{"title":"Man Man","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"carrot-on-strings","title":"Carrot On Strings","description":"\u003cp\u003eNew album by idiosyncratic LA act Man Man draws on Krautrock, Italo-disco, oddball prog, and the films of Werner Herzog and Rainer Werner Fassbinder for a wildly entertaining art-pop romp.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhen Man Man released its last album, \u003ci\u003eDream Hunting in the Valley of the In Between\u003c\/i\u003e, frontman Honus Honus (née Ryan Kattner) was in a state of unrest, oscillating between hope and cynicism. Perhaps fittingly, the album dropped during the pandemic, a time at which we could all relate. But, much like that bizarre turn of events, the ennui now seems so distant to Man Man. A revived sense of purpose washes through Man Man’s new album, \u003ci\u003eCarrot on Strings\u003c\/i\u003e, radiating a mix of calm and confidence.  Kattner always embodied a wild-man pied-piper vibe: his melodic, unhinged art-rock was at once intriguing and angsty. He was so alluringly creative that you went along with it, even if you were never sure where Man Man would take you. \u003ci\u003eCarrot on Strings \u003c\/i\u003eis no less inventive, but its ethos is radical in context of the band’s two-decade career. “When I was younger, I would feed off of chaos. I would, you know, be upset and get drunk and smash chairs,” Kattner explains. “Now those chairs are in my head: It's less of an outward projection, more of an interior monologue.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe name “Carrot on Strings” came to Kattner while experimenting with the sound of someone munching on the vegetable, which you can hear in the cacophonous, similarly named song. It alludes to how success always seemed to dangle uncertainly before him, often just out of reach. But listen intently and you’ll hear a more content Kattner finding an uneasy peace: “Life, as far as I’ve known it, has always been side hustles. Would it be great if I could go into a studio and record for a year without figuring out how to finance it? Yeah, it would be,” he says. “But ultimately, I need to keep making music because art is an extension of my psyche. It’s how I have learned to translate the palpitations of my heart. Simply put, I’d go insane without it.”  Growing up as a multiracial Hapa kid (half Filipino, half white) with a father in the U.S. Air Force, Kattner lived an itinerant childhood that included a few pivotal years in Germany, where he honed in on an appreciation for out there German cinema and art. His film obsessions and screenwriting background were crucial to \u003ci\u003eCarrot on Strings\u003c\/i\u003e. The album nods to the films of Werner Herzog and Rainer Werner Fassbinder as much as Italo-disco, Randy Newman, goth rock, and avant pop. (Kattner continues to work in the film industry with an acting role in the upcoming horror-comedy movie \u003ci\u003eDestroy All Neighbors\u003c\/i\u003e, for which he also served as composer; music supervising season 1 and 2 of the \u003ci\u003eInterview With The Vampire\u003c\/i\u003e AMC TV series; and shopping around, with director Matthew Goodhue, a script he wrote that he describes as a Wim Wenders road movie on acid.) In a bid to not overthink anything - his last album took seven years to make - he recorded the bulk of \u003ci\u003eCarrot On Strings \u003c\/i\u003ein five days in Mant Sounds studio in Glassell Park, Los Angeles with “very chill” producer Matt Schuessler, who had worked on Man Man’s cover of Neu!’s “Super” for the seminal Krautrock band’s box set.  \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe resulting album represents a newfound sense of self for Kattner, who finds himself inspired and at peace both personally and artistically in ways that eluded him for most of his first 15 years playing music. When, on \u003ci\u003eCarrot On Strings\u003c\/i\u003e, you hear Kattner croon humbly, or sing of the tension between his outsize stage persona and the thoughtful, soulful guy he actually is, you’re hearing Kattner liberate himself. “I first got into music to escape from myself,” he says. “And now, it sounds so corny, but I have zero doubt that music ended up saving my life.”\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Sub Pop","offers":[{"title":"Orange LP","offer_id":50447939666251,"sku":"2190506","price":27.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":50447937012043,"sku":"2190505","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/ManMan_CarrotOnString_1500px_2c2e3c8b_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1727084316"},{"product_id":"dream-hunting-in-the-valley-of-the-in-between","title":"Dream Hunting in the Valley of the In-Between","description":"\u003cp\u003eHonus Honus (aka Ryan Kattner) has devoted his career to exploring the uncertainty between life’s extremes, beauty, and ugliness, order and chaos. The songs on \u003ci\u003eDream Hunting in the Valley of the In-Between\u003c\/i\u003e, Man Man’s first album in over six years and their Sub Pop debut, are as intimate, soulful, and timeless as they are audaciously inventive and daring, resulting in his best Man Man album to date. \u003cbr\u003eThe 17-track effort, featuring \u003ci\u003eCloud Nein, Future Peg, On the Mend Sheela\u003c\/i\u003e, and \u003ci\u003eAnimal Attraction,\u003c\/i\u003e was produced by Cyrus Ghahremani, mixed by S. Husky Höskulds and mastered by Dave Cooley also includes guest vocals from Steady Holiday’s Dre Babinski on \u003ci\u003eFuture Peg\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eIf Only,\u003c\/i\u003e and Rebecca Black (singer of the viral pop hit, \u003ci\u003eFriday\u003c\/i\u003e) on \u003ci\u003eOn The Mend \u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eLonely Beuys.\u003c\/i\u003e The album follows the release of \u003ci\u003eBeached\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eWitch\u003c\/i\u003e, Man Man’s contributions to Vol. 4 of the Sub Pop Singles Club in 2019.\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAt the end of 2015, Man Man went on an unexpected hiatus, and thus began a period of creative reinvention for Honus Honus. He worked in music supervision and on scores (The Exorcist, Superdeluxe, Do You Want to See a Dead Body?). He acted in the indie film Woe (“I played a park ranger, a nice guy in a sad movie.”), So It Goes, a short musical film with Mary Elizabeth Winstead, and starred in the award-winning tour documentary Use Your Delusion. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn the midst of this surreal exile from Man Man, Honus began piecing together what would become \u003ci\u003eDream Hunting in the Valley of the In-Between\u003c\/i\u003e. He recruited longtime-collaborator Cyrus Ghahremani to help him produce. Written in a friend’s LA guesthouse that had “an old upright piano, a thrift store lamp, and nothing else,” it was an arduous, three-and-a-half-year process, “I had chord progressions that looked like chicken scratch and lyrics on pieces of paper stuck all over the walls. It looked like I was about to break the big case, catch the killer,” he says, laughing. “There was a lot of self-doubt, fighting the urge to throw in the towel. It wasn’t fun but it definitely forced the best album of my career out of me. Sometimes you just gotta tear it all down to rebuild things the right way. Trust the process.”\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Sub Pop","offers":[{"title":"Black | LP | x2","offer_id":50448039706955,"sku":"1088361","price":27.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"Pink | LP | x2","offer_id":50448039248203,"sku":"1088362","price":32.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":50448040198475,"sku":"1088359","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/962dd53a-e7e3-4fb6-b86e-a422704fe625_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1727085473"}],"url":"https:\/\/shop.roughtrade.com\/fr\/collections\/man-man.oembed","provider":"Rough Trade","version":"1.0","type":"link"}