#224 - Open Mike Eagle & Kenny Segal breakdown 'DOOMED!' - Album Alchemy

And I said, how long is this?

But one of the main reasons I was psyched to know Doomed was coming out was its clear focus on a relationship or breakup or whatever, because relationship shit is just my jam and music.

Like personally, it's just always something I'm interested in.

It's just a topic of life that I'm fascinated with.

And in the hands of, you know, a skillful writer and a skillful producer, I had really high hopes.

And I think this one was just clearly delivered.

And, Mike, particularly I'm curious to understand, like, you know, when I think of the last time you were – you were on the show you were meant you mentioned how making anime trauma divorce was actually a key album for you because it played a vital role in you processing difficult emotions and traumas where you know albums like anime and neighborhoods god limited are very real showcases of the work you've been putting in your therapy journey So through making this album, through re-exploring these old memories, processing these traumas through this, you know, absurdist black comedy miniseries on wax that you, you know, put it in the presser for this album.

What do you think you learned about yourself and, or this past relationship from this exploration you underwent creating the album?

Man, that's a deep question.

And I, part of the difficulty of answering it is that I feel like I'm learning more every day.

Uh, like it's not a, it is not at all like a finished process.

You know what I'm saying? Like I'm unpacking like a five year thing.

Um, and the, the, The emotions or the processing that I was most attracted to doing on this project is like the most complicated stuff.

So I don't think I'm like landed anywhere on any of it.

It's kind of like I'm still working it out in real time, which makes it sort of a sensitive kind of project in some ways.

I don't know.

It's I think I think that the jury's still out, honestly, on what I have learned, because I think I'm still learning, you know?

Yeah, I mean, I mean, that that sounds like a very mature answer, because a relationship that significant and obviously given all the things you've described on this album, like it had a real impact on you and.

to act it's almost arrogant to act like you learn to everything it's possible to truly it is but more likely there's still some things you need to unpack and on the surface something that i find interesting with this album is that you know given like the the the cliff notes of what this album is quote unquote about like you could assume the album is like extremely downtrodden it's depressive But I don't really feel like that's the case.

Not only are there a bunch of funny non-sequitur one-liners, funny framings of songs, the production is very lush and pretty often as well.

But more importantly, the album doesn't actually feel very dominated by this sense of self-pity or anger.

To me, most of the album, especially as it progresses towards the end, has this...

It definitely feels melancholic, but it feels like... a melancholy acceptance where the dust has seemingly started to settle and you're like just soberly taking stock of your life now post breakup um you know i'm thinking of tracks like uh remember it trying to remember where i aimed at which kind of like to me i know it was kind of seemingly felt focused on career but i felt it was interesting because it felt like uh what most lots of people do post a breakup, you're kind of just looking at everything with a new lens, you know, what, what do I do now? Like, what is my what is my purpose, literally, now that this person's out of my life, and this all makes me just wonder about what stage of, of grief Do you feel you were in for the majority of writing this album? Like was most of this writing inspired by being in the eye of the storm? right after the breakup with all those like raw emotions like anger pity or whatever depression or was it more it came after reflection unpacking it closer to kind of like the acceptance yeah i think i think

acceptance is probably the key to the whole thing especially the second half um i think it yeah like i think the the big untangling the big processing is about okay, your life has been organized around this particular dynamic, And now that that foundation is gone, it's like this questioning, okay, of like, what now? What's next? How do I see myself in the world now? How do I collect myself and my definition of self and move on after this foundational chapter is over? And I think that's the...

you know, the question sort of informing the entire thing.