I interviewed “Man on Man” two years ago, and it was a marvelous conversation.
Here is the follow up where we talked about their new album ‘Provincetown’ which is a masterpiece musically and lyrically.
Roddy Bottum and his boyfriend Joey Holman formed Man on Man during the pandemic, and gave us some great rock, pounding rock, with some very gay content. They are a good couple of dudes in a happy relationship, and they are very loud about it.
20-Minute Banter with Man on Man
Jeremy Hinks: Joey Roddy, thanks for taking the time again. It’s been almost two years and now we got some quick banter about the new record. I wanted to tell you that you guys got the 2nd most amount of streams on my show.
Joey: Oh wow
Roddy: Who was the first?
JH: dUg Pinnick from “King’s X”
Roddy: Oh shit… (respectful)
JH: That was a great episode, Roddy, you hit me with the best jab I ever got about being bald, when you said, “Oh yeah, I do think I remember meeting you that night, but I thought you were wearing a wig”. (Roddy laughing) But I have to say, I got so much from that conversation, and I realized so much about my dad and his situation from that conversation.
Roddy: Yeah, we remember, that was a great conversation, we loved it.
JH: I was in San Diego, standing in line for a donut shop right before the episode aired, and met this guy who owned a record store. He told me how he couldn’t wait for the Man on Man record to come out, and I told him, “I’ve heard it, it’s fantastic”. There was a lot of chatter about it before the release. IT lived up to everyone’s expectations. But, I gotta say this new one is the one you guys were meant to make.
Joey: Oh thanks.
Roddy: That’s nice to hear, we’re in the funny place where we haven’t discussed it with many people. But it’s so great to hear. You work so long on these projects, and it’s just us by ourselves, and trusting our instincts, and now people are talking about it.
JH: Well, I love my job I got to hear it before anyone else did, winner for me. Brian in GayC/DC said he played a gig with you guys, and said it was probably the loudest gig that venue ever hosted. So, the title of the new album ‘Provincetown’, I’m pretty sure what it means, but let’s hear it…
Roddy: Well, we spent a lot of time in Provincetown, it’s a little town on Cape Cod, and it has a lot of history for the queer community and queer artists. It’s where Eugene O’Neal put on his first play, it’s where the Velvet Underground played one of their first shows. It’s this “outsider” vibe and history, and it’s a place for the last hundred years that has become a “Gay Mecca” where people can go and live their best gay lives. We have spent a lot of time up there, and around the pandemic, we got a place up there and it’s where we went to record this new record. We did it by ourselves and with some friends on occasion, it’s where we were at and what we were creating so we called it ‘Provincetown’.
JH: So it’s an homage to the place and the experience, cool. Let’s talk about the opening line to “Take It From Me”… “Poppers, disco, 1980s, San Francisco.” It has this GREAT synth line perfectly out of 1983. It’s one of the showcase pieces, tell us about that.
Roddy: It was a hard song to get right, but the fact that we chose it for the first song on the record says a lot. The sound is what we were focusing on, we had toured our first record and concluded that it felt a lot better being on stage playing loud songs. Songs that were declaring something, and heralding in some way. When we set out to make a new record that was foremost in our minds, we wanted to do loud songs, that was the message in that.
Joey: “Take it from me” was one of the first songs on the record, when we were heavy into record writing mode, we had like sixteen or seventeen songs deciding what to work on and throw away. And Roddy had a demo version of “Take it From Me”, and I loved the synth line it’s amazing, cause you mentioned 1983, and some of those are my favorite parts that Roddy writes, and I was like “YES THIS SONG”. But I didn’t know where to go with it guitar-wise, he had the drum parts, but I didn’t know what to play. But he flew to Denver for a few days in the middle of the summer, and I was by myself and I “cracked the code” I got really excited, and this is the song that reminded me of the last record when we were writing “Daddy” and our potential of what we could do as a band. I had this feeling when I was figuring out the parts that got me excited about this record. It was making sense now, and to Roddy’s point, we had so many songs on the last record that were downbeat and introspective. It was a product of the time of uncertainty etc, and there was a self-awareness that entered the room, and we knew we would be playing shows, that people would be listening to the record, and we knew what we liked playing live. So I think that really informed the direction we would go in with this next batch of songs.
JH: That walked me into this next question, your first album you were in a very different head space. With your mother dying and driving across the country during the pandemic.
Joey: We didn’t know we were “MAKING” a record either, we were just passing the time, so a lot of the songs that are on the record were just an experiment of me and Roddy just writing music together. That’s why there’s a lot of range on that first record.
Roddy: It was a lot more wobbly, even us as a couple we had never done that before, we’d never made music before. The process and outcome were a “figure it out” sort of condition. Compared to this time around we were very determined and knew what we wanted to do. So it’s rewarding to hear you say this is a real declaration for us, it does feel way more intentional, and way more specific in terms of two artists making a project. We were a lot more aware of what we were doing, which was just basically making a record.
Related Post: Man On Man, Roddy and Joey. Get Ready For This.
JH: Joey mentioned last time the stress of making a record with your boyfriend, and your boyfriend being Roddy, there was a lot of where Joey was asking “Am I doing this right” last time. Well, you guys are doing it right.
Joey: Thanks.
JH: I’m gonna say “I Feel Good” was a great dance tune, with some good vibes. I would have put you next to the band The Naked and Famous with that song. The line “Trying not to be toxic, just take it, it’s yours, step up and make it loud, and get FUCKING PROUD” is a feel-good about everything kind of song. That was the winner, I also have to point out, the litmus test is that if I can listen to it in my car with my teenage daughters, and they like it, then you know you’ve won.
Roddy: OH COOL!!!
Joey: YEAH!!!
JH: Yeah my girls enjoyed it in the car. So, it was a euphoric-driven piece is what I got from it.
Roddy: Thanks for saying that, I’m glad your daughters liked it. It’s one of my favorite songs on the record, when we were working on it, Joey did a fully realized sketch of it, and he had done words on it that were really profound to me. I loved them, and we started doing that song and then for some reason, we turned on it. I say “We”, cause Joey wanted to get rid of it.
Joey: Don’t say that…
Roddy: You really hated it, (At this point they are both laughing, and you can just see they are a happy gay couple arguing as anyone else does)
Joey: Yeah I didn’t like it…
Roddy: I like that you like the words, and are referencing the lyrics because they took a lot to get right. I recorded a verse and I ended up sounding a lot more showboating, and like Annie from the musical, more than I was comfortable, so I did a verse, and Joey did a verse, then we did the final verse together. And it took a long time but it was one of those songs that took a while to get right, and we finished it, thanks for liking it cause I like it too. I don’t know if Joey likes it yet, it’s an important song to me.
JH: You two are a cute couple… (Laughing)
Joey: Thanks. I like where it went, it was a very Rock “Bruce Springsteen” drive-y song, I felt so cheesy with it being so drive-y and saturated, and it was Roddy’s idea to remove all these layers, to make it feel more nighttime drive-y, nostalgic, it just feels like night time summer, relaxed, cool in love.
JH: Dansy too BTW.
Joey: Yeah it feels good. No pun intended
Roddy: There is a darkness to it that probably didn’t exist in the original version.
Joey: Yeah that song started cause we were still post-ish COVID, the whole sentiment of the song was we can do a lot of things, we can move, we can live in the middle of nowhere, get away from the madness, but we’re not. So we might as well deal with our decision to stay in it. What are going to do with our decisions here, a lot of our feelings versus the environment are at odds with each other, but at the end of the day, you’ve chosen to stick around. I think that was the entry point into what is this song gonna be like.
JH: Well, sound wise that was my fave on the record. BUT, lyrically, I have to say, the powerful in-your-face song, (and touching) says, “We’re two middle-aged mega talented gay guys with huge hearts”, that song “Kids”.
Roddy: Cool, I’m glad you liked it.
JH: That was the most powerful song, the lyrics, aside from the lines about the coke can in your pants, and “Hey piggy” are great lyrics, but I guess that was about a dating app. (They are both laughing, wait ’til you hear the song) The lyrics for “Kids”, last summer I took my youngest daughter to her first Punk concert, she was eleven at the time. I was photographing the band, and she met some great kids, and this one cute girl there they were both just talking and really getting along. And I said, “She” is a cute kid, and my daughter said “They” and I said “She” … then my daughter said “No Dad, “THEY” Get with it man” This is what my eleven-year-old is saying to me, and I’m sitting there saying “Oh shit that’s right”. So there is your line “Take a minute to get with the pronouns. You’ll be happy you did”. It was just direct, solid, and soft, saying “Just talk to the kids, talk to them about who they are, because you don’t want them to die”. Just acknowledge them and who they are. You guys are the best, what a beautiful soft piece of musical literature man, you guys have huge hearts, and that lyrically is the winner for the record for me.
Roddy: Thank you, that one is important to us, too. It’s the one part on this record where we took it down a bit, so it’s a gesture that sticks out on the record, and it’s nice that you recognize those lyrics as such. We talk a lot on the record about cross-generational references and respect, we also have a big age difference between the two of us. For us, our relationship is a generational gap that references each other constantly. The songs come out that way and the themes of the songs come a lot. Us respect kids, kids respect us, and how we learn from each other from generation to generation. I am glad that you pick up on that and like it.
JH: Well, you are saying “Start with your kids” in addressing the transphobia problem. Ok “Hush” was a great song, that was the only one with the vibe from the previous record, that was a great one. Let’s tie this up with how is the “Chosen Family” project going.
Joey: Thriving, we are going to figure out a new version of it, we have had time to figure out how people reacted with the pen pal thing, and being on the road and playing in front of people, and meeting people, I think we’re gonna figure out what that means.
Roddy: Chosen family is first and foremost, and inspiring, we are still on board.
JH: Well, I hope some guy comes out, and finds the love of his life at a Man on Man show.
Joey: People have connected at our shows, like find a dude to go home with, so that’s a nice second place. Cause really hot people come to our show, so it’s inevitable that you’re gonna find someone to go home with.
JH: Meanwhile you’re just the gay couple playing the music. So people connect at your shows’, that’s great. Hey guys, congratulations on the new record, I hope you get a lot of great exposure for it. So, thank you for your time.
Roddy: Thanks Jeremy, always a pleasure.
JH: The pleasure is all mine guys, all the best.
the full audio of this can be heard here.
https://zencastr.com/z/DGdFtsAE
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What a great name for a gay rock band, Man on Man.