Interview with MTTM

"We are ready to open for Depeche Mode"

According to the description on the band's website, MTTM is a band dedicated to reviving New Wave music. Based in Berlin, the trio combines music from the 80s, post-punk, and modern synthpop, drawing inspiration from artists such as Depeche Mode and David Bowie. MTTM combines poetic lyrics with powerful drums and synthesizers, creating a bridge between the past and the present. The band's creativity is filled with a dark aesthetic, but the music doesn't sound too depressing. The musicians kindly took the time to answer our questions.

Is it true that you are preparing to open for Depeche Mode?

Of course! We've been preparing ever since we started MTTM, so yes, it's very much true. We're actually ready now, by the way! So Martin and Dave, if you're reading this (I'm completely sure they are), we're ready, guys. Jokes aside, that would be incredible. I'm sure every band would love to open for the artists who are great influences for them, and we're definitely no different.

You have a chance to say something to the guys from Depeche Mode now. What would you like to tell them?

Can we open for you? Haha. I think we would thank them for having created so many albums that inspired us and helped us do something we love so much – making music. All those years listening to Depeche Mode got us here and even helped us connect with each other musically, since we're all fans. We appreciate their talent and all their hard work. Besides that, I guess we'd be normal fans and would take a picture with them. It would actually be cool to just hang out a bit, as it's always great to be around amazing artists.

When I found your site, I don't know why, but its design reminded me of the iconic German band Kraftwerk. A lot of musicians from Germany and Europe mention this band in their work. Do you like any of their music?

We absolutely love Kraftwerk, and we always have, even before coming to Europe and Germany. Way back when we used to be based in our home country, in Brazil, Kraftwerk was already a reference for us, both musically and aesthetically. We hadn't realized this similarity, however, so it wasn't something conscious, but that's pretty cool to hear because we, like so many other artists, admire them a lot. We actually think it's pretty cool to be in Germany, where they came from – a country that has such a great history for the type of music we play.

You also mentioned that you like David Bowie's work. Which period of his work do you like the most?

Yes, Bowie is immensely important for us artistically. We always turn to Bowie for inspiration, and we all agree that he was such a complete artist. We have Bowie with us in everything we do, and we love everything he did. I'd say personally that I'm most deeply touched by the beginning – the Ziggy Stardust phase. However, we're hugely influenced by the 80s, the Let's Dance album and his 80s vibe. I'd say that resonates more with us as a band. But it's hard to say which period we like more – we love what he did in the 90s as well, and also his last songs, Blackstar, everything.

I notice you have quite a few black and white photos and videos. What is it about this aesthetic that appeals to you so much?

We really focus on having a consistent aesthetic and style, so all of our choices when it comes to design, colors, how we dress, our videos, our themes – everything – we try to unite it all to express and communicate in the best possible way what we want to make people feel. It's about having an artistic brand, but more importantly, it's about providing a certain feeling that's also in our music. The black and white appeals to us because we feel it adds a sense of nostalgia, sometimes isolation, internal battles – things that our songs talk about. We also combine that with a little bit of red, which we think complements the black and white. This has become part of our brand in this current phase. Of course, this aesthetic can change depending on what we're doing at the moment, much like Bowie did different things. We focus on having visual material connected to what we're doing at the moment.

What's behind the creation of your songs? Do you use your personal life stories and personal experiences to create, or is it just a collection of interesting images that come to your mind from the world around you?

It's both things. Our songwriting process starts mostly with simple sounds and a collection of images. I'd say we let the first notes we play guide us and inspire the way forward, and then we start experiencing what we feel through these sounds. From that, some images come to our minds and we slowly start really understanding what the song is about, where it wants to go and what it wants to say. This usually ends up connecting to personal experiences and becoming clearer. For us, it's pretty much like a living thing that we go along with and let develop itself.

On a scale of 1 to 10, how difficult is a musician's journey?

Eleven. It's hard, but if you truly have the connection with art like we have, it's just something you have to do. You need to create to live, or at least to live healthily. However, it's hard because it isn't easy to have the opportunity to dedicate all your life to it. This part of the journey asks you to manage so many other things in order to be able to do music. Not being a full-time musician is a big difficulty in the journey, and I'd say only a few of us have the benefit of not having this challenge. There are, of course, other difficulties if you really want to have this experience in the best possible way. The journey will ask you to be good in many areas that aren't just making music. Besides investing time and resources, it will be expensive at times, and you'll have to be a marketing professional, a manager, a booker, a video maker, an editor, an influencer, and on and on.

What helps you create your own personal style rather than just being wannabe old musicians?

I believe it all comes down to the dedicated effort we put into creating something that is consistent, that has a consistent style and wants to communicate something clear. It's about being serious with everything we're doing. I think it's alright to be just wannabe old musicians and play and have fun – I don't judge that – but we chose to do something that we think is truly great, and all the effort in being true to this direction is what helps us create our own personal style.

What was the main impetus behind the creation of the songs?

The songs from our album "The Diver" have a metaphorical theme related to water, the ocean. It's basically like a journey of self-discovery and internal battles to be who you really are, and we narrate this through being in a flooded house, then in a storm at sea, then lost in a boat and drifting away, etc. But you discover you are a diver, so you can go into the deep water, you can breathe there, and you can find strength and everything. It's the journey, or an odyssey, of a diver. This is the theme that came to us when we were making the songs, and we understood that it was connecting everything together. Some of it, personally, also talks about the period where we weren't making art or making music. We lived through that for some years, and during that period we were trying to find ourselves, basically. So these are, as we mentioned before, images that came to us that also relate somehow to personal experiences.

What person/s in the music industry would you say is the nicest?

Not sure, to be honest. We know Bowie was such a nice guy – he helped other great artists and used to give so much great advice to musicians. He used to say how important it is to make music foremost for yourself and not based on what a label or other people like. I think that's essential to truly make real and good music. Not sure about who else we could say is the nicest. I know we do have professionals we admire in the sense of helping musicians with their careers, like some musical marketing influencers today – for example, Matt Bacon. We think he's a nice guy and provides relevant and honest content that helps people succeed in this industry.

Now 80s music has become very popular again, and there are a lot of bands that play in that style. Do you have any strategy on how you will stand out in the music market?

We're actually very happy to see how 80s music is popular today. We love so many new projects that are also inspired by this decade. We think it's great to belong to this wave of artists – it only helps us connect with people who love this type of music. In terms of strategy to stand out, I believe this is something we do by being serious about everything we do and how we try to make it all work together. We care about our performances, we want to entertain whoever comes, we want to be present on all social channels we use, and we are indeed truthful to the music we make – we do it mostly from the heart. I think artists who do that are the ones more likely to stand out naturally. Not everybody really works hard on all of this.

If we take the average music lover, in your opinion, what song is the right place to start to get acquainted with your work?

"The Flow" was the first single we released from our album "The Diver," and I'd say we were quite happy to hear nice things about it. I think it was a great choice to release it first as it has a little bit of everything we do in it. I'd say it summarizes most of our sound and our vibe, so it's definitely a good song to start with.

How often does melancholy take hold of you?

Quite a lot. I think this can be felt in most of our songs – there's a melancholic tone to all of them. I think melancholy is a very inspiring feeling, to be honest. It's melancholic reflection, I would actually say, as there's quite a lot of observing, feeling, and reflecting about everything when you feel it. I think life is quite complex and we go through moments that are melancholic and where we're unsure about it all, but at the same time there's a lot of beauty in it, there's poetry, and this is what we attempt to express. It's what we share through melodies and hope that others can also connect with it. So it's funny to say, but melancholy takes a good hold of us, but it actually gives us meaningful feelings that end up transforming into something good and into understanding life better and understanding ourselves better.

What challenges have you faced in your work lately?

Lately we have a challenge related to distance. We used to all be in Berlin, but now we have one band member in Frankfurt, so it gets a bit harder to rehearse, plan gigs, write new songs, among other things. This became a recent challenge, but we're doing quite well at the moment, I believe. We speak regularly and sometimes we spend a week in Frankfurt together, which in the end is nice as well.

What achievement in your chosen musical field makes you most proud?

MTTM is actually a very new project, but we had great achievements from the project we had together before – it was basically the start of MTTM in a way. We stopped playing together and lived in different countries for years, and now we're back together again. However, with our older project we did play at a very big festival twice in Brazil called Planeta Atl?ntida. We performed for around 30,000 people – that was really amazing and we're definitely proud of that. Can't wait for the opportunity to play big festivals again.

How do you inspire your team to work hard?

We're all very conscious of what we love to do and what we want from this. We share the same excitement for being on the road, performing, making songs – the whole deal. So I believe this is what inspires us to work hard, as it's what we want, and we know that to live it we have to work hard. The inspiration comes from remembering that. I'm glad all three of us work hard – we're equally devoted to this project and this makes a difference.

If your life was accompanied by a soundtrack, what would it be?

I'd be very happy if the composer of my life's soundtrack could be like Ennio Morricone or perhaps Jon Brion. I don't know if my life would be as great as those that had their music in it, but I'd like that, haha. I'm a great cinema lover as well, and all of us like a lot of different things. I'd have a part of my life with 80s-inspired synthpop-type music in the background, but there would be different moments and genres as well.

What is the biggest misconception about you that you have encountered?

I couldn't easily say in our career so far with MTTM – we're relatively new, so I haven't heard any big misconception about us I could mention. Although MTTM is new, we have been making music for quite a while and we've been out there a few times in the past. I think sometimes there's a misconception in this sense, but nothing big or actually a problem, really.

What social networks do you use? Who do you follow?

We're everywhere, but mainly on Instagram, I'd say. We follow many other new artists in our genre. I think it's great to support new bands, and there really is a lot of great stuff happening right now, whether it's darkwave, synthpop, post-punk, or whatever. We follow these new artists and other pages that promote this type of music. It's great to see such a cool scene happening, and we think it's great to be part of it.

What challenges does the music industry face right now, in your opinion?

I believe the challenge is that there really isn't much money for most of the artists in the music industry. If there is some money in the industry, unfortunately, it doesn't really stay with the artists, especially the smaller ones, and we all have to struggle so much to make it all happen. It's a problem that's hard to solve. At the same time, it's great how things are more easily accessible – you can reach more listeners, and it got easier to record and produce – but at the same time, you have to figure out ways to financially get something back, because that's usually not the case.

Jenet Bonishi