Cancel your plans, MICO gets real
by Elmer “Eruma” Ferraren || photographed on Sept. 11 at Los Angeles’s Echoplex for MICO’s “Cancel your plans” tour
What can we expect [from] your newest project, “internet hometown hero,” releasing October 25?
I feel like there's something here that everybody can enjoy, even fans of the earlier stuff. There's a lot of softer influences that come back in on this project that I didn't really attack on projects like “second thoughts” or “the tears we fight” where it's just straight barrages of rock. There's a fair amount of pop coming back into this now. Even within the lyricism, it's back to that same super blunt style that people knew before back then but blended together with a couple [sonic] elements from the last two projects, but in a more tasteful way on some of these tracks. “glhf<3” or “HOMESICK” are probably the closest to that cheery vibe that I used to have before. There's one other one on here that kind of shares that vibe. But then, for anybody that also likes the new stuff, you have songs like “Idontwannaknowyou!” that just came out, like “TV,” and there's still new things that [had] yet to [be] explore[d]. This EP has my first two proper ballads on it. I've never properly written a ballad before this project.
What do you think about the development of your sound as you grew as an artist? You mentioned bringing back your older style and also bringing in a new ballad sound.
I've always had a vision for the type of stuff that I've wanted to make. I've just been getting closer to making it every single project with what I've had available to me. “21st century heartbreak” was literally just me in my room with my guitar that I was renting month by month from Long & McQuade, which is like the Canadian equivalent of fucking Guitar Center [...] Half of those songs, I was in my bedroom, but then half of them, I was flying out for them. But we didn't have kits in the studio at that point [...] As I've gotten more resources, I've been able to tap into what I've been wanting to make more and more. And I feel like this is probably the most realized version of this image I've had in my head since I was 16, which is kind of terrifying because, after this, I'm like, Well, what do I do [now]? I need to change and develop it somehow. But it's exciting. This is the culmination of five years of what I've been wanting to do.
How has your career been beginning independently for the last several years?
Still fully independent. Now it's a little bit different because we're working underneath the distro deal with the guys over at Stem— they're amazing and loving working with them. But at its core, we're still indie. There's only so much that can be done on either side. It's just an interesting approach because I'm not really focused on, even from the start, making viral content per se and songs that are meant to blow up to make up for the lack of funding that we have. I've always focused on gathering up [a] raw audience that would show up every single time. And that's the thing that's been mainly keeping me to it because it's like, well, now if a label wants to come to me, I don't really have a hit for them per se. I don't have [a] 100 million streaming song that they can just nab that one and then nab an additional two, three projects on top of it. If a label comes to me, they're gonna want my entire catalog because that's my legacy; that's what I've built up. It's not just off of one single song, which I don't even know if I would take that deal, to be honest. But it's a good feeling to know that everything I've made is what makes this [valuable], not just one thing over the last couple of years.
Favorite pastimes while you're on tour?
You know the game “Wavelength”? It's that game where somebody comes up with a number in their head, and everybody else has to ask questions, and they give an answer that's reflective of that number. Except instead of one to 10, we play from one to 100. I have to come up with answers that fit on a scale of, I don't know, 76 out of 100. And we'll ask the most absurd questions ever. Like, give me a Marvel Cinematic Universe character based on how likely Andrew would be able to take them down in a fight [...] We just get really creative with our questions.
What has been the worst experience while you're on tour or on your last tour?
In Chicago last tour, there was just a lot of tension building up. There was a lot of internal tension because, you know, everybody's gonna be fighting each other if we've been back to back for four days in a row [doing] shows, driving constantly, five, three, eight hours every single day, having to wake up on no sleep because we leave the venue at like 12, one in the morning too. Naturally, there's gonna be some [tension] there. There was a day in between Washington D.C., Chicago, free day, and then actually playing in Chicago. So, a lot of us flew in for Chicago. I stayed behind in DC for a little bit because I have some friends there. A lot of the guys [who] worked on “the tears we fight” and “second thoughts” are from that area. So I stayed behind in DC and flew to Chicago later that night [...] I got stranded there, actually, just because there wasn't really anybody that could pick me up because of stuff that was happening. And I landed at around 10:30, 11, and I didn't get picked up until about one in the morning.
So then I get back to the BNB that we rented for that night only, and I'm just in my head thinking, “At least it can't go any worse than this.” I mean, I can't protect anybody's personal belongings because both [I] and my parents got robbed on this tour in San Francisco and in DC. I can't really protect my bandmates and crew from feeling exhaustion, from feeling hurt. And I can't even really protect myself from it just because I'm the one front-loading basically all of the blame for this. On top of that, I literally did something to try and secure my own personal sanity by flying in late. And even that couldn't end up well. But then I was excited for the show the next day, and I was like, You know what? The show’s sold out. Chicago has been a city I've been wanting to play for a while. This is going to be worth it.
And right before “cut my hair,” which, for context, is the last song that we played on that tour before the encore happened. Somebody in the front row, I don't know if it was an asthma attack or something, but we need to take them outside, give them water, make sure that they're okay, stop the show because they're borderline convulsing in front of my eyes. And I go outside, check up on them, make sure they're okay, and then, once that's all sorted, go back into the venue [...] After that show ended, I literally bolted to the green room, and I was swerving around other fans, which I don't do; I try to take as many pictures as possible before I go back to the green room and then come back out. I was swerving around people, and I just fell into a chair in the green room and just sobbed because, at that point, I couldn't keep myself happy or safe. I couldn't keep my crew happy or safe. I couldn't keep my family happy or safe. And now, I know it's not my fault that it happened, but I couldn't keep my fans happy or safe, and that's everything that I wanted to change on this tour. So I'm really happy that now we have a lot of it internally figured out, too, because that means we can give a better show. We can have better responses for everything.
How excited are you? Anything you want to say to the people?
I'm super excited to have Haiden [Henderson] [as the opener]. He's been a good friend of mine for a while. I met him two years ago in LA, where he said he was a fan. And then I checked out his stuff, and it was really great. And now he's making some of my favorite songs of this year. I don't know if I should be saying this, but somehow, a melody of one of his songs worked [its] way into one of mine. I texted him feeling so bad, and now, there's literally a Haiden writing credit on this project. This is something that definitely makes a lot of sense for both of us, and I'm [also] very excited to see him play because I haven't gotten to do that yet [...]
… I'm just excited to see people and see people's reactions to everything, and not only that but see what happens after both of these things, just because I'm excited to see everyone's reactions because this tour and this project are severely different from anything that I've done before well at the same time having a very good sense of familiarity to them…
This interview was edited for clarity.
MICO with drummer Matt Olliver, guitarist Jason Khater, and bassist Andrew Oliveira
