CMAT on Her Upcoming Album and Working With John Grant to Create ‘Where Are Your Kids Tonight?’

Following her Glastonbury debut, a festival headline at Ireland's Otherside Music Festival and massive shows supporting Florence and the Machine, CMAT is having an unbeatable 2023.

The Irish singer-songwriter also just released her latest single, "Where Are Your Kids Tonight?" featuring the inimitable John Grant of The Czars, and we haven't taken the track of repeat since. Both the song and its music video channel epic '80s vibes with a nostalgic and dreamy sound as CMAT laments turning into her mother, with the stunningly layered vocals each representing a different perspective in time. It's also the third single from her upcoming album, Crazymad, For Me, which is out Oct. 13, and we had the pleasure of chatting with CMAT all about the collaboration and its place within the album in the interview below.

The Story Behind 'Where Are Your Kids Tonight?'

CMAT: I wrote this song about the feeling that I was turning into my mother. The line "Where are your kids tonight?" comes from something I used to say with a friend of mine about a guy I knew who literally never saw his kids. He'd turn up to the club, be chatting to everyone, and I'd be like, "Where Are Your Kids Tonight?" This is probably not the kindest thing in the world, but it struck me that he must have no relationship at all with the younger version of himself, or his "inner child" as the kids say these days, if he was carrying on like that. So I began to question my relationship with my younger self and it just kind of snowballed.

 

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What 'Where Are Your Kids Tonight?' Means

CMAT: Writing the song, for me, was about trying not to lose touch with my past self while also not being afraid of what I may be about to turn into (old, lol). I hope that somebody in a bit of a transitional period in their life finds it and gets some comfort from it.

 

On Collaborating With John Grant

CMAT: I am a bit embarrassed to admit it, but I had him in mind the entire time I wrote the song. I think the song only works with his voice combining with mine at all times because, without it, you don't have that dual-time perspective that I was trying to get across in the song. He also is just, like, the best singer of all time, so that helps.

(Photo credit: Mars Washington)

 

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CMAT's Favorite Lyric

CMAT: Probably "Lonely, I didn't know good choices make you lonely and bad ones, bad ones only make you disappear." Just think I nailed it, tbh.

 

The Song's Place in CrazyMad, For Me?

CMAT: It lands at a point in the album where I am starting to consider whether or not I have ever done anything wrong in my life and also what time has to do with everything. Time has everything to do with songwriting on this album, and this is the most time-y song I have. Time-y?

 

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Final Thoughts

CMAT: Have fun and make friends 🙂

 

For more from on our favorite new music, click HERE to read our interview with Madilyn Bailey on her latest single, "Doomsday in LA."