Interview by Leah Wasilewski

Leah Wasilewski: I listened to your new album. I’ve been a fan of your music for so long. I know you kind of blew up on TikTok, right? I’m curious what your relationship is with social media as a musician and the pros and cons of it? Do you feel like music careers are changing with the rise of social media?

Mareux: I feel like I’m in the middle. I’m not too online but I’m also not totally ghosting the fans, so I try to get on there as much as possible. If I’m gonna make a video, I have it be a little funny or somewhat compelling. I’m not trying to post just to post —- I’d rather just let my account die. It’s just a part of being an artist now. Nobody’s promoting you. You’ve gotta promote yourself and do all the legwork yourself. It’s still just a very select few artists who get pushed hard core and if not, the entire burden is on you to make videos and post on YouTube; do whatever it takes. I don’t think anyone likes it. It’s kind of like a thorn in my side but sometimes it’s fun and you can have fun with it.

L: 100%. I even feel that way with my writing. It’s such a conflicting thing. A lot of my friends are artists and, especially for friends who are musicians, they’re like, this does not feel natural to me. Do you feel advertising yourself that way is authentic or you’re not into it at all?

M: For me, I feel like it’s authentic. Since I was a kid, I have been making videos. I used to make little movies with my sister and my cousins — little claymation stuff. Whenever there was a video project in high school, I jumped at the chance to make a comedy. Also I have a film degree from UCSB. Some artists are better marketers than artists and some are better artists than marketers. It’s great when you can find someone who can do both. I was trying to do that for a while. I feel like I was doing okay on TikTok for a year or two and then life started changing. And I just wasn’t making music. Or I was, but I was doing stuff in the background, not so much marketing stuff, and I feel like I kind of fell off from there. We’ll see how it goes. I’ll try to bring it back a little bit.

L: So you’re from LA? When you were in school for film, were you into music? When did you get into music and, specifically, the genre you’re in now?

M: Right out of highschool I started making music, like seriously trying to produce. I didn’t know what I wanted to do for a living because I didn’t think music was an option. It didn’t even cross my mind to do music, so the next closest thing was film, because you can go get a degree for it. I was in a film program at UCSB and I just didn’t go to class. I just stayed home working on music all the time. The beat for “The Perfect Girl” I made in college in Santa Barbara.

L: What is your production process now compared to that?

M: Basically the same. I’m a total bedroom producer. I don’t work in studios, I just don’t know how to. I’m not a classically trained musician. I was in orchestra in middle school and high school. I played the bass but I don’t even know how to read music or anything. All the theory is just intuitive — like if you gave me a music theory test I wouldn’t know what the hell is going on. Everything is just like through years and years of practice, just DIY stuff. I just get in there.

Usually it’s late at night or when it’s dark and everyone is asleep, that’s usually my favorite time to work and I’ll just smoke some weed and start writing bass lines or melodies. I’ll write like 10 songs and I’ll work on them all year long, two years, and sometimes I take old ideas I couldn’t finish and revitalize them.

L: My partner produces all of her own stuff and I think it’s so fucking cool. I really respect her for it, you know?

M: Yeah I think it’s good for a number of reasons. It’s purely you, but also, if you start making money from music it’s way easier having just you on there because you don’t have to worry about splitting stuff and you have to pay people for the accounting and it’s just a whole mess and thankfully I don’t have to deal with that. 99% of my own stuff I just write by myself.

L: That’s really cool. I listened to your new album and I loved it.

M: Thank you.

L: I feel like there was a common thread from your past songs. I feel like one or two songs here maybe have a little 80s twist to them. Where did you get the inspiration for this new album and how is it different from your past music?

M: I think this one is just a little more upbeat and dancey. It’s not so sad like the last two, which were super angsty. There have been two EPs and one full length album. The first EP was kind of like bedroom synth teenybopper shit, that’s how I describe it. Because I was like 19 or 20 when I made it. And then the other one, Decade, I was just angsty — it was breakup shit. And the last one was a collection of older songs and newer ones and I was kind of rushing to get something out. It was good; it was doing what it had to do, but for me it wasn’t reflective of who I was when I released it because half of the album was older songs. And this new one is, this is how I am now, life ain’t too bad, let’s have some fun, let’s do some weird sounds, let’s just try to make something fresh.

I mean all music right now is pretty bad. Not gonna lie it’s pretty stale. It’s just how it feels. Whenever I listen to new music on Spotify or New Music Friday or Release Radar I’m like looking through songs and nothing’s catching me how music used to. So I just wanted to make something that’s kind of fresh, kind of nostalgic and combine all these elements to make something compelling and nice to listen to. I think it’s a great driving album and there are a lot of songs on there that are fun. I think there’s something for everyone. If you’re an old Mareux fan you’ll probably like “Laugh Now Cry Later,” which is a more classic, darkwave song. And then you have “Wild at Heart,” which is more indie, electronic, fun. It’s light hearted and it doesn’t take itself seriously. It feels good to have something that’s a multi-genre album.

L: You don’t have to answer this because if someone asked me this about my writing I’d tell them to fuck off, but how would you encapsulate your new album in one word?

M: Ummm… I wanna give you something but I can’t. [Laughs]

L: That’s so fine, that’s cool.

M: If I think of something I’ll email you.

L: No no, it’s all good. It’s a tricky question but sweet, I didn’t know you started writing your songs when you were so young. Do you feel like the music scene has changed in LA and what do you think the music scene is right now compared to New York? I assume you’re a little bicoastal.

M: Well it depends. For example, we have a huge post-punk darkwave goth scene that’s driven by Latinos. At least half of LA is Latino and they love that stuff. It feels like those are my people and my biggest supporters. And the same thing applies in certain cities in Texas. The Southwest is my base: Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Colorado. They just don’t have that on the East Coast. It’s just not as popular. The more indigenous stuff there is Hip Hop and rap, and maybe some like indie rock over there. I’m not sure, you’re from there you could fill me in. I mean that’s how it feels like when I play shows. I do okay on the East Coast but not like over here. It’s completely different. That’s why I don’t know how interested I am in touring. If I do play shows, it’s probably gonna be on this side, like the West Coast and Southwest. I don’t know, just a different taste over there, different everything. What do you think is like the kind of “it” genre in New York?

L: I don’t even know if I’d be able to pinpoint that. But it’s tricky because I feel like no matter where you are, it’s hard to keep your authenticity. I interviewed another artist who is based in New York but she’s bicoastal. She’s a tattoo artist and you know, she talked about the fact that there’s such a distinct difference in tattoo style — like fine-line originating in LA and then there’s the community in New York and Brooklyn and how it all feels different and it’s tricky keeping the individuality. I don’t know, I just always enjoy asking artists what they find the difference to be in their craft. I think it’s an interesting question.

M: Yeah it’s a good one. I mean it’s something I’ve talked about with my manager and bandmates and everyone — it’s just a whole other beast there compared to here.

L: Yeah for sure. It was funny what you said about Spotify and not really digging any of the songs you’re hearing these days. What are some musicians you’re into?

M: In our house, we don’t listen to a lot of new stuff for those reasons. We just keep playing the same Elvis radio on Spotify [laughs] or rockabilly stuff. That’s what we put on in the background but I’m not a big music fan. I don’t really know a lot of music and it’s probably because when I hear stuff, I’m not interested enough to go digging. Maybe it’s also from making music: it creates like me an aversion to music where I can’t really enjoy it like other people can. It’s also just more fun to make it than to listen to, so I don’t know… I apologize, I’m like the worst music fan. I feel like I loved music until I was like 21 years old and then from then on I just didn’t care anymore, but I have my favorites from back in the day. I think my top three heros are Interpol, Blood Orange, and TR/ST.

Until 2020 I was just trying to copy them and that’s how I learned how to write music. Recently I had flashes of my own artistry dragging through but for the first ten years I was making music, I wasn’t taking it seriously. It was just a hobby of mine and I didn’t think it was gonna go anywhere. It wasn’t even on Spotify. I was like, it’s not good and people aren’t gonna listen to this. It was only living on Soundcloud for the first ten years or whatever that I was making music. I was just basically trying to cover them, like how close can I get my sound to these guys? Then over time, like the last three to four years since I’ve been doing this professionally, my whole approach has changed and I’ve been really trying to impart more of myself and less of my influences in there.

L: Nice. You said you dabbled in film and that was an interest of yours at one point. Does anything else influence the music you’re making now? What’s it like for you?

M: I still watch films all the time. We watch like three to four films a week at least. When I’m writing music, I have a little CRT TV where I put a movie in, put it on mute and start writing to it. I love going on ebay and shopping for antiques and collectibles. Me and my girlfriend will put a movie on, sit on the couch, then go on eBay and just look at antiques. We do trips to Palm Springs — they have really good antiquing there. I feel like that’s a new artistic hobby of mine… even though I’m just buying shit [laughs]. It’s fun to collect and cultivate and have a little collection of things that express yourself. All that happened when I met my girlfriend, Natalia, and we built a life together. Her interests morphed into mine but I don’t really consume much other media. This is something I’ve gotten better at. I was scrolling social media so much and it took so much time. I was trying to learn things and see what’s trending, but in the last year or so, I’ve just been detoxing. It’s just like everything else where it gets boring and you just don’t care. We’re almost at a point where everyone is feeling that and losing interest in all that stuff.

L: Yeah 100%. It’s cool that you and your girlfriend influence each other.

M: She’s a tattoo artist. She does beautiful fine-line tattoos. She’s been doing it for like 13 years or whatever.

L: Gorgeous!

M: Yeah and she came up with the album title as a little sub brand she wanted to make, and I always saw it around and thought it was nice. I named one of the songs after it; then I was like, oh this should be the title track. Then I named the album after that. But she does a lot of the art and she’s perfect. She knows everything about everything, about music, about movies. I don’t know, she’s like my biggest help, my biggest friend, my biggest inspiration and everything. And that’s why I made this album. I just wanted to make an album she would like. She has such particular taste and I really wanted her to love what I’m doing. Every time I make a song, I’m like, would this pass the Natalia test? Would she actually like this? And she loves it, you know. I kind of learned what her taste is and kind of adapted that to the album. I just feel like I made something cool and fun and different from everything else I’ve made.

L: I love that.

M: Yeah but it’s still the same stuff. L: The Natalia test, I love that. [Laughs]

L: What are both of your favorite tracks on the album?

M: I think “Radio Club” is our favorite just because it’s the most different. It’s kind of experimental, it has that weird voice effect going on, which is kind of unsettling. A lot of people would probably skip it but we love it. I like the beat on that one a lot. There are a few points in the song where there’s just a wall of sound morphed into each other. And it’s crazy. But also, I like the Riki collab.

L: I love that song. I’m fangirling. I really like her music too, like her own individual music.

M: Yeah it’s great. That one I feel like is the most conventionally complete song on that album. It’s four and a half minutes long; it goes up and down. Yeah that one is great. I kind of like them all, for their own reasons. I like “Wild at Heart” because it’s fun. The beat is really fun.

L: What was the experience working with Riki and in general collaborating? Do you enjoy it?

M: [Laughs] Usually not, just because I work best alone. I’m just not great as a producer in the traditional sense like when you go to a studio and you tell them what you want and they do it. I’m a monkey when it comes to that stuff. I work so slow and I make so many mistakes. I can only work two hours at a time so when you have someone over, what are you gonna do?

They’re coming from halfway across the country and you can’t work for like two hours. But it was great. I made the beat and I said to her, I think you’d be great for this, let me know what you think. She’s like, yeah, I love it, I’ll get you something. Then five days later she sent me a recording and I put it over the beat. She came over to our house and we worked on it for like an hour, then I just worked on it some more, and that was it. Super easy, just a perfect collab. Her lyrics, the singing and everything against the track, it’s almost like we sat down and made it together from scratch. It doesn’t feel like she heard it first, then wrote lyrics or whatever. It feels pretty organic. I’m really happy with it. It was a great experience, as good as it can get.

L: Sweet, that’s awesome.

M: I’ve had some bad experiences with collabs, like where people are being insane or egomaniacs… crazy shit. That’s a rare experience but it’s enough to scar you and make you not want to work with anyone.

L: Yeah for sure. I feel like people’s egos really get in the way.

M: Like dude… none of us are that famous, you know? It’s crazy. I feel like the less accessible you are sometimes the bigger the ego is, it’s crazy. It works inversely. And when people make a life out of their craft or whatever, they’re secure and happy and they don’t need to do all that shit.

L: For sure. Even if you are extremely well known and famous, I feel like you don’t need to be acting like that.

[Laughs]

L: Is there anything else you want to include?

M: I don’t have much to say [laughs]. I just hope people listen to it and enjoy it and think it’s a little fresh I guess, compared to all the other cookie-cutter stuff. Especially in my scene, there’s so much formulaic bullshit. I’m guilty of that stuff too but now it has reached the point where it’s just unbearable. I think a lot of people are feeling that way.

L: What would you say your scene is?

M: I’m often placed within darkwave, goth, post-punk bands. I’m not even gonna say any other bands but go look up darkwave playlist on Spotify and that’s where I am.

L: I do! I listen to all of them! [Laughs]

M: Yeah, it’s good and bad. I don’t know. It could be very good or very bad.

L: Yeah it’s weird when you’re in a category, it’s like, how do I break out of that but how do I cater to it? It’s an interesting dichotomy that I feel every artist has to struggle with.

M: Yeah, luckily I’m not too pigeonholed. I’m not very goth presenting so people don’t think I am. Like the Reddit goths don’t think I’m goth, which means I can basically do whatever I want and I’m not at the mercy of a theme or cemented in anything. If I want to make dance music, I can make dance music.