Dot To Dot Festival is almost upon us! One of the hundreds of musicians performing at the day-long musical extravaganza is local artist Davoli. We spoke to him about his brand new EP, his inspirations, and what DTD means to him...
You’ve just released your latest EP Tarmac Trees in collaboration with Penny Moon’s Jess Beer – for those who have yet to listen, how would you describe the sound, and what was it like working with Jess?
We released it on 14th May and it’s had a good reception so far thankfully. It sounds... I want to say slightly melancholic, stripped back sort of acoustic, with more of a focus on blending our two voices together and adding lots of harmonies and sort of vocal layers, rather than lots of guitar parts (like some of my other stuff).
It’s really easy to work with Jess, we hit it off pretty quickly. Most of the songs were done (going to the studio and write the songs there and then, record it straight away) which I think is probably the best way to work if you can. Yeah, for most of the songs on the EP, [they] were all recorded in a day, really quick – not thinking about it too much. Which I think maybe adds to the vibe of it being kind of relaxed (or it sounds relaxing to me at least). Jess is great, she’s a super-talented songwriter herself so it was a pleasure to be able to work with her. Hopefully we’ll do some more if people like it! We’ll just have to see.
Could you tell us what (or who!) musically inspired the name Tarmac Trees?
I write down lots of weird things on my phone when they pop into my head! I think I was walking home from the studio one night, and it was a full moon or something, and the moonlight... there were just shadows of trees on the road, and it looked really cool. And that phrase just popped into my head, so I wrote it down and it made its way into Charlie. Just a bit of an off-the-cuff observation, I guess!
Last year you played at The Bodega for D2D. Were there any memorable highlights from that gig that have stayed with you?
I remember it being really loud! I think we were the first band on... (maybe they were still tweaking some things) and it was a wake-up call, that’s for sure! I think we played at 2 in the afternoon, which is always a good slot on Dot To Dot, cause you can kind of play and then get stuck in and enjoy the rest of it y’know? But yeah, I just remember it being loud and fun!
You’ll be playing at The Grove for Dot to Dot Festival’s 15-year anniversary this year! How are you feeling about it and do you have any personal connections to The Grove?
I’m feeling excited for it. We played the opening of The Grove; they did an all-dayer – Catmilk and Victory Lap played, it was a good day. I know Cam quite well, always seem to bump into him on the scene, he’s a very talented guy. It’s just a good vibe and a nice size venue with a good sound system in there; it would be nice to go back. We played it as a full band when it opened, and I’ve played there solo since then - so it would be nice to get the band back again!
What can we expect for your D2D set?
I’m not sure if Jess will be able to join us as she’ll be playing with Penny Moon across the road at Carousel (unless she fancies running across and hopping on stage with us!) but we’ll have to see how that goes. I think we’re going to try some songs which will maybe make it on to the next album that I’m working on. I’ve got a list that I need to whittle down into a track list, so we’ll try some of those out, I think.
What do you love most about the festival?
Just the range of stuff you can see! I have a bad habit of cottoning on to things once they’ve actually started to become a bit more known. I remember really getting into Faye Webster and then saw that she had played The Bodega at Dot To Dot the year before and thinking, “Ahh why didn’t I go to that!”
There’s just so much on the line up that there’s bound to be something really good on wherever you are really. It's also kind of cool to just walk around and see what you can find. This year I really want to catch Greg Freeman; he’s on at The Bodega early on, so we’re all pretty stoked to see him.
Where would you hope to play in the future?
It would be great to play at Rock City, I feel like we’ve got enough band members to fill out that stage (We’re always trying to squeeze one more person into the band it seems.) But we’ll play anywhere – not fussy!
Davoli will be performing at The Grove during Dot to Dot Festival on 25th May. He will also be performing at Splendour on 19th July and headlining The Bodega on 1st November. The EP Tarmac Trees is available to stream now.
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