DIIV tackle their existential crisis: “This album just feels so hard fought”

There were moments during the making of DIIV’s new album that, for a split second at least, the band’s members wanted to wipe one another out completely.

‘Frog In Boiling Water’, the quartet’s fourth record, is out now via new label Fantasy and, as has become the norm with DIIV, it’s somewhat miraculous that it ever got finished at all. This time, Covid-enforced separation, distance and creative differences ripped their relationships with one another to shreds.

Once again, a lot has changed since DIIV last spoke to NME.

As singer and guitarist Zachary Cole Smith and bass player Colin Caulfield explain, every decision felt like one that could compromise the whole endeavour. Cole has always been a perfectionist, and with guitarist Andrew Bailey and drummer Ben Newman involved in the songwriting alongside him and Colin for the first time, things reached a new level. The process was so fraught, that 10 13-hour days of recording in a rented home in the Mojave desert yielded nothing more than a case of nicotine poisoning for Colin.

“We’re just a group of four very different people,” says Cole. “And I think some groups of people tend to grow together and they become more agreeable to each other, their personalities coalesce a little bit. We’ve become very good at just not doing that. I wonder what other bands internal dynamics are like, they’re probably fucked up too?”

“We’re really hard on each other and we’re very brutal about the [principle] of, ‘The best idea wins,’” says Colin. “And when you have that kind of approach, it can get intense.”

Eventually, with the addition of producer Chris Coady, ‘Frog In Boiling Water’ came to life four years after it was first conceived. With its title lifted from Daniel Quinn’s The Story Of B and the idea that if you drop a frog in boiling water it will immediately try to get out, but if you drop it in cold water and gradually increase the temperature, it will allow itself to boil to death, the record illustrates DIIV’s take on the world we live in.

Suffice to say, it’s a bleak impression of a society driven by untouchable authority and faceless corporations. Sparse lyrics (‘Our parasites are still in control’, Cole sings on Reflected) hit hard over the music, which is dense, intricate, flawlessly formed. The contrast between scorched lyrics and its transcendent sound is stark. Truthfully, DIIV have scarcely sounded so in control: the motorik-style motifs, euphoric melody and waves of noise found on 2012’s Oshin, its much-delayed successor Is The Is Are from 2016 and 2019’s heavier, darker Deceiver are all perfected here. And with Cole choosing to look primarily outwards rather than inwards, there’s a freshness to the lyrics.

For the promo campaign, they’ve invented an evil corporation called Soul-Net with its own AI named S.E.P.I.A. (Spiritual Enhancement Protocol & Intelligent Augmentation), while also encouraging fans to join their own Freedom In A Boundless World (F.I.B.W) protest group. Oh, and they faked an appearance on US TV show Saturday Night Live, enlisting Fred Durst to film a spoof video for lead single Brown Paper Bag. Earlier this week, they muscled in on Apple Music’s current 100 Best Albums rundown, posting a fake artwork showing ‘Frog In Boiling Water’ named Number One.

Given how hard it was to make, perhaps it’s no wonder they’re taking the piss to a certain extent with the rollout. It also feels like a natural evolution of DIIV’s approach to the promotional element of being in a band. But don’t be fooled: they are extremely serious about what they do.

“I’m really proud of us,” Cole says. “We did make a good record.”

“Yeah, I think it’s an amazing album,” Colin adds. “It’s so nice to be a fan of the band you’re in! [Laughs]. I feel like most people [in bands] probably are, or convince themselves they are, but I really like the music we make. This album just feels so hard fought, for a while it was painful to listen to it because there’s so much baggage that no one will ever know about.”

‘Frog In Boiling Water’, then, prompts many questions. Could it be the record that finally propels this band, beset by chaos, addiction, all manner of problems since the beginning, to the heights their talent deserves? Perhaps the continued support of Ride’s Andy Bell – who NME saw leaving their London show in March and happily nipping into Sainsbury’s after his shoegaze fix – is a good sign. Tour dates with Fontaines DC (who were also in the crowd that night) at Alexandra Palace later this year certainly are.

The album also evokes existential enquiries. Do DIIV really think society is hopeless? If so, what is the point of the band continuing? Or does it have a life of its own entirely? Before they decamp to a distinctly unglamorous sounding hotel near Heathrow airport, we get into all that and more with Cole and Colin…

The album is about how we are all frogs waiting to be boiled to death. Can you outline why you chose that title for the record?

Cole: “Once we started going through the themes, that was one that really stuck out. But I thought, ‘I don’t know if that’s gonna work, what if the rest of the band say no?’”

Colin: “Cole was nervous that we wouldn’t like it, partially because making the record was really difficult. There were a lot of disagreements, but then actually, he came forward and we were all like, ‘Sick.’”

Cole: “That was me at my most scared. Imagine your wife is pregnant, and you go through the pregnancy and it’s so crazy. It’s this whole thing, and she’s sick and this and that. Then the baby’s born and you’re like, ‘Let’s name the baby frog in boiling water.’ You know? Thinking about how somebody’s reaction to that would be was scary. But it was also scary, because I didn’t want it to be anything else besides that and was worried about what the plan B was, because there was no plan B.”

Can you give some context of what exactly happened to make recording so tough? 

Colin: “It’s particularly funny to answer this question with you, because last time we did an interview with NME, I remember it being so positive, like, ‘We’re doing the best we’ve ever done.’ And it was true at the time, it felt like this rebirth for the band. There was so much optimism and hope and with this one, I think we went into it with these really big ambitions to try to make a different kind of album and really stretch and push ourselves to make something new. And I think we just did not anticipate that it would be a really, really big challenge to agree with those new guidelines, or that kind of exploded approach to the band. We were still, in a certain way, in that mode of, ‘Everything’s good,’ and then that’s when things really sneak up. You’re not expecting it. And then resentments build…”

Cole: “Relationships take work and some vigilance. We left making ‘Deceiver’ saying, ‘Let’s do that again!’ And maybe we would have, but being in a band is tough. I think for a lot of people the music just shows up on their phone, and they’re, like, ‘Cool,’ and they’ll listen. But there’s not a tonne of transparency about all that goes into making the sausage, there are so many decisions and so much money and time… It’s daunting. You make it on spec, like, ‘I hope people like this,’ and you kind of put all your eggs in that basket. I believe in the record and we all believed in it.”

After parting ways with Captured Tracks, did you make the record while unsigned?

Cole: “Yeah, we had no label so we were paying out of our own pocket more or less to make the record. So it felt like our investment was pretty big. And because the record took so long to make, we weren’t touring for a year. It created a more fraught environment because the band is very much our livelihood, and we’re all investing so much into this thing. And then it’s our friendships and our creativity and they all become intertwined so it becomes really difficult to make decisions, because there’s so much wrapped up in every single one. Maybe this one decision you make could be the one that makes the record a flop and we all go broke and that’s it. It really feels like that in the moment.”

Can you give any examples of what you mean?

Colin: “There would be a timing of a guitar part where a layperson would not even be able to tell the difference between the two. Cole and I would just be like, ‘I will kill you…’ Not actually, but it felt like that in the moment. And with relationships, too, you’re arguing about something in particular, but if you took a step back, [you realise], ‘That’s not really what we’re talking about.’”

Cole: “It was so loaded with interpersonal relationships, power dynamics and financial stuff. It’s just a lot.”

Do you think all bands have those kinds of issues or is it DIIV specific?

Colin: “Yeah, I’m sure they’re fucked up in different ways. This is not to say that other bands don’t have high standards for themselves, but we really, really do. We’re really hard on each other and we’re very brutal about the [principle] of, ‘The best idea wins.’ And when you have that kind of approach, it can get intense, especially when your taste is different. At least with bands that we’re friends with, I rarely have a conversation with someone where I’m like, ‘You get it, you guys are struggling.’”

Cole: “That’s true. We do have a lot of friends who are musicians, they don’t seem to have the same things [going on].”

Colin: “I know, a band where two of the guys in the band hate each other, but they have a really good working relationship and it works and you would never know. So I guess whatever… Being in a band is so hard. And being in a band for over a decade is really some crazy milestone in and of itself. And we’re still going, and we still want to go for much longer and that’s just hard. Coming to terms with the difficulty of a relationship, especially when it’s family, we just are that to each other now, the four of us, and it’s worth struggling for. Obviously, the goal is to have a healthy dynamic, which I think we have arrived at now much more so. I think we just had to suck it up and talk, which can be hard.”

You’ve spoken a lot in the past about how challenging life in DIIV can be, is it worth all the hardship?

Cole: “Yeah, I don’t know how to do anything else. It’s as if you’re asking somebody, ‘How do you put the bolts on this thing? It’s like, ‘Wouldn’t you rather be taking the bolts off?’ We committed pretty hard to this lifestyle and we don’t have education, training or any of the things that we would need. So we’re in it for better or worse.”

Colin: “I shudder to think about my life without it. That feels worse, especially because it won’t last forever, there’ll be a certain point where we don’t do this anymore, like with everything, so you just enjoy and make the most of it. Bailey was talking about how he read something and it changed his perspective about how to navigate being an artist and how to think of it not just in terms of, ‘I make a piece of art,’ but his life <i>is<i> art. And not in a pretentious sense. Like what we were saying, it <i>is<i> what we do. It’s who we are.”

Cole: “I don’t think it’s unique to us, you know, the water is boiling. The music industry is is fucked. And it’s just the nature of it, and it’s not just this industry. It’s not a good time to be a worker, the money is floating to the top and it will stay there. It’s just… It’s not good.”

You made a mini documentary about your time on the road with Depeche Mode for their arena tour and at the end you talk about searching for “a moment of transcendence” during the show, after which life just goes back to normal. It sounds cheesy out loud, but hasn’t that search been the point of DIIV since the start?

Colin: “I mean, it is a cheesy idea, but it’s real. What is unspoken in those quotes is that the moments that are good are really so good and rewarding and transportive and crazy. Playing a show where people are singing what you wrote back to you and you’re connecting in a really visceral way… That’s amazing. And even though every time you finish the show, you kind of just go, ‘Well, let’s have a cigarette,’ and it’s back to normal, in the moment it finds new ways to feel fresh and different, because it’s some sort of spiritual thing that we partake in.”

You summon something together…

Cole: “Mmm hmm.”

Colin: “It’s outside of us too. We’re definitely not a personality forward band where we’re strutting around and taking our shirts off. So it’s not as much about the spectacle, it really is about the… The summoning.”

There’s been so much change since Cole started the band. How do you think DIIV has changed you since then?

Cole: “I don’t know. I like that the records have come out at these intervals, because they really mark chapters. I think Bailey was talking about that one time. People rarely have a chapter marker in their life, so it’s cool to be able to look back and think, ‘Man, this is what was happening then,’ and then the next chapter [starts] and there’s a lot of change. People change as you get older, and you sometimes see bands trying to resist change musically, in their persona, or whatever it is. And it just feels dishonest. I really like how the band has kind of… It’s like the Harry Potter movies, it grows up with you. We go through all this stuff in life that we might have gone through otherwise, but we’re forced to talk about it on records. That’s such a big question. I don’t even know what to say, besides just ramble. Good question, though.”

The other half of that question is, do you define what the band does, or does the band define what you do? It feels like DIIV is a thing in and of itself that is malleable and resistant…

Cole: “It is. It’s definitely that. We have to define it, you know? It’s like catching something in the air. We don’t necessarily know what it is, but we know what it isn’t and so we are defining it through this negative space by figuring out and talking about what the band is. So in some ways, it feels like it’s telling us what to do. But it really is just us. We’re chasing this thing that none of us can really put into words and we call it DIIV, but it’s a feeling and that’s what we’re chasing the whole time.”

DIIV’s ‘Frog In Boiling Water’ is out now on Fantasy

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