Track-by-Track: Evil Twin’s Peter McGee Appraises New Album ‘Upside Down We’re Flying’

As a musical entity, Evil Twin is a throwback band. They are moulded more like a vintage rock act from 30 or 40 years ago. Rather than an elaborate band with a lot of different instrumentalists, Evil Twin is just a trio, making all that noise without any other assistance. Featuring lead singer and guitarist Peter McGee, rhythm guitarist Claire Stevens, and bassist Riina Dougherty, the band has created an innovative sound featuring soulful vocals and intricate instrumental parts. The group developed out of several local acts that had formed at Northwestern University in Illinois. The members had all made their way to New York City, which is where the band began to develop.

Evil Twin’s latest album, Upside Down We’re Flying, was released earlier this month. Featuring ten new songs, the record features fuzzed-out guitars, melodic hooks, and pop-oriented vocals. There’s a noticeable 1980s indie rock influence of bands such as REM, Pavement, and Dinosaur Jr. McGee has stated that Evil Twin is fashioned after some of those aforementioned acts, a group of very capable musicians who are old school in their approach. At the core of each song on the album is just the band members playing together in a room, reacting to the sounds each other is making. Indie music nowadays sounds so different than its roots. Evil Twin wanted to opt for a more classic sound that felt true to them and would pay homage to the acts that inspired them.

With the recent release of Upside Down We’re Flying, Peter McGee joins us for an exclusive Track-by-Track rundown of the album, pointing out the key elements that helped this record come together.

1. “Frost on the Lilies”

“An atmospheric opening track, with a fast tempo that offsets the dreamy vibe. It sets up the song cycle that’s implied throughout this album: suggestions of a young love relationship that is already underway here, plagued by a certain amount of non-commitment due to apocalyptic despair. The main character of this song is perhaps unwilling to take on emotional risk, having lost faith in their own future.

“I personally love the layers and layers of guitar effects we built on top of that percussive assault and bass groove. We got a device called the Dream Reaper that creates a controllable infinite feedback loop that we used to create those shrieking tones in the middle, which we beefed up with overblown fuzz/synth bass. I think that big moment (the drone section) is a statement of tonal intent for the album: that we’re going to bring a lot of different sonic colours into each song.

“You’ll notice there’s a spoken word part in the middle too: that’s a Reddit post about Neon Genesis Evangelion, a profoundly nerdy show that is also somehow super hip in the club scene. The post is a chronicle of one man’s experience with the show: watching it, falling in love with it, relating to the characters, being devastated by the ending and then becoming depressed that they have no more show to watch. Then they try to watch some of the extended content, but nothing seems to hit the same fix.

“It becomes increasingly desperate to the point where the author starts calling out to characters from the story, asking for help and forgiveness. It’s as though he thinks not liking the show is somehow their own fault. Truly a profoundly lonely but misguided person, but that post really encapsulates a desperate hope that people have for certain things to change their life, be it media, a relationship or a new job.

“The show, which has a certain meditative vision of the apocalypse, speaks to the subtext of ‘Frost on the Lilies.’ It’s taking place during or shortly before some kind of armageddon, just after a major setback in the narrator’s life, and they almost feel like they wished this apocalypse into existence in order to escape from reality. That’s what it feels like to me, and there’s some elements of our real life pandemic that creep into the narrative.

“We also sampled the Philippine ice cream truck. Claire grew up partly in Manila.”

Evil Twin ‘Upside Down We’re Flying’ album artwork

2. “California (She’s So Royal)”

“The song is instantly infectious, deploying hook after hook in its first 2 minutes, before entering into an extended instrumental break that sees spoken word monologues, bleep bloop synth effects, searing twin guitar solos, and heavy drum fills, all of which culminate in a climactic active jump for the third verse vocal. Lyrically, the song is an in character kiss of to an ex lover, the kind of lyrics that feel like they should be sung with sunglasses on at night, but the chorus hints that this character knows they aren’t really as cool or put together as they seem, and in the end don’t know much more about life than the person they wish to judge.

“Its placement in the track list is to lift you up into a fun, catchy pop place while still exploring some instrumental fun, some spoken word jokes and developing our identity as a band: i.e. we don’t always take ourselves too seriously.”

3. “In Flames”

“Things take a darker turn here with our heaviest song. This one’s more about instrumental hooks and that fun ’90s bass groove. It’s a continuation of the song cycle that began with ‘Frost on the Lillies,’ and it’s about the obsessive romantic love that some people feel. It starts off passionate, but eventually it’ll burn a relationship out, especially if they aren’t very introspective. That then causes them to try to seize control of their partner’s life out of fear that they might change. I took inspiration from ‘The One I Love’ by R.E.M. with these lyrics.”

4. “Red Thread”

“This one’s more laid-back. The instrumental is inspired by modern Japanese dream pop. Definitely going for a cleaner sound on the verses, but the chorus is just the opposite, which gives it an almost Nirvana thing. There’s a deep melancholy to all of it as well. I wrote the lyrics about wanting to encounter a long-lost crush at Penn Station in New York, where you might run into anyone theoretically. You know it’ll likely never be your crush. I think we all want an excuse to reach out to each other, but something stops us, maybe having to take ownership of our own desires. So we long for this kismet meeting to take it out of our hands, and put our lives in destiny’s control, but really, that’s not a life I’d want to live; it’s much better to just ask for what you want.”

5. “Gyms Girls”

“We’ve had this song in our vault for a long time. We even tried to record it before, but this version is the only one that captured the triumphant parade that it demands. Lyrically, it’s a scatter shot of several emotions and images, not a song about a particular person or idea (you could say that about a few songs on this record). It’s just meant to get across a feeling; when you feel ok with yourself and everybody else ok with naming your desires and your shortcomings.

“That first refrain (stay ahead of the curve/stomp your big boots/what you want deserve ) definitely says to me that someone is setting unrealistic expectations for how ‘cool’ and perfect any one person can be. All the lyrics in this song, be they boasts or complaints, are just masking the true intention of it, to profess an undying love. If this song is part of the cycle, then it is right at the very end of the relationship, making it sort of a breakup song, but it’s right before one of our two protagonists disappears…”

6. “Aren’t You Lucky?”

“This song is a wanderer, a wanderer. Sonically more bare bones than the rest of the songs on the album, ‘Aren’t You Lucky?’ circles itself as the protagonist finds himself lost in the space between heart and mind.

“We built this song piece by piece, starting with one looping, somewhat dissonant chord progression, and adding layers of high notes and sparkling embellishments. We did continually have to remind ourselves to hold back on this one as we went into the studio, and we do have a bit of a tendency to just keep going.

“Lyrically, it’s both feeling happiness for the first time and coming to terms with the fact that it won’t last.

“The song feels like walking outside in a December snowstorm to me, looking out across Lake Michigan, and feeling warmth despite the cold. The chorus is cryptic, even to me: I’m not sure exactly who the protagonist is singing to, but there’s a real sarcasm in what they are saying.

“I had a professor who grew up in the Eastern Bloc, and once said that he didn’t recognize himself as feeling happiness until he was about 50 years old. Quite a life, but perhaps people don’t let themselves feel happiness until they reach a life stage where it’s possible to keep it, at least for long enough that it means anything.

“If I were to connect to the song cycle in this album, it’s the higher points of a relationship, thinking back to the good times, but looking ahead to how things will go based on how things are now you’re on a trajectory to crash even if things are going great right now, the title upside down we’re flying also references that.

“Imagine it as a peaceful walk down the snowy street in some city, maybe the first snow of the year, and our characters are imagining a happy future for themselves, even though it’s not in their nature.”

7. “Kudzu”

“So the song cycle/story of the album is out of sequence, more like moments scattered throughout someone’s memory that a story starts to finish. This memory is when the two protagonists meet, which puts it first, or close to first.

“They meet at a party, in a South Georgia bunker where kudzu vines grow over everything. Later, someone’s body might get pulled out of a river here, but I don’t know if it’s the mission person the man in the story was looking for; it’s a red herring. As I said, it’s ‘hints of a song cycle,’ not a fully developed one, but that’s because I want people to fill in the gaps with their own life.

“Musically, it’s a chastity belt/Courtney Barnett-inspired jangly/chill indie rock song, with a great main guitar by Claire, and really great baselines by Riina all throughout. I use my guitar as more of an ambient texturing/a way to create variety throughout this recording rather than having to carry any melody, and I got to explore a lot of different sonic colours that way. Claire and I also spent some time coming up with those woozy Slowdive harmonies on the verses, and then Riina comes in for a three-part harmony on the chorus.”

8. “C74”

“The main melody began as a collection of notes that kept tugging at my sleeve, begging to put them in the right order. After many moons of noodling, reconfiguring, and noodling some more (we have the poor-quality iPhone videos to prove it), it became a rolling, shifting line that continues to play over and over in your head long after you listen.

“The bridge steps forward like a sunrise, breaking the tension of the odd time signature into dreamy and bright wonderment, with lyrics revolving through the same hypnotic feelings of passing a stranger on the train referenced in ‘Red Thread.’

“When the sun sets on the bridge, we delve back into our main line— slower this time— before building into a smashing outro that combines 7/4 and 4/4 lines that itch that part of your brain just right. Writing and practicing this song together was a great way to learn how good we were at counting to seven 50 times in a row.

“As one of the slower, more melancholy songs on the album, this one was definitely a treat to build together. There’s an ebb and flow to the piece that’s almost reminiscent of three and a half songs in a colourful, sequin trench coat.

“Lyrically, this is the one that most feels tied to this song cycle: two people in a casual relationship that becomes dangerous to them as time goes on. It’s about trying to build a life with someone who deliberately sabotages themselves, and anything that could make their life better.

“That polyrhythm at the end, different parts of the song crashing together, a very strong emotional dissonance, which is what the characters are feeling. Yet it is almost triumphant: as if, despite the strong dissonance, there is some great value to what these characters are suffering. We had a cellist come in for this one, as well as some minimal horns in the background, but the complex drums and great backup vocals really sell it.”

9. “Eta Carinae”

“This was definitely a change of pace for us: a piano ballad. It was originally pitched as a guitar song, but I suggested that we keep it in the piano world. Then the bass and guitar come in one by one, and we built to that big finish for the whole album.

“It’s from the perspective of Christa McAuliffe, the teacher who was on the Challenger disaster, talking to her parents. Some have read into it as a metaphor for starting a music career; I think that is a valid interpretation, though I wasn’t thinking about it at the time. I just thought the idea of Christa (or someone like her) talking to her parents, who might’ve had reservations about her doing something dangerous like going into space while she’s not an astronaut. She gives a convincing, movie-like speech, and yet we know what’s in store. I couldn’t get that scene out of my head, so I put it into a song. Maybe it is a metaphor; the subconscious sometimes functions that way.”