Underneath the craze of Brat summer, New Jersey guitarist, vocalist and producer Mk.gee (pronounced “ma-ghee”) has been the year’s biggest word-of-mouth success after the release of debut album Two Star & the Dream Police (following various other releases dating back to 2017). He’s a woozy pop-soul virtuoso, an 80s historian with an eye for Americana, known for shadowy performance videos where he plays on moving vehicles like some sort of lone train-hopper. Playing to a heaving venue of newfound obsessives with arena rock energy, he provokes mad, delighted screams – from both crowd and artist.
Stylistically, he’s somewhere between Jai Paul and Alex G, and like those artists, he looks up at constellations of classic influences and fires himself somewhere in the middle of them. The drums of How Many Miles or You Got It could just as easily start up a ballad from Celine Dion or Whitney Houston; the live version of Are You Looking Up tunes the guitar and vocal down to reveal the hidden influence of Tom Petty’s Free Fallin’. I Want beats like the Police’s Every Breath You Take before exploding into white-hot yearning: “I’m not your hero but I’ve got his desire.”
He opens with Dream Police, done as a frosty tango that booms with raucous guitar feedback, countered with otherworldly synths. A beam from behind the artist casts a long, shaggy-haired silhouette into the room like an inverted lighthouse. But before long, we’re given a bright view of the stage as he debuts new single Rockman, slicing into the 1975-ish groove with cocky flair, and interrupting it with wild screeches like his own version of David Lee Roth.
He and his band connect songs seamlessly with washing instrumental bridges under total darkness, before embers of the next track flicker into view and are greeted with howls of excitement. Breakthespell creates the most intimate moment of the night as the lights turn deep red; synths start noodling like the clarinets on Bon Iver’s 22, A Million, but they could also be guitar strings in a different light. This indistinguishability is what defines his music – its slipperiness.
In a recent interview on BBC Radio 1, Mk.gee said: “People spend three years on a record to sound more human […] and relatable … I think it’s evil.” Indeed, in an age when pop songwriting is often as personal and direct as a DM, Mk.gee counters that by bringing back mystery and an inability to be fully understood, as extended intros and additional jamming circle around his volatile Rockman persona. It’s a joy to not know what it means, if anything.
