The phone rings a few times and in crackles the voice of Matt Martians, the 23 year-old member of The Internet and Odd Future. He’s doing what you’d expect a member of Odd Future (or any rising young star, for that matter) to be doing: chilling with friends, smoking weed and painting a space girl themed mural all during an interview. The fact that we’re communicating over the phone does nothing to disturb the intimacy of our conversation; Matt and Syd, 19, are just two down-to-earth kids focused making good music. And they do. The totally in sync duo are creating some next level electro sounds and the release of their first album Purple Naked Ladies this past December has brought them newfound and well deserved fortune and fame.

We discuss their parents jobs, relationships between Odd Future members, MySpace and the mediocrity of today’s music scene as the two race turns finishing each other sentences. I don’t know if it was divine intervention, but I can’t help but think that these ten musicians were destined to meet each other to create some of the most original and eclectic music of our time—just for us.

Read it in their own words…

Matt Martians: Hi this is Matt.

Lauren Schwartzberg: Hey Matt, how’s it going?

M: It’s good it’s good. I’m painting the wall in my room, the normal.

What color?

M: I’m actually painting a mural. I drew it out, it’s like a whole bunch of like space girls.

Cool.

M: Pretty original.

So, How did you guys get involved with Odd Future?

M: I was Odd Future before Syd was. I got involved just from being on MySpace and seeing the movement starting. I met Tyler on a music forum and that’s how I first got hip to who he was and I saw Odd Future blow up on MySpace. It’s always kind of been known on MySpace. I just started sending Tyler music and we got cool and he started liking my music and we just started working together and he just put me in it.

Syd: I met the guys through Hodgy. He was doing some session and he invited me along and it just clicked really well and that was about it. I just came and never left.

Did you link up with Odd Future through a Neptunes forum? How was that involved with you getting together?

M: Me and Tyler used to lurk this Neptunes Grindin forum. It’s one of those forums that only like super duper fan boys know about. There’s not actually a name for it so it’s like people would share music because we were all a select like 30 people on it that all knew each other from just being on the Internet. So, I met him through there and we just liked the same music. I believe when somebody has similar music taste as you, you tend to get along with them. When music is being made it tends to be a lot easier because you get their influences and they get the things you’re trying to do.

 Syd, what’s it like being the only girl in the group?

S: (Laughs) It’s nothing out of the ordinary because I grew up like that, being the only girl in a lot of things. I’m down with it.

And your brother, Taco Bennet, is also in Odd Future. What’s it like doing all of this with your brother? Are you two close?

S: I don’t know. I mean, like, not really.

What do you mean?

S: We’re close enough. We don’t talk every day, but we have each other’s backs.

Where did you learn to mix and engineer music?

S: I taught myself and my high school was a music academy, so they had a lot of music classes. They had a musical technology class and I took that class, grew a really cool relationship with the teacher [Bob Bruning] and he just helped me with everything as far as putting together a studio.

 He helped you build the studio at home?

S: Well, he was the guy I went to for advice and stuff. He never saw it in person, but every update, every new piece of equipment I would go to him and talk to him about it. He was that guy for me.

Did you guys record The Internet album in your house?

S: Yeah, we did. We did like one song at a big studio, but we recorded pretty much everything from the comfort of our living room.

What do your parents do?

S: My mom is a stay-at-home mom. My dad owns his own company; it’s like an importing/exporting business.

What do they think about your music and Odd Future?

S: They’re very supportive of me and all my dreams and they always have been. The music we were making was shocking to them at first, but they learned that we weren’t gonna change and if you can’t beat ‘em join ‘em, so they just started giving all the support that they could.

What do you think about the relationship between the lyrical content of the music and how you and the rest of the crew were brought up? Is it contradictory?

S: No.

M: I would say this: In our music nobody talks about really being impoverished. I mean, I was brought up very well-off, but I’ve been broke. Some of us might have parents who may have money, but they don’t just give us stuff. There was a time when we’ve not had money to eat or not had money for gas. Some of us have nice houses and have a mother and a father, but what teenager hasn’t been broke? What 20-something year old who’s in college hasn’t been broke? Who’s not in college? It’s something that everybody relates to, so I don’t see how that even matters because…it’s the pain of being a young adult. In America everybody’s broke.

Syd, What’s your favorite song to open a set with?

S: On the national tour I would open with an anthem for whatever city we were in. Other than that I’d rather not name one song ‘cause I feel like then I’ll just be attached to that song in some way and I don’t necessarily want to be. I usually go to the guys and ask them what they’re listening to and take what I like from [that] ‘cause the main purpose of that opening set is to get them ready behind-the-scenes; to get them excited and pumped.

What was your involvement in the production of Goblin and the catalog of Odd Future music? How are you involved in that? What’s your role?

S: I’ve mixed everything except for the first Odd Future tape and the Jet Age [of Tomorrow] album. I haven’t been involved production-wise except for Mike G’s projects, which was a big reason why I decided to do my own thing musically and do something where I can showcase my musical abilities. At the time nobody knew I was producing because the stuff I was making was so different from what everyone else was making that none of them knew how to approach my music, so… I found Matt and we vibed out so well.

How did you two first start making music together?

S: We met on MySpace. I was a fan of his from back in the day when we didn’t know each other. I would hit him up and ask him for advice and questions on MySpace and stuff and he always was nice and would respond to me. That was something that nobody else would do. Everybody always thought they were too good to respond to people. Before they asked me to become a member of Odd Future he had made a mission out to Los Angeles from Atlanta just to work with some people and he came to my studio cuz that’s where everybody was meeting up and we just clicked.

What do you think of MySpace today? How has it changed since you two first met up? Are people still connecting musically through MySpace?

S: Noooo (laughs).

What do you think is the way to do it?

S: I think the new way to do it is to focus on perfecting your craft rather than trying to get famous. I think the music industry is headed towards being more music related these days ‘cause it’s not about the music anymore, that’s unfortunate. I think MySpace contributed to that because everybody was overwrought about how many friends you had.

M: MySpace changed because it made way [for every artist] to meet mediocrity. Before MySpace if someone was mediocre you wouldn’t hear about it because it wouldn’t get no grade. But when MySpace came into play, that’s when you start hearing mediocre music and everybody and their mom can just play music. It became a thing where if you weren’t so bad people would actually say it was good because it’s entertainment. That made way for a lot of mediocrity to make its way to the top to the point where now in the industry you have people that are purposely mediocre so people will talk about ‘em. It’s terrible, man.

S: Yeah, it’s not about the music anymore. It’s made it a lot harder for people who are really trying to perfect their craft…

M: …People who are making real music…

S: …To shine—people who do it for the love of music and not for the love of fame. MySpace started an era where everybody thought they were famous, everybody thought they were important, everybody’s opinion mattered now. Not to say that everyone’s opinion shouldn’t matter, but…

M:…you never heard any of these opinions before Myspace.

S: Yeah, to be honest hearing that many opinions really [has] been unhealthy for me, at least, I’ll speak for myself.

How has it affected you?

S: It made me delete my Twitter.

I was going to ask you about your online presence. Compared to a lot of the other members of Odd Future, you’re not very active online.

S: Yeah, I had a Twitter and I just got tired of hearing people’s opinions about everything I had to say, so I deleted it. I still have a Tumblr, but nobody knows about it because I don’t promote it. You know, like, it’s not necessarily something I need everyone to see. It makes it something special for the fans of mine who do know about it ‘cause it’s like they have something that they can connect with me with that only the true fans know about. I’d rather have ten real fans than 100 people who don’t give a fuck, ultimately.

How does one become an official member of Odd Future? Is there a certain process? Is there hazing involved?

M: You have to walk across the country…

S: …and get cheescake…

M: …and bring it back to Tyler at the studio. That’s it.

S: Yup, we all had to do that and…

You have to bring cheesecake to the studio?

M: You have to walk from Los Angeles all the way to New York, all the way across country, all the way to Junior’s cheesecake. You gotta get cheesecake and bring it back to Tyler at the studio in a matter of 2 days. It’s crazy shit, but a few of us have done it.

Nah, but honestly it’s no real way to get into Odd Future. I mean it’s really organic, it’s really a family kind of. Before any of this happened we were all friends and before anybody knew about our music, so that’s kind of a trust… as you get to the top, I guess, the people you can trust is kinda slim.

Syd, what do you think of your name drops in Tyler’s songs? For example, in “Yonkers” when he says, “While Syd is telling me that she’s been getting intimate with men…” How do you react to that?

S: I don’t react.

You have no opinion?

S: No, I don’t care. It’s just jokes, it’s not serious (laughs).

How are you responsible for the Odd Future aesthetic?

S: I don’t know how to answer that question myself. I think a lot of other people answer that question about me. I mean, obviously, it helps for them, with what they say, me being a contradiction to a lot of what they say about, I guess, women and homos, but I don’t know. Everybody plays their role. My role is the DJ and so to me it’s nothing serious. I think I add a softer touch to the bigger picture. I add a little bit of a balance, I think, to the craziness. I’m not that crazy on the outside as they are.

What do you think of you being Chad to Tyler’s Pharrell?

S: Like if Tyler was Pharrell would I be Chad? No. We don’t hang out. Me and Tyler don’t kick it or anything and we don’t produce together, so no. He’s more like a distant big brother in a way.  He has my back when I need it and everyday and all its just cordial.

Would you say the base for Odd Future as a group is more of a friendship? Does the music or the friendship come first?

S: We’re a family. We were a family before we were a company and we don’t plan on changing that.

How did both of you come up with the aesthetic and idea behind Purple Naked Ladies and The Internet?

S: Every song on there is very real to us and relevant to what we were going through at the time. The aesthetic, I guess, came from whatever we thought looked cool at the time and what still made sense with the sound of the album or didn’t make sense. With the album cover, Matt designed it and from what I understand his whole feeing was something simple to balance out the sporadic-ness within the actual music.

M: The music is very complex and it’s almost to the point where it’s so complex that it feels simple at times. The stories behind the lyrics are very, very deep. It’s just a culmination of everything 2011—just everything we went through.

So you’re singing about your life during 2011?

M: Life, relationships, anything. It’s deeper than just lyrics, like even now, the stuff sounds… It goes with the stuff that we’re listening to at the time. [We put] certain instruments in certain songs because these songs were made over an eight month period, so we changed what we were listening to over that period. [Syd] went on tour, she went overseas. I was in L.A. for the first time, I had to make my way through the industry. So it’s deeper than just the lyrics – it’s the instruments, it’s how the songs end, how long the songs are. It’s everything.

Why do you call yourselves the Internet?

M: That nigga Left Brain. [laughs] That nigga Left Brain, he said, From now on when niggas ask where we from, we gon’ say we from the Internet. I was like, niggas gon’ hate on it ‘cause it’s so up-front, just stupid, but honestly it’s tight so I was like fuck it, we’ll call ourselves the Internet. A thing about the Internet is this album is just fun. We didn’t have a direction; we just made music that we felt at the time. It’s all just about fun and being sporadic and random ‘cause that’s when shit’s the best, when it’s sporadic and random.

Do you guys play the instruments on Purple Naked Ladies?

S: We played some instruments and we had some of our friends like Chris Smith, he plays on the drums on the intro.

M: Yeah, he played the drums on the Intro. That was crazy. And Syd played the drums on the Outro. Some of my friends play bass guitar. Most of the key playing is me and Syd and most of the programming, the drum programming. It’s way deeper production-wise than you think as far as what we use.

S: If anything we tried to use this album to help showcase not only our talent but the talents of our friends who aren’t from Odd Future who otherwise would get overshadowed by a lot of it.

What is your favorite music to listen to?

M: We listen to a lot of funk music. We listen to a lot of house music. You know Katy B? We listen to Jamiroquai, Quadron. We don’t only listen to rap music over here. We listen to our friends. We listen to this guy Speak. He’s a rapper out of Moreno Valley. Crazy. He’s the dude who wrote “Gucci Gucci.” People need to really check his album out ‘cause it’s really… It’s in there. It’s tight.

How do you think you’re going to change the music industry?

M: As far as changing the music industry…musicians being able to make [their own] albums. Here’s the thing: with this album, we didn’t have to clear with anybody—this was our album, we made it from scratch. The label had no interference with what we did and we did everything ourselves as far as artwork, concepts, videos, me doing the album packaging, we’re mixing the album, recording. I think it’ll change the music industry in a way so that it’s best to do things on your own because at the end of the day when people try to come at your product. I can make more from this project because I made it myself and it’s not a matter of the record label being like Well if something’s not as successful as we want it to be… we don’t wanna put it out again, so we’re not gonna give you money to get mixing, to do artwork, to have a recording budget. But when you control your own destiny, nobody can stop you because you do all the stuff yourself, so you’re a self-contained business that can’t be stopped. I think it’s moving more towards the DIY as far as that aesthetic, working in the industry.

Where do you see yourself in five years?

S: Let’s see, I’ll be almost 25. Ew. [laughs] That’s weak. I’ll probably drop off the face of the earth by then.

M: Real talk, I’ma try to stack enough guap to move to like Bora Bora and just have a studio out there. No seriously, like, I’ll move to a tropical place, just move this music as far as possible. I don’t know the world is getting too crazy out here, man. I’d rather get back in touch with Earth, like low-key. High key.

What should people know about you that they don’t already know?

M: I don’t know. People take me really seriously on Twitter and shit, and they get really offended sometimes. But I don’t know. As far as about me personally, a lot of people don’t know that I was one of the original members of Odd Future, just as far as the first album we put out – it was me, Hodgy, Tyler, and Left Brain and Casey Veggies, who’s not in Odd Future anymore. A lot of people think I’m new to the scene with Odd Future and new to these projects when in actuality I’ve been around before Earl was here, and Frank Ocean, all those guys. But it’s cool though, ‘cause people who really know their shit about Odd Future, it’s cool to them that I finally got signed and got put out there as far as my talent. So it’s cool.

S: My ass. [laughs] I don’t know, I don’t think people need to know anything else about me. I’ve been trying for the longest to maintain a sense of privacy, but because I do, at the same time, feel an obligation to certain people who seem to find me as an inspiration, I’ve let out more than I planned on, so I think I’m just gonna stop. People know all they need to know.

 Are you guys going on tour at all as the Internet?

S: Maybe. We plan to. As soon as I get a vocal trainer.

What do you think of singing? Was one of your goals to start singing?

S: I do enjoy it. But when it comes to recording, actually recording, it’s a less enjoyable process when you’re not that good ‘cause then you spend a lot of time trying to get something right. But it becomes a lesson in the end, of course. But for now, I’m waiting for a vocal trainer. We have a whole band ready for us. Just made up of the people that spend the most time at our house. We’re ready.

If you were to go on tour would it be a live band behind you two?

S: Oh yeah. Of course. Of course. Drummer, bass, keys, and me and Matt.

How do you two split the responsibilities of the Internet? Who does what?

S: For the most part, he does all the artwork. I do most of the songwriting, most of the singing. And we do production 50-50.

What is the worst thing you’ve heard someone say about you and what’s the best compliment you’ve received?

S: I try not to pay attention to the bad things people have to say about me ‘cause that stuff can bring you down. But I don’t remember the worst thing someone’s ever said to me. I probably took it with a grain of salt as everyone should. Best compliment we’ve received? Probably when people thought the Neptunes co-produced “Cocaine.” ‘Cause they definitely didn’t. We did that ourselves.

How do the members of Odd Future influence each other’s work?

S: We all compete with one another silently. It’s friendly competition and we all have been evolving together and getting better together. We enjoy each other’s sound, of course. We learn from each other. Left Brain probably has the most influence in the way I produce today. Just from watching him spend hours on my computer at my parents’ house just making music and studying how he did it and wondering how he did it. His whole production process is so mind-boggling and I ended up adopting a lot of his practices.

What’s the biggest change you’ve experienced since Odd Future blew up this past year?

S: The biggest change is that I pay my own rent now. And I live with Matt and Mike G, and it’s like the best thing ever.

M: Same thing. I can pay my own rent, more people know about what I do, I have a deal with Sony. A lot of my stuff is behind the scenes that a lot of people don’t see. I gotta make a lot moves. My art’s in on a certain hot topic. I have an album out. It’s a lot of stuff that’s going on with me behind the scenes that it’s crazy that a year ago I was kinda like wondering where my next meal was coming from.

What’s your dream collaboration outside of Odd Future?

S: My dream collaboration? It’s hard to say because a lot of my favorite musicians I never will wanna collaborate with ever. I would prefer to keep the idea that I have of them pure. Like Erykah Badu for instance; She’s like the queen of my world, and I’ve met her before, but working with her? I don’t think I’ll ever feel worthy. And if I ever do, I don’t think I would ever wanna even tamper the image I have of her in my head ‘cause you never know. I know a lot of people who have worked with people that they looked up to for years only to realize that they didn’t like that person that much. And I’d rather not. It was like when I asked my mom if Santa Claus was real and she was like are you sure you wanna know? And I was like yeah and then I was mad when she told me.

M: A lot of my dream collabs are collabs with people that a lot of people don’t even know. Quadron was a dream collab for me a year ago. The fact that Coco who’s in Quadron is on the album, that was kind of a dream for me, but as far as dream collabs… Hmm. I guess Jamiroquai, man, I’ma be real with you. Theyre like the greatest shit ever man, I don’t know. I might die first. And Andre 3000–I seen him at the mall the other day. I froze up. It was the craziest shit.

Since I have you guys on the phone, I’m gonna ask this ‘cause why not. Where is Earl and when can we expect him to come back?

M: Earl is on Earth, and I don’t know when he’s coming back. He’s on the Earth, on some grass on planet Earth.

Planet Earth, but not on the Internet.

M: Yeah, he’s not on the Internet, but he’s on Earth.