‘We don’t care whether it’s cool or not’: inside the weaponised weirdness of Mermaid Chunky

Twist in the tail … Moina Moin (left) with Freya Tate, AKA Mermaid Chunky. Photograph: Simon Pizzey

“It was really surreal,” recalls Moina Moin, of the day in 2022 when DFA Records founder James Murphy invited Mermaid Chunky, the duo Moin formed six years earlier with best friend Freya Tate, to sign to his label and support his group LCD Soundsystem at the Brixton Academy.

“We didn’t really know who he was,” admits Tate. “To be honest, I thought LCD Soundsystem was something like the Ministry of Sound.”