learned that the cool guy thing—the opaqueness—is just a substitute for trying instead of it actually being cool. Like, “Oh actually, you’re just lazy and scared of being criticized.”
DD: It’s like finding your voice. I never thought that anybody was going to pay attention. Saying “the apocalypse” a hundred times without saying it felt cool and right in the moment. Like Randy was saying, there’s French people that you’re sticking the mic in their face, and you’re like, “What does it sound like with that accent,” you know? You start to have a different sort of experience. Sometimes the lyrics are like the grounding moment.
IS: That’s the human element. That’s the only thing that can actually reach another human being. A guitar or a synthesizer is not a human, and therefore you can never actually relate to it. Those aren’t the things in songs that we’re returning for necessarily. It’s the human element, I think.
NP: The music in in our case represents the setting that Deedee is fighting against and I feel like that plays into the character that he created for it.
IS: That’s a succinct answer, unlike anything else we’ve heard today. I’m only going to ask two more because we’ve been going for a while and people don’t want a full novel of this. Randy, you’re someone who is very quick to point out when you’re noticed by someone who inspires you and how honored you feel when you feel that reciprocal enjoyment with. Are there artists you’re hoping find MSPAINT?
RR: Tons of boxes have been checked just for my musical history, like (Turnover’s) Peripheral Vision, literally ran five years of my life on just replay. That was a huge album for me and my friend group when we were making the transition from high school to college type of type of vibes. I think that you know how there’s like a six degrees removed kind of thing where someone’s telling us, “The guitar player for this band bought our record.’ That’s a cool feeling. The guitar player from My Chemical Romance bought the record, and I thought that was fucking sick. I can’t remember exactly who it was, but somebody was wearing an MSPAINT shirt and was taking a picture with Mike Shinoda (Linkin Park), and I was like, cool. That’s fucking sick. That would be cool if it was a Fallout Boy guy. Stumped, stumped. Patrick Stump.
IS: That stumped you (laughter).
RR: But yeah, so that that would be that would be really cool, if he knew about our band. I’m more on the production side. Something that we have joked about is, what would the sense be if we were working with Trent Reznor, how cool would that be? That is certainly crossed my mind.
IS: I imagine that Nick is not rushing to say Thom Yorke and Johnny Greenwood (Radiohead) right now.
NP: No, I wish they would recognize the genocide in Gaza.
IS: He somewhat acknowledged it, but then he also was like, this is really hard for me.
NP: I think that was the part that really weirded me out. You can have your mental health issues, that’s fine. But, you know, talk to your therapist. You’re in a public sphere. He’s rich enough to afford a therapist. He should be talking to the guy, you know. It was highly inappropriate. It’s embarrassing, honestly.
IS: Yeah, each of you give one artist you hope to find is an MSPAINT-head, and then I’ll move into my final question.
DD: For me. I think it’s T-Pain.
IS: That’d be so good. Deedee on T-Pain’s podcast would kill. That would be amazing.
DD: Not even just how he is post-career in the video game and streaming stuff. I remember when the Tiny Desk came out, how everybody was surprised that he could sing because of autotune. I remember messing around with autotune on a buddy’s computer one time and was like, ‘Oh, you actually do have to be able to sing.’
IS: That’s what people don’t realize is, it sounds bad if you are on the wrong note.
DD: It would be cool to play shows with a big artist like T-Pain. It’s weird to even consider that it might happen somehow in a funny, serendipitous way. It would be really cool to meet someone who at least para-socially seems to be really fun to hang out with, and who actually is a music head. I feel like he knows who Mahavishnu Orchestra is.
IS: Quinn, give me one.
QM: My mind went to Caroline Polachek.
IS: That’d be so sick.
QM: Her music’s kind of weird, but she’s vocally so talented. She does production. I just think she’s super cool, an ethereal artist kind of vibe that I think is sick.
IS: I would love to see a Fred Again/MSPAINT remix. He just did that with Shady Nasty, and I feel like it’s possible.
RR: I watched that live remix that they did with The Japanese House at that intimate London show probably 200 times on a phone recording. I was like, this is so fucking good! That would be sick.
NP: Greg Sonier from Deerhoof. I really love that band, and I think genuinely Dearhoof is a real influence on MSPAINT. If I found out that he was an MSPAINT head, or really anyone in that band, I would be thrilled.
RR: I do have a very obvious answer now buried in my mind. You had actually brought this up when we first met, when we were recording and like working on “Delete It.” The Postal Service. Death Cab for Cutie was one of my first favorite bands, and then, of course, Ben Gibbard being in the Postal Service, and that being an overtly various synth-based project, which I also loved. That would be so sick. Doing a doing a cover of “Such Great Heights” like you pitched all those years ago, I would still say yes to it, tonight at practice.
IS: That’s a great segue into within a couple of days, “Delete It” will have 1 million streams on Spotify, which means it’s been heard more times than that around the world. I’m honored to have been a part of that song and trying to spread the word on MSPAINT with doing that song. What do you guys want to do next? When is the album going to be an actual conversation and not just a cerebral thing?
NP: We have almost 30 demos right now for the next record. We’ve been working really fast. We’ve collected a lot of ideas over the years. But we’ve gotten a lot faster. I think we’re sitting on probably three or four complete songs and then we have 20-something demos that we’re working through at the moment. I would like for us to be recording at the end of the year and to have 16 songs ready going into the New Year for mixing and mastering, which I think is actually very feasible with the speed at which we’re moving.
IS: What would be one venue in America that you would feel comfortable hanging it up after selling out?
RR: Red Rocks maybe?
QM: The Superdome (laughter).
RR: Yeah, the New Orleans Superdome.
IS: Deedee, Nick?
NP: I don’t know if I really have one.
IS: So you’re saying you’ll never be comfortable hanging it up. That’s also a good answer.
NP: Well, OK, yeah, I guess so. If we sold out Thalia Hall, that would be really cool. I remember playing there with Soft Kill, and when Quinn hit the bass drop, it made the whole building shudder from top to bottom. I just want to experience that again. It was genuinely terrifying. It felt like if Quinn had played the right bass drop, the building would have fallen, and I want to feel that kind of danger again, honestly.
RR: I liked your interpretation of that, because I don’t think we have any inkling of hanging it up, really.
IS: Alright! Thank you, guys.
DD: To the person transcribing this, we were late because we have jobs and stuff, not because we’re, like, big time.
IS: Sweet dreams, boys, sweet dreams.
No Separation is out Friday, and you can preorder it from Convulse Records. Follow MSPAINT on Instagram and Twitter for future updates.
All photos by Thorne Hood
