A Chat with The Margaret Hooligans (31.07.23)
Eclectic, obscure, energetic and completely bonkers, US-based duo The Margaret Hooligans can have you whirling about in a dizzy haze with lights twinkling all around and loving every second! We speak with Meg Cratty about their new album Saturday Night In Bartertown, future plans, superpowers and more.
OSR: Let’s jump straight in: What can you tell us about your album Saturday Night in Bartertown? Is there a theme or backstory to it?
Meg Cratty: Just a sense that civilization is truly on the decline. Humans are once again demonstrating how transactional and violent they can be. Bartertown, the barbaric hub of trade and sadism in Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome, could really be any Saturday night in any major city in the U.S. Still, we try to have fun with it.
OSR: Did you face any challenges when creating the album?
Meg Cratty: Yes, we both wanted to be the drummer, but we decided Strontium should do it since he actually knows how to play the drums. Seriously, the best thing about us has to be that so many musical parts/ideas/songs fly out of us so naturally, much like those delicious Nashville hot wings.
OSR: Some artists choose to release singles and never albums. Why do you think an album is important?
Meg Cratty: We’re old school. I remember eagerly awaiting the release of an album, I was always excited to see what gems I might find that weren’t “the singles”, which were more pop or more ballad-like. They were supposed to grab you right away, not grow on you, which is what I prefer- a song that requires several listens to reveal itself. If I really was into a musician or a band, I would be most excited about the overlooked songs. Something the band knew was really good but didn’t grab you like a single. They kept it on the record because they liked it. If you are constantly releasing a “single”, maybe you never choose the subtle, in-between song because it might take real listening to be appreciated.
OSR: What is your creative process?
Meg Cratty: There used to be a good deal of fighting and crying and miscommunication, but Mr. Strontium hasn’t shed a tear in months and I’ve stopped throwing my microphone at him, mostly because it just clanks into a cymbal and not his skull. Making music while being married brings a different aspect to the band for sure – some songs have definitely arisen out of an argument we are currently having (we have joked with other bands that this is our form of marital counselling) and then it morphs into something else. But mostly we have a system of jamming for a period of time (say several sessions a week for a month or two), then listening to everything and picking out the good bits to develop further into songs which is the next step, and then we record the live drums and uke tracks, and then overdub everything. From start to finish it can take almost a year or so for an idea that came up in a jam to become a finished piece of music and then it can take another year to release it depending on what we have. At the moment we already have our fourth album mixed and mastered and live drum and uke tracks for the fifth laid down.
OSR: What does music mean to you?
Meg Cratty: Music is the ultimate trip. I can hear a song I haven’t heard in years and be taken back to the place where I first heard it, or remember a situation in my life. It’s a sensory experience akin to the sense of smell in that respect. I am fascinated by how it affects our brains – how it can capture a mood perfectly and transcend that space where words don’t go. There is also a great catharsis in being so loud and noisy. I channel a lot of frustration and anger through our music.
OSR: What do you hope people take from your music?
Meg Cratty: I hope it is something they want to return to. I want to be a musical ghost, something that haunts you whether it is something that makes you laugh, cry or get angry. We often write from a place of humour, but there is always an undercurrent of seriousness beneath that. I want people to be able to peel those layers.
OSR: If you could change anything about Saturday Night In Bartertown, what would it be?
Meg Cratty: I would find the lost chord coming out of the bridge in ‘Hey Love’. We had a beautiful ringing-out chord to end that spacey bridge that somehow got buried in the mixing process and while I have gotten used to its disappearance, I do miss it. We’re still bitter about the muted “extinction of the dinosaurs” electric uke wail from the last record. We will now write cautionary tales about it.
OSR: If you had to recommend one song from your discography to a new listener, which would it be and why?
Meg Cratty: Great question. What would be a wonderful introduction to the weirdness that is us?? That encapsulates all that we can do in a single song. I think it might be ‘Basement Island Girlfriend’ from our first album, BoomBox Blasts. It is an unusual topic which we like to cover, a man’s love for his blow-up doll, that is actually poignant, sweet, and humorous, while also a pretty rocking song. I think it was also the first song we wrote together that was really off-topic from what I used to write songs about – it was the first hint that we could be a band that covered a lot of different topics, many of which are atypical, or atopical.
OSR: It’s said that the music industry is one of the most difficult to break into. Do you agree or disagree and why?
Meg Cratty: Absolutely, yes. If you have even the slightest hint of ambition it is a really depressing place to be. Everyone loves to say that the changes in the music industry really benefit the independent musician, and I think that’s true if you are a whiz at social media. I try to be as creative as possible with our social media efforts, but the truth is, social media burnout is inevitable if this is really not your thing.
That being said, we have been so fortunate to have teamed up with some bands whose music we really like and respect and have been able to cross-promote and create our own online community, which is really exciting. We’ll see them all in the UK in August. I have also made some lovely connections with the music blog writers on MusoSoup, like yourself, and this gives us heart to continue promoting ourselves in some fashion.
OSR: If you had a superpower, what would it be and what would you do with it?
Meg Cratty: My superpower is my patience in dealing with Mr Strontium’s shenanigans. That’s a load of crap, says me, Strontium. The real answer to the not-asked question is: Which superpower would be the worst? The answer is Knowing What Others are Thinking. You’ll never have a friend or a romance when you know exactly what The Other is thinking about you. We lie all the time, mostly by NOT telling people what we think of them. Lying is a great thing. There can be no social ties without the thousands of white lies that bind us together.
OSR: Do you have future plans as The Margaret Hooligans?
Meg Cratty: Oh yes. We have singles from our fourth album coming out this fall that we are truly excited about. By far our most rockin’ record, with drums jacked to 11 and many brilliant electric uke leads. It is a 14-song album and we are releasing 11 singles over a period from September 2023 until September 2024, with the full album release in October 2024. We also have some collaborations coming out with 9 o’clock Nasty and I Am the Unicornhead.
OSR: Do you have a message for our readers?
Meg Cratty: You should listen to us. We are not for everybody, but if you’re the 1 in 50 who might like us, you’ll really like us. We also make funny home music videos.
Many thanks to Meg Cratty for speaking with us! For more from The Margaret Hooligans, check out their official website, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and Spotify.
This artist was discovered via Musosoup. #sustainablecurator
