Dave McLean and Paul Lake have never seen psychedelia as something you pin down. It’s where the weird bits, the in-jokes, the odd threads of folklore that all get to coexist without needing to make sense together. Their new Fruits de Mer single is a good example. One track starts with a fridge magnet collection and somehow ends up wondering if one might actually be a stolen tomb artifact. The other has someone dropping into a hallucinogenic state that’s equal parts mystical and ridiculous, angels and that famous torture scene from Marathon Man sitting side by side. They explain all to Jason Barnard.
The ‘Tragic Fridge Magnet’ plays with the idea of an everyday object carrying a buried history. As the co-founder of a band long fascinated by unexpected connections, what drew you to framing a song around that tiny domestic talisman rather than a more obviously ‘mythic’ object?
Paul – Whenever and wherever myself and my wife or our daughter or son go on holiday, we have got into the habit of buying fridge magnets. In fact our fridge is covered in them.
It wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to say that we’ve become genuine fridge magnet snobs over the years, rejecting the most obviously cheap tat for those that we consider to be the higher-end, objet d’art masterpieces of the FM world.
Without wishing to sound boastful, I would say our fridge could be considered The Tate of FM collections. I wouldn’t be surprised if, in years to come, it gets put on show and exhibited in the V & A as the fridge magnet assemblage exemplar for others to follow….( maybe I’m overdoing it, but you get the idea) …Anyway, this got me thinking that it might be possible that a previously-tomb-raided pharaonic item could end up being passed-off as a fridge magnet in a desperate effort to sell it on.
I like the idea that such an everyday item as this could actually be something of significant value both financially and historically – a brilliantly unstated ancient relic but perhaps not realised or appreciated as such by the purchaser.
Just imagine acquiring an actual ancient amulet worn by an Egyptian Queen in 2,500BC for a few Egyptian quid and then sticking it on your fridge next to your favourite one from Benidorm! Priceless!
In ‘STP’ you revisit the visionary territory of ‘Paint Me A Dream,’ but this time the narration feels more comic. What made you want to return to that world, and what does humour unlock that straight surrealism doesn’t?
Dave – I wanted it to be less serious and more tongue in cheek but still keeping it within the parameters of a surrealist trip. I really enjoy reading surrealist literature and in particular, surrealist comedy. There are a wealth of good writers in South America; Julio Torres, Julio Cortazar and Silvina Ocampo (amongst others) and they mix dry humour with magic realism and absurdism. My favourite author is Jorge Luis Borges and he has always been a big influence. In fact going back to one of our songs ‘The Fountain’s of Neptune’, we reference labyrinths, time and mirrors, which Borges often draws upon.
Humour allows you to be more outlandish, much larger than life. Hence the celestial beings and then the abstract reference to Dustin Hoffman in the Marathon Man (more later). How can they both appear in the same song? Well they can, because humour allows you to go places you don’t normally go or feel you can.
The line “we cannot give you what you deny” feels like the emotional hinge of ‘STP.’ When you wrote it, were you thinking more about the internal logic of a trip, or about something broader in how people deal with fear or acceptance?
Dave – That is a reference to our continual search for ‘something else’ and we cannot be happy unless we are searching. We can spend our whole life looking for the illusive golden orb, perhaps look in a different direction.
You end ‘STP’ by repeating “is it safe,” borrowing a line from Marathon Man. Were you trying to break the mood a bit, or was it just a case of an old memory slipping into the track naturally? Does that happen a lot in your material?
Dave – The dentist scene in Marathon Man has to be one of the most powerful, intense scenes in cinema. Poor Dustin Hoffman, he really does not have a clue what is going on. It is so unintelligible and abstract for him. So, I like the confusion created and the juxtaposition between the main narrative of the song and the line ‘Is it safe’. It could just as likely be a part of a ‘Trip’ where things are not going to plan. And yes, we do like to insert a reference here or there, sometimes they are musical references/riffs from other songs (Red Crayola, Syd Barrett, HP Lovecraft) go find em!…
Further information
The Double A-Side single from The Chemistry Set ‘STP’ and ‘The Tragic Fridge Magnet’ is released as a limited-edition coloured vinyl on 19 December 2025 by Fruits de Mer records.
Digital release, with bonus track (extended version of STP) will be released on Bandcamp on 15 January 2026.
Artwork is by Robin Gnista. Videos are made by Drain Hope.
