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Jan 05, 2016 LCD Soundsystem By Christopher Roberts

LCD Soundsystem may have broken up in 2011 and denied various reunion rumors, but over the holidays they released a “depressing” new Christmas song, “Christmas Will Break Your Heart,” and yesterday it was confirmed that they would be headlining Coachella. Now frontman James Murphy has issued a lengthy statement on the band’s website that explains why the band has reformed after such a public breakup (including a final show at Madison Square Gardens). The post also promises more touring in 2016 and that the band are also working on a new album for release this year. “We’re not just having some reunion tour,” Murphy writes. “We’re releasing a record (sometime this year—still working on it, actually), so this isn’t a victory lap or anything, which wouldn’t be of much interest to us.”

In the post Murphy explains that he’s continued to write songs since the end of LCD Soundsystem and wrote a lot that felt like LCD Soundsystem songs and thus then reconvened with his former bandmates, Nancy Whang and Pat Mahoney. “So I asked Pat and Nancy to come over to my apartment for coffee and told them: ‘I’m going to record some music. Should I make up a band name, or make a ‘James Murphy’ record, or should it be LCD?’” Murphy wrote. “We all thought a good amount about it. We have had lives for the past 5 years, which has been nice, and those guys have made amazing music with Museum of Love, The Juan Maclean, and all sorts of other things. I’d managed to do a bunch of fun, dumb stuff which mostly annoyed people who were into the band because, well, subway turnstiles and a coffee aren’t LCD, basically.”

They all agreed it should be an LCD Soundsystem record and that without Pat and Nancy it wouldn’t be LCD Soundsystem. As Murphy laid it out, “here were our choices: 1. Make music with your friends and call it something else, which seems hilarious (everteen) or egomaniacal to the point of sociopathic (James Murphy solo record). 2. Make music, but willfully exclude your friends because of the horrors in option 1. 3. Make an LCD record with your friends, who want to make said record, and deal with whatever fall-out together. 4. Don’t make music, to avoid the horrors of all of the above. 5. Make music and, like, hide it somewhere. We decided, clearly, on option 3, and I was fully prepared for a certain amount of ‘oh fuck that guy’ over-it stuff—in fact welcomed it.”

But Murphy does admit he was a bit surprised by how many fans have been annoyed that the band is reforming after only five years. “In my naiveté I hadn’t seen one thing coming: there are people who don’t hate us at all, in fact who feel very attached to the band, and have put a lot of themselves into their care of us, who feel betrayed by us coming back and playing. Who had traveled for or tried to go to the MSG show, and who found it to be an important moment for them, which now to them feels cheapened. I just hadn’t considered that. I know—ridiculous on my part. I saw some comments online a few days ago from people who felt that way, and it blindsided me, and made me incredibly sad. I saw some other people replying with stuff like ‘if that’s what you cared about, and you don’t want them to play anymore, maybe you liked the band for pretty weird reasons,’ and it made me think. The truth is, while I get what the replier is saying, I kind of side with the original complaint: if you cared a lot about our band, and you put a lot of yourself into that moment (or anything about us you chose), and you feel betrayed now, then I completely understand that. It’s your right to define what you love about a band, and it’s your right to decry their actions and words as you see fit, because it’s you, frankly, who have done much of the work to sustain that relationship, not the band. I was so clearly expecting the cynical cries of foul, that I hadn’t seen the heartfelt complaint coming. We’ve always talked about how we’d never betray anyone who cares about us, but here we are now. Given the chance again to make new music with the people I care about, and who have given a big part of their lives to doing this weird thing together, and who wanted to do it again, I took it. And in doing so, I betrayed whoever feels betrayed by that action. I by no means think that everyone who liked our band feels bad right now. A lot of people who liked our band are very happy, and we’ve been pretty blown away by the almost overwhelmingly positive response. Last night I sat with Al and Nancy in a weird Italian bar and we talked about how fucking awesome it was that so many people were happy to have us back. But that doesn’t take away from those who feel hurt. To you I have to say: I’m seriously sorry. The only thing we can do now is get back into the studio and finish this record, and make it as fucking good as we can possibly make it. It needs to be better than anything we’ve done before, in my mind, because it won’t have the help of being the first time. And we have to play better than we’ve ever played, frankly.”

Read the full statement here and below is “Christmas Will Break Your Heart” again.