It’s a whole new world for Portugal. The Man
Funky ‘Feel It Still’ pulls off-radar band into the mainstream
Eight albums in, Portugal. The Man are finally getting their kicks in the mainstream.
The five-piece psych-pop band has contentedly scaled the alternative charts for more than a decade but is now getting a taste of crossover success with Feel It Still, the swinging second single off its latest effort, Woodstock. The playful funk earworm reached a new high of No. 7 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart this week, with 469,000 downloads sold to date, according to Nielsen Music.
USA TODAY catches up with lead singer John Gourley to learn more about the breakout group.
THERE’S A REASON ‘FEEL IT STILL’ SOUNDS FAMILIAR.
After releasing seventh album Evil Friends in 2013, Portugal. The Man spent nearly four years writing dozens of songs and working with producers including Danger Mouse and the Beastie Boys’ Mike D. “I had the line ‘I’m a rebel just for kicks’ for a while,” Gourley says. “I tried it with a ton of different ... songs, but it just never felt right.”
He stumbled on Feel It Still in the studio one day while noodling around on the bass, playing the Marvelettes’ 1961 Motown hit Please Mr. Postman. “It was a placeholder melody that I threw at it, and the second I did, it just felt so natural and right.”
‘BREAKING BAD’S JESSE PINKMAN IS A FAN.
Feel It Still has cropped up in ads for YouTube TV and iPad Pro, but none has excited the self-professed Breaking Bad fans more than Aaron Paul dancing to the song on a treadmill in a Vitamin Water commercial.
“That was crazy,” Gourley says. “It could’ve just been a normal ad and we would’ve done it, but instead, we got this rad Aaron Paul vibing to the track. I go to the movie theater back home and it plays before the movie I’m watching. I feel like a little kid every time I hear it.”
THE FRONTMAN IS AN ALASKAN NATIVE.
In 2004, Gourley moved from his hometown of Wasilla, Alaska, to Portland, Ore., so he could focus on music. He still has fond memories of the Last Frontier, which he showcased in Portugal. The Man’s wilderness-set short film Sleep Forever in 2011.
“When we were kids, my favorite thing was coming to upstate New York where my family is from and hanging out with my grandparents’ friends, pre-Internet, and them asking if we had stores or ‘Do you have TV in Alaska?’ ” Gourley says. “They were valid questions, but yeah, we’re wearing clothes, not furs.”
DESPITE THEIR POP RADIO HIT, THEY HAVE HARD-CORE ROOTS.
Before dropping out of high school freshman year, Gourley befriended bassist Zach Carothers, whose band at the time would play in the cafeteria during lunch. “He was the homecoming king, and he was in front of the whole school jamming (to) Rage Against the Machine, Slayer, Metallica,” Gourley says. They formed the emo/screamo band Anatomy of a Ghost in 2002 but broke up two years later to focus on Gourley’s then-side project, Portugal. The Man.
THEIR NAME IS (ALMOST) AS SEEMINGLY RANDOM AS IT SOUNDS.
Gourley was shy growing up, so “I wanted to create this onstage alter ego, like (David) Bowie creating Ziggy Stardust or The Beatles with Sgt. Pepper. We were just slightly dumber than both of them,” he says.
“A country is an individual in the world that represents a group of people, so I decided we would name our band after a country, and Portugal happened to be the one that popped up. In hindsight, we should’ve named it something to do with Alaska. But you become so burnt out on beluga whales and huskies, you don’t appreciate it the same way.”