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Interview: Michael Angelakos of Passion Pit

If you guys are able to do that and cross over, which is just a crap shoot, the big question is “are they pop enough?”
You asked me about my voice earlier. If we do cross over…that’s crazy. Listen to my voice on this record. I have to repeat myself. That is a particular character I have decided to sing. I don’t normally sing that way. It’s a whole other voice. My father sang opera for many years and he thinks that I am absolutely insane. But he loves it. But he has no idea what I am doing. It’s not necessarily not good for you, but it’s not the way people are supposed to sing. If we become successful in that way, let’s be honest with ourselves; that is crazy. That’s really cool too. If that voice can break through in that way, what does that say about the pop culture climate? Where it stands and what people are looking for. It’s really kind of weird. I think it’s weird. And I’d be ecstatic if it worked that way. That to me is the inner, critical self where I am always thinking about the effects of everything. I love the fact that we look out on the crowd and it’s Frat dudes with New York Yankees hats on backwards screaming out all the lyrics while I’m screaming like a girl.

So your dad was an opera singer?
My dad was a music teacher, he sang opera. He sang in New York, underground, nothing huge. He’s currently the chair of a concert series in Buffalo. He brings in all these independent artists like Joshua Bell. It’s pretty awesome.

Was your mom musical as well?
She is pretty musical. She can sing. But my father was the one who was feeding me Beach Boys and Beatles on a regular basis. When I learned to play an instrument, I didn’t want to know how to play an instrument, I wanted to know how to write a song. And my dad just made me crazy about pop music very early on. I don’t think he really understands that he did, but I mean "Barbara Ann" was my jam in kindergarten. I brought in this weird tape player with Phantom of the Opera on it and I walked around with it on my shoulder. And all the dudes hung out with me because I was the dude with the boom box. I’m not even kidding. That’s my dad’s fault. I’ve always wanted to write pop music and I’d like to blame my dad for that.

Hopefully, some day I’ll be able to make some sense of what I am doing right now. You asked me how it happened. I have no memory of exactly how it happened. I just know that it happened and we are somehow successful now and I have no idea how it happened. I know that it’s there, but there is a very limited timeline that I can provide.