86TVs have spoken to NME about working with US tennis legend John McEnroe – who stars as the band’s rage-filled therapist in the video for their latest single, ‘Komorebi’. Watch the visuals below, and read our interview with guitarist/singer Felix White.
The song marks a stylistic shift for the group – which is completed by White’s brothers and former Maccabees bandmates, Hugo White and Will White, alongside drummer Jamie Morrison (Noisettes and Stereophonics). Following on from ‘Tambourine’ and ‘Someone Else’s Dream’, 86TV’s latest offering finds them in a calmer, more reflective mood. ‘Komorebi’, however, gradually builds to grander heights akin to The National and Arcade Fire.
Speaking to NME, White explained that the single showcased an “introspective and melancholic” side of the band’s self-titled debut album (out August 2).
“When we started getting closer to actually playing and singing together, it felt like the most natural, instinctive thing was to make outreaching, positive, and high-dynamic guitar music,” he said, adding that their new song sees the group move somewhat out of their “comfort zone”.
“It’s coming out slightly under the cover of a John McEnroe rage video, but it kind of felt like a nice way to introduce that side of the band,” White told NME, recalling how his “left field friendship” with the sports star and pundit began when he wrote the score for the McEnroe documentary (2022).
“I was actually really nervous to meet John before I did the film with him because he’s got this history of being mates with Keith Richards or going on stage with Pearl Jam,” White remembered. “If The Eagles were in town, they’d asked him to go and play [with them]. So he’s got a sort of lineage of old-school rock history. I was really aware that he would be thinking, ‘Who’s this guy from England who wants to do my film? Does he rock hard enough?’ [Laughs]. I was really conscious of it.”
NME: How did you end up joining McEnroe on stage?
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Felix White: “When we went out to New York – he was up for the Tribeca Film Festival. And he hadn’t told me, he just announced on the stage in front of everyone at the opening that I was going to be joining him in his band from now on, after the Wimbledon final. He does it for a sort of charity fundraiser. [It was] literally just news to me as well.
“Now we’ve got into a yearly routine where he’ll message me a couple of days before the final of Wimbledon saying, ‘Learn all these songs’ – and it’ll be a totally random set of songs.”
Is it happening again for this weekend’s final?
“It’s happening this weekend. I actually had the text today.”
What sort of tunes are on the list?
“We’re doing ‘Molly’s Chambers’ this year, you’ll be happy to know, by Kings Of Leon. ‘Squeeze Box’ by The Who, ‘Rock And Roll’ by Led Zeppelin. ‘Oh! Darling’ he wants to do, by The Beatles. Basically, what ends up happening is [McEnroe] forces slash demands me to play guitar solos and doesn’t let me stop, in front of a slightly sort of bewildered set of tennis fans.”
Will he be returning the favour on the 86TVs tour?
“I haven’t broached it yet with him… the next healthy step in our relationship would be for him to be in a video. Now that he is, I feel like that’s probably due to happen.”
How was the experience on set?
“I’ve got great videos actually, because he was screaming in my face! The first time we did it, I recoiled underneath the chair. It’s probably the most scared I’ve ever been in a human one-to-one confrontation. But the reason the performances are so strong is because what we thought would be funny to do while we were recording it was that we would be moaning about the music industry and letting John know our anxieties about getting this album out.
“So we were channelling reality. I think halfway through the video, what you’re seeing is John getting genuinely irate with us and our petty anxieties. He’s shouting things like, ‘Get a real fucking job!’, ‘Get over yourselves!’, ‘It’s very simple – write better music!’, stuff like that. But screaming it in our faces while smashing us with chairs.”
His weapon of choice was a cricket bat – is this a nod to your second love and Tailenders fame?
“No. I was desperate to avoid that, but the baseball bat Barney Douglas – who directed it, he did the [McEnroe] film – ordered didn’t arrive in time. So I spent a morning finding my old cricket bats and taking the Slazenger stickers off them. I didn’t want to use a cricket bat, but it was fate. I felt like it was maybe too many worlds coinciding.”
You also wrote the score for the cricket documentary The Edge (2019). Is it rewarding combining the worlds of music, sport and film?
“Yeah. I’d never imagined my life to go that way. It was just a sort of thing that spiralled outside The Maccabees, these sort of left field things. I’ve actually just scored the music for a new Michael Johnson film – the Olympic runner. You do end up doing a lot of psychoanalytical sort of channelling with those people.
“So, in a weird way, I do sort of feel close to John in that sense. It has been kind of a mad Venn diagram, but it’s kind of amazing. I love it, yeah.”
86TVs’ album tackles the shared grief you and your brothers experienced. How has this affected your relationship?
“When our mum died, we were all teenagers and it was at a time when… we didn’t talk about it, and it wasn’t encouraged. So it took a long time resurfacing before it could even get mentioned or bought up. It’s quite interesting to come back at this point of our lives, as adults, with it processed individually and then put all of those different interpretations of childhood onto a record because they’re slightly different takes on it.
“It’s been interesting reflecting on that because none of that was intentional. But a lot of the music, it turns out, is about missing someone and loss and processing who you are on the other side of that. So it has been a sweet thing to do that collectively, even though we haven’t been literally sitting down for therapy. Oh – apart from with John McEnroe!”
A fan once told you that 86TVs sound like The Strokes if they’d had therapy. Is that an accurate assessment?
“I really liked [that], especially as it’s technically a first album. Going back into the spirit of those bands that we love, like The Strokes and Interpol, felt natural and affecting. Because we were so struck as teenagers – like most people were – with what those bands could do with guitars, and how you could almost make rock music with two guitars, bass and drums sound orchestral and really affecting, direct and connected in a very emotive way.
“And so it felt kind of natural that we’re doing that again now, but with that context of who we are as adults.”
You’re supporting Noel Gallagher in London next week. Have you crossed paths with him since chasing him out of HMV on Oxford Street?
“I actually did a Q&A with him for Banquet Records at the end of last year about his record. I just sat in a room with Noel while he was eating Wagamama. He just had his phone [and] he was just playing new music – some of it his, some of it he just loved. We were just going back and forth with songs.
“Obviously, for my 15-year-old self, it was quite a moving feeling of, ‘This is incredible’. But the other really great thing about that was he was so engaged about new music and so set alive by discovering new things. So that was inspiring.”
Did you play him any of the album?
“I did not have the guts to play him anything we’d done. I felt like that would be a high-risk manoeuvre. I did play him some weird stuff that he liked. We ended up texting it back and forth to each other, it was pretty cool.
“He was really into Cleaners From Venus – he’d Shazamed it or something. I’m really into the Michael Head record and Shack’s. We ended up playing a lot of Shack music and stuff to each other.”
Next year will be 10 years since The Maccabees’ final album. Are there any plans to celebrate?
“I haven’t spoken to anyone about it. Sometimes someone from Fiction, the label that put our records out, says, ‘This is an anniversary for that’. But no one’s got in touch with me about [the 10th anniversary].”
Bloc Party, Razorlight, The Killers and Jet are all doing anniversary tours for their classic albums. There’s a big appetite for indie nostalgia…
“Yeah. I like the classic album tours that people do – I’m really into that. So it’s a weird one with The Maccabees, yeah. We’re not doing any of that. We’re sort of just doing our own lives, which feels pretty good. Where we left it at Ally Pally… it’d be so difficult to replicate.”
You started back on the BBC Introducing Stage at Reading & Leeds 2023, and spoke about the “perfect heartbreak” of The Maccabees never headlining. What trajectory do you hope for with 86TVs?
“I honestly think the songs are meant to be in bigger spaces; they feel good in those spaces. If we get to do Brixton [Academy]… it was such a big deal growing up and Maccabees had lots of important gigs there.”
What can fans expect from your Electric Brixton gig?
“I’m really hoping that it’s going to be the definitive 86TVs show up till now. And to your point earlier, I will speak to John after Wimbledon and I’ll plant the seed. If I can fly him down to Brixton to play on ‘Komorebi’, I’ll do it.”
See 86TVs’ UK and European tour dates below, and find any remaining tickets here (UK).
JULY
20 – London, Alexandra Palace Park (with Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds)
27 – Truck Festival
28 – Tramlines
AUGUST
01 – London, Banquet Records
02 – Brighton, Resident Records
03 – Kendall Calling
04 – Y Not Festival
05 – Sheffield, Bear Tree Records
05 – Leeds, Jumbo Records
06 – Edinburgh, Assai Records
06 – Glasgow, Assai Records
07 – Liverpool, Jacaranda Baltic
08 – Bristol, Rough Trade
09 – London, Rough Trade East
23 – The Big Feastival
NOVEMBER
15 – Hamburg, Rolling Stone Beach
16 – Berlin, Lark
18 – Amsterdam, Paradiso
19 – Paris, Les Etoiles
21 – Portsmouth, Wedgewood Rooms
22 – Birmingham, O2 Institute 2
23 – Sheffield, Sidney & Matilda
25 – Nottingham, Rescue Rooms
26 – Manchester, Gorilla
27 – Bristol, Fleece
29 – London, Electric Brixton
30 – Cambridge, Mash
DECEMBER
01 – Leeds, Brudenell Social Club