MGMT / Skyrocketing to stardom may be a dream for many artists, but it isn’t without its consequences. Young stars who make it big quickly can burn out just as fast. Andrew VanWyngarden and Ben Goldwasser, recent graduates of the liberal arts college Wesleyan University (other famous alumni include Buffy the Vampire Slayer creator Joss Whedon) never set out “to expect or try to be rock stars on a major label,” said VanWyngarden in an interview with the Weekly. “When we did get into a [pre-show] routine last year, it wasn’t necessarily a positive one ‘cause we were really worn out. Our routine was taking a nap and smoking pot and eating and kind of slowly getting up and [being] like, ‘All right we’re gonna play this show.’”

As tiring as success can be, with playing almost every major music festival the world over, MGMT members have still worn their headbands and face paint with a freshness that has earned them legions of fans beyond the similarly headband-sporting crowd.

Synthesizers, guitars, facetious lyrics and a mean falsetto all jokingly described as “future ’70s music” are meant to turn anyone into a dancing fool. It’s strangely hard to get sick of listening to 2007’s 10-track Oracular Spectacular over and over. And strangely still, “I never did and still don’t like my voice. It’s nothing I ever trained to do or anything. I just did it. I’m happy when I get to scream and sing loud and high pitched so that’s probably why I do it so much,” said VanWyngarden of the famed falsetto. As for non-vocal instruments, MGMT’s second LP, Congratulations, due in 2010, will introduce “a couple of modular synthesizers. We’ve used synthesizers before, but not really the modular kind. That’s really cool.”

Other MGMT projects that are also really cool include a “collaboration for the new Flaming Lips album…and then we sang on one of Kid Cudi’s 8-tracks…it’s really been like a dream. We’ve been working with one of my favorite artists, Pete Kember of Sonic Boom, Spacemen 3. It’s kind of crazy. All the people we’ve wanted to work with we have. And now we’re opening up for Paul McCartney. Maybe we can work on a song with him one day, which would be insane,” said VanWyngarden. A side project with of Montreal’s Kevin Barnes, called Blik Fang, is also something that has been on the back-burner for a few years. With the ever-growing success of both bands, VanWyngarden hopes to get back to the project soon.

With the band’s schedule, it is hard to believe that MGMT has any free time. But VanWyngarden said he’s been reading POPism, a book about Andy Warhol. And while it seems likely his fame will last longer than 15 minutes, VanWyngarden has considered an alternate life, one in which MGMT never existed.

“I think about that in relation to what I might be doing in a year even though I’m like, ‘Buy the second album!’ But you know, I like the ocean and the beach a lot and maybe I’d take a job that had something to do with that.”

The band will be playing in Hawaii for the first time this week. “We’re just gonna be relaxing. I’m gonna try to surf a little. I started surfing a couple months ago in Malibu. I’m gonna try to keep that up.”

While the praise and ticket sales for MGMT may swell some egos, VanWyngarden and Goldwasser don’t forget those around them who are instrumental as friends and more.

“People never really ask about our live band. I think people assume they’re hired professional musicians or that we don’t play with them all the time…[but] our first thought was just to play with some of our friends we’ve been in bands with before,” said VanWyngarden. “They definitely deserve credit. They’re all great guys.”

To prove this point, these are the same dudes who donned capes like the head duo did on the Late Show with David Letterman while rocking out just as hard. Who knows what else they’ll be so jovial about at the Pipeline show? Here, things for MGMT should turn out to be just beachy.

The Making of “Time To Pretend”

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