'Having The Ability To Reach That Far With Our Music, That's Insane To Me'

When Cloud Nothings played Lollapalooza this year, frontman Dylan Baldi found himself unexpectedly moved by the headliner: The Killers. "I didn't think I was going to know all of their songs," recounts Baldi, 26. "I was standing there on a hill, quietly singing along to myself. I listened to them a lot when I was 14, so that means that I knew all the songs, and I still knew all the words, too, which was weird. That band had so many hit songs."

Baldi is not the kind of guy "to go to the front of a show and scream along", which means he's unlike many of the fans of his own band; the front rows of Cloud Nothings shows filled with many a fan hollering along. "To have inspired someone to do that, that's a pretty cool thing," Baldi says. "A lot of the lyrics to the songs are pretty depressing. They're about dark shit, being depressed. So, it is nice to know that other people relate to that. But, I wish other people were happy!"

One crowd-favourite, though, has been retired from the set. "There's certain songs from old records that I don't like playing, because the lyrics on some of them, they're a little much. I look back and I'm like 'Jesus…'" Baldi says. "There's a song called Quieter Today on Here And Nowhere Else, where the lyrics just sound like something a 15-year-old would write in a poetry class, about how he's angry. And I don't necessarily feel that bad, like, ever. So, that's an example of where the lyrics, which are such a document of a time and place, can just feel funny to sing. But, I like the songs."

Baldi is in his hometown of Cleveland ("I do have a lot of love for Cleveland. It's a real underdog city"), in the wake of a tour with Japandroids. He's spending a day off learning bass lines to Speedy Ortiz songs - who are fronted by his girlfriend, Sadie Dupuis - filling in for them at an upcoming show. Playing and jamming with other people is "fun" for Baldi, a break from his main gig. "My day job is the singer of this band, and I do the interviews, and I'm thinking about it all the time. I'm always trying to work at it, always on tour. Cloud Nothings takes up most of my time," he offers.

Baldi's also thinking a lot about the band's next record, their fifth LP; trying "to figure out what the point of making this record is". The point of the last record, 2017's Life Without Sound, was personal: he'd moved to Massachusetts to live with Dupuis, but, away from his friends, and with his girlfriend often on tour, an "all-encompassing" feeling of "loneliness" set in. "I was feeling pretty bad. So, the point was to get out of that, and make a positive-sounding record," Baldi offers.

Whether albums sound positive or not, the net result at shows is always something cathartic, filled with feeling. "I have to yell in front of a crowd of people every time we play a show, so it's always emotional," says Baldi. "It's been what I do for eight years now, so there's that emotion attached to it, too. It feels important to me, to have this band... It's the first really meaningful thing I ever did in my life. I got out of high school, went to college, and quickly realised college was bad for me. So I started this band, and almost right away people were [saying]: 'I like this'. It's nice to have people telling you that what you're doing is cool, that you're receiving validation and gratification."

Now, Baldi offers, he gets "almost a freakish amount" of validation from others. "Like, we get to come play in Australia," he marvels. "Playing to people on the other side of the world, having the ability to reach that far with our music, that's insane to me. Every show we play I'll talk to someone who'll say, 'This record helped me get through this part of my life'. I wouldn't be able to do that as a person, so if my record can do that on my behalf, that's amazing."