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How The Unlikely Candidates lived up to their name and went from simple acoustic project to global rockstars

MEA WorldWide (MEAWW) spoke to Kyle Morris of The Unlikely Candidates after their single Novocaine recently hit No. 1 on the Billboard Alternative charts following an unprecedented 33-week journey to the top
UPDATED APR 22, 2020
The Unlikely Candidates (Errick Easterday/artiste)
The Unlikely Candidates (Errick Easterday/artiste)

The Unlikely Candidates are currently one of the most popular alt-rock bands on streaming platforms today, but that wasn't always the case. The five-piece outfit came from humble beginnings, starting off in 2008 as a fledgling acoustic project made up of vocalist Kyle Morris and guitarist Cole Male in Fort Worth, Texas.

Even though they weren't overnight sensations, they both realized that music was something they wanted to do fulltime and were passionate about following their dreams.

After adding guitarist Brent Carney, bassist Jared Hornbeek and drummer Kevin Goddard to the lineup, the quintet embarked on a voyage of self-discovery and spent hundreds of hours honing their sound and songwriting skills.

Their hard work paid off when they signed with Atlantic Records in 2013 and released their debut EP 'Follow My Feet' soon after. Two more successful EPs, 'Bed of Liars' and 'Danger to Myself' followed in 2017, garnering the band millions of streams for singles like 'Oh My Dear Lord' & 'Your Love Could Start a War'.

They also toured relentlessly, supporting acts like Fall Out Boy, Young The Giant, Dirty Heads, and Brick and Mortar in recent years. Their 2019 hit single 'Novocaine', an anthemic ode to slackerdom, hit No 1 on the Billboard Alternative Songs charts after a 33-week long journey and heralded the band's arrival on the mainstream music scene.

They've recently premiered a brand-new single, 'Invincible', so we caught up with frontman Kyle Morris of The Unlikely Candidates for a chat.

Kyle Morris of The Unlikely Candidates (YouTube)

What's the story behind the band's name?

I basically just made a list of 200 names and it was the only one that wasn’t awful. Dark Horse came in second... The moniker ended up suiting us, though.

We had never been in a band, written a song, and I hadn’t even sung in front of anyone before that fateful teenage party when I drank enough Keystone Lights (three) to do a shaky rendition of Green Day’s 'Basket Case'.
 
Your music is tight, powerful and cohesive, which mostly only comes when bandmates share a good relationship. Have you always been close?

We have been playing and mostly living together for over seven years. The chemistry and ability to forecast where someone will move on stage and how they will hit the next note become innate.

Cole and I have known each other since middle school, but it wasn’t until we started spending hours upon hours figuring music out together that we became best friends.

Kevin came in four years after we started, but he lived in Dallas and Brent was 19 when he joined two years after that, so we mostly only saw them for band stuff. We would stay in Jared’s garage when we played shows in California.

He was a mate of ours and we really just liked hanging out and getting drunk with him even before he joined the band. Jared had a bass amp in his garage and we knew he’d been in bands but we didn’t think much of it.

The Unlikely Candidates (YouTube)

But then our guitarist left the band, so Brent shifted to guitar from bass & we had a month to find a bassist before a year-long tour. After several dead-ends, Jared texted me out of nowhere, saying he'd learned our songs and wanted to try out. He flew in, nailed them, and we left a week later for a tour that lasted almost two years.

The closeness came with physical proximity, the experiences that we all shared while living together. We basically didn’t know each other that well except for Cole and I, but then we all became blood brothers because of this shared experience.

What kind of sounds and bands do you enjoy the most?

We like creating moody, almost psychedelic sounding beats and bright melancholy melodic synth lines. When it comes to favorite bands, we love the early 2000’s garage rock revival and other bands from that era like The Strokes, White Stripes, Spoon, Kings of Leon, The Hives, TV On The Radio and Yeah Yeah Yeahs among others.

Your single 'Novocaine' finally hit No. 1 on the Billboard charts after 33-week slog — it must have felt like a marathon! How did you celebrate?

 We knew it was probably going to hit number one while we were playing a show in Hawaii so that really was the celebration. It was a great one. We ate some strange island things and stumbled from one tiki bar to the next after playing an awesome show for the radio stations there.  



 

We're getting massive 'The Big Lebowski' vibes from the 'Novocaine' video — was that intentional? Do you have any interesting stories from the music video shoot?
 
I would not have put that together but I actually love that. There is a "zen of the slacker" in the song and video. I love the movie so maybe I just exuded a bit of it. There are so many great stories from that video shoot.

There was a massive storm so we all got on separate flights that were rerouted all around the country and almost missed day one of shooting entirely. We shot one day at Salvation Mountain, which is a place where a religious dude painted and plastered a mountain of hay bales together to create a Dr. Suess wonderland out in the desert.

We got to eat junk food and throw it all over a really nice house for an entire evening. The grand finale was when we got back to our hotel in LA after shooting in the desert, there was a man dressed like he was in 'The Matrix' who had been living in our hotel room for two days.

No idea how he got in. He had two Bluetooth headsets on. Didn’t steal anything. Totally bizarre and very 'Big Lebowski', actually!

Any upcoming singles or full-length LP release plans for The Unlikely Candidates?

We just dropped a single last week called 'Invincible'. It’s like our version of a modern-day Jock Jam. Still not sure about the album details. It will be a mix of old and new stuff, but we're not finalizing any names yet.

Plenty of artistes are now embracing the trend of releasing singles as opposed to recording a full-length album — do you reckon the LP format is dying a slow death?

I think there will always be a place for the LP. It’s now, more than ever, a love letter to your fans. Also if you make a great record and really capture a vibe, people will listen to it, like 'Currents' by Tame Impala for example.

The single game is important to keep people’s attention, especially the fair-weather fans. But the LP will always be important to artistes with something to say and fans who want to hear it.  
 
Your alt-rock songs stand out as catchy, high-energy blends of indie rock, electronica, and pop. Given the various subgenres that rock has spawned, do you think we could see rock and roll morphing into something altogether different since its early days?

I think there will always be purists and the rest of us will blend stuff together that speaks to us. There is a lean or intent that makes something rock & roll even as the genre is constantly being defined and redefined.

There is something simple and pure about picking up a guitar and pouring your heart out over it. Other things may gain more popularity but something like that always finds a place. Four chords and the truth will always be a North Star of sorts for rock and roll.

You can follow The Unlikely Candidates on Twitter and Instagram for frequent updates. Make sure you check out their snazzy merchandise here and their brand-new single 'Invincible' here.

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