ARTIST OF THE WEEK: Unknown Mortal Orchestra

From hobbyist bedroom recordings to wowing ?uestlove and staying on the road forever, Ruban Nielson's Unknown Mortal Orchestra project is taking him to the places we always expected the Mint Chicks would.

Unknown Mortal Orchestra is both the band and album Ruban Nielson always wanted to listen to - but could never find. Curled up in the back of a van somewhere in Arkansas with the worst hangover of his life - Nielsen explains. "There was this psyche record that I was looking for - this sound, and no matter how hard I looked, I just couldn't find it. So I ended up making it myself."

Defining ‘psyche’ as, in his words, "psychedelic rock and roll music inspired by taking drugs and about trippy stuff,” Nielson's pursuit of this set of conditions began around a year ago. An initial factor was the demise of the Mint Chicks, the band he relocated from Auckland to Portland with in 2007 (alongside his brother Kody), to make a proper stab at making it in America.

"I've got a wife and two children," Nielson says. "At the time I just had one child, and for a lot of different reasons it was just time to call things quits with the Mint Chicks. I've always done art and graphics, as well as music. I thought I could intern with some companies, get into that industry and maybe have a normal life."

Unknown Mortal Orchestra - Ffunny Ffrends

Settling into a routine, Nielsen found himself impulsively picking up old tape recorders and random pieces of audio equipment from various junkshops along the way. Next thing he knew, he was, as he laughs, "recording in our living room after the baby had gone to sleep."

At this point, with no external pressures attached to his creativity, Nielsen found himself really enjoying the songwriting and recording process. "I had no expectations or goals aside from making the record I wanted to hear, and it just became a lot of fun. I was trying out a lot of things I never got to do in the Mint Chicks and it just felt really good," he says. "The next thing I knew I had an album worth of music."

Unknown Mortal Orchestra - How Can U Luv Me

Mixing hip-hugging drum breakbeats with lucid dreamlike voice, guitar and bass work, with Unknown Mortal Orchestra Nielsen builds on the optimistic psychedelia of the sixties and the swamp rock and funk of the seventies, creating a body of work that feels like a snapshot of ‘love generation’ music from an alternative reality.

For the full feature on Unknown Mortal Orchestra grab your copy of the new issue of Rip It Up out now.

By Martyn Pepperell