Our Chat with Mumdeathcake

Written by Worm Marsden

PHOTO CREDIT TO @SAFETYNET_VFX ]

While sitting outside on an awful, violently stormy night, I was introduced to Mumdeathcake over the phone. Self-described as “lo-fi indie/garage deadbeat”, MDC is a one-man project from Darcy Eddy that blossomed over lockdown and sat quietly dormant until recently. This being my first interview I’d ever conducted, I was reasonably nervous – however this feeling was relieved just as soon as the zoom call started and I got to actually talk with him; Darcy’s down-to-earth character and halcyon demeanour worked to quickly dispel any anxieties I’d brewed. 

With the name coming from a somewhat eponymous event, the morbidly humorous name of Mumdeathcake captures a feeling of disturbing unease and grasping for beauty in painful times. This dialectic and bittersweet affect isn’t confined to just the project’s name - as we moved throughout the interview, I’d come to learn that the quintessential gothic appeal of finding beauty in melancholy is the skeleton supporting nearly every facet of MDC. 

The 4 tracks that comprise MDC’s seminal EP “The Big Slow”, for example, were written not only during covid times, but in the midst of a personal health crisis, surrounding themes of chronic illness and the struggle to balance emotional health with a failing body. 

 One aspect of Mumdeathcake that I found personally alluring is the accompanying music videos. By producing a set of accompanying videos that are recorded and edited using analog video gear, feedbacking and distortion, we are given a visual medium that perfectly amplifies the nebulous emotion and wistful ambience behind the tracks.

Mumdeathcake comes as a rather notable departure from Milksick, the noise-rock band that Darcy plays guitar in. Juxtaposing the brash and loose punk stylings of Milksick, Mumdeathcake shows a softer, more intimate side of Darcy’s musicianship. Eventuating after being laid off from work and left with a covid stimulus check, MDC was all self-recorded and produced in a truly DIY bedroom-indie manner. Struggling with the isolation of solo projects and the endless cycle of self-motivation to create, the tracks which came together for ‘The Big Slow’ sat untouched for a few years after their initial recordings, lost in musical purgatory. 

So what was the incentivising push for Darcy to finally release these tracks? What was it that saved these songs from the aforementioned pit of sonic purgatory? The needed propulsion of motivation and encouragement to complete the unfinished project, as seems to happen ever so often, came by route from a friend of his. This prosaic conversation kicked off a snow-ball effect for Darcy, with this simple yet essential push from a friend led him to picking the tracks back up and starting the process of refining and producing them in preparation for an EP release.

At the core of Mumdeathcake is a truly poignant and self-reflective project that touches on the fragile sensibilities of physical and emotion degradation, a collection of tracks that leave you feeling like you’ve walked in on something intimate yet not alienating in their rawness. Metaphorical writing in various states of emotional abstraction, soft layering of guitar tracks, and fuzzy reverbed vocals come together on The Big Slow to build a musical framework that leaves you wistful yet keen to explore further. 

PHOTO CREDIT TO @SAFETYNET_VFX ]

Vulnerability in Naarm’s vibrant scene of indie musicians can occasionally come across as manufactured and performative as a byproduct of sheer quantity, yet MDC comes around as a refreshingly honest project in our local ocean of artists. The core tenant I gauged from our interview was honesty in suffering, and doing your best to detach that from self-flagellation in the face of a persistent beauty behind the pain. Darcy discussed his lived experience as somebody with Crohn’s disease, and how that tends to play so fundamentally into depression, with MDC being an outlet to air the constant uncertainty of a body that doesn’t function well or consistently. Chronic illness comes with grieving, introspection and uncertainty, and songs like ‘Black Eyed Susan’ are an honest look into the inner clashings of a holistic struggle. 

Nearing the end of our chat, I asked about any local acts that resonate with MDC as a project – Darcy recommends both Lady Fern and Isaiah Keepsafe for any fans looking to explore further.

A key discussion point that I really held onto from our interview was that chronic/invisible illness in local music/arts scenes can tend to be majorly overlooked, with the only option for advocacy feeling like martyrdom via harnessing a sob story, and that the only way we can take back that autonomy is with open and honest conversations about our lived experiences and the reality that exists beyond medical labelling or any diagnosis.

Mumdeathcake has just dropped an additional two singles, “Polite Plastics Club”, preparing for his new EP release in early November, with the two teaser tracks offering up more of the wistful yet quietly powerful noise that Darcy seems to do just right. Available for streaming via most platforms, I’d highly recommend giving Mumdeathcake a listen (and chucking him some dollars by buying the EP!). Rehearsals with a live band are underway with live shows soon to follow – so make a mental note to keep up to date with Darcy at @mumdeathcake on Instagram.