Chvrches have an 'Eye' for pulsing synth-pop

Patrick Ryan | USA TODAY

Chvrches never thought they'd be "that" band.

You know, the kind whose fans sing B-sides back to them at their shows and flood their social media with artwork and cat memes. But ever since they jolted music blogs with galvanic anthems Lies and The Mother We Share in 2012, the Scottish synth-pop trio has watched their audience steadily grow: selling nearly 1 million copies worldwide of 2013 debut The Bones of What You Believe, racking up more than 150 million Spotify streams, and kicking off yet another U.S. tour in New York this week.

Meeting people after shows, "I'm a total crier," says frontwoman Lauren Mayberry, 27. "When they're emotional and telling you what a song meant to them, it just makes you think about bands that are that for you. It's really surreal to be that person for someone, it's an incredible privilege. I don't know how long we'll get to do that for, so I try to remind myself of these things."

Chvrches (pronounced: "churches") will be sticking around for at least a little while longer, having just released sophomore album Every Open Eye last week. Unlike Bones, which was sporadically recorded after Mayberry formed the band with Iain Cook (40) and Martin Doherty (32) in 2011, they went into Eye with the intent of making an album, which gave the louder, glossier music a more cohesive feel.

"I can hear that this time when I listen to it, it's more of a record," Mayberry says. "Other than that, the approach was pretty similar. At this point, we know a lot better what the band is and what we want it to be, and we wouldn't have had that without having been on the road for so long."

Groundwork for Eye started on tour — Mayberry, the band's songwriter, scrawling words and phrases in a notepad; Cook and Doherty, noodling around with production on their laptops — "but that was more a product of itchy feet about having not written anything for a long time, rather than trying to start an album," Mayberry says. Instead, they waited until they returned home to Glasgow last winter before diving in, writing and recording in the same converted three-bedroom flat where Bones was born.

The first song recorded was the glimmering Never Ending Circles, but it was the teetering, stadium-ready Clearest Blue midway through the writing process that "kind of epitomized what we were trying to do," Mayberry says. While Bones took a cue from the synth-fueled hooks of Depeche Mode and Eurythmics, Martin and Doherty looked to Quincy Jones' minimal production on '80s classics such as Michael Jackson's Billie Jean this go-around. "They were keen to see how many elements you can take away and if it's better for the song," Mayberry says.

Even as Eye propels them closer to pop stardom, Chvrches have not sacrificed their core values as a band. While some record labels and management tried to position Mayberry as the attractive, young "star" early in the group's career, she still prefers to do photo shoots and interviews with Cook and Doherty. Although there have been some exceptions — such as solo shots for a New York magazine story last month — "we're in a place where I can say, hand on heart, that we stand behind every decision we've made," Mayberry says.

Chvrches have also become outspoken opponents of online misogyny, occasionally using the band's Facebook and Twitter pages to call out some of the sexist comments and messages Mayberry receives on a near-daily basis: ranging from marriage proposals to violent rape threats. It's a topic she penned a Guardian op-ed about in September 2013, and addressed again last month after releasing the music video for Eye's defiant lead single, Leave a Trace.

On the day of its release, a thread sprung up on online forum 4chan about Mayberry's appearance in the video: a short, black dress in some shots; wet hair in others. A slew of online commenters called her a "slut" and "whore," and debated whether they'd have sex with her. Mayberry linked to the since-deleted thread in a tweet, writing, "Dear anyone who thinks misogyny isn't real. It is and this is what it looks like."

Although some commenters brushed off the remarks as online trolling, Mayberry says it's greater problem than just "guys on the Internet. As if those men turn off their computers at the end of the day and don't take those opinions into the real world."

At the end of the day, "I'm here because I'm a musician and I would like to be able to be afforded the right to do my job in exactly the same way as my male counterparts," Mayberry says. "It's not that people are getting in touch saying, 'I don't like your band,' 'I don't like your singing' — that's fine, that's their opinion, I relish that. But there's a difference between somebody not enjoying your work and somebody making threats of physical and sexual assault. I don't really see why I should accept that in my job."

Oftentimes, it will start a positive dialogue among Chvrches fans, who come up to them at signings and after shows to say the conversation has resonated with them.

"Obviously, first and foremost, we're here to write music and talk about that, but at the same time, there are a lot of young people who follow our band," Mayberry says. "If that discussion helps spark some thoughts and opinions, that's a good thing."