Interview

As I walked into the coffee shop to meet with Daphne Loves Derby, I noticed them socializing with their fans. This is common for bands to do, to meet their fans, but the guys genuinely seemed to care about them and were engaged in the conversations they were having. As we went into the back room, they said a quick “I’ll be back,” letting their fans know that they were interested and cared about their chats.

With the new release of their new album, On the Strength of All Convinced, Daphne Loves Derby has been on tour to help support and increase awareness of their album. When we sat down, I asked the boys where they draw their influences, and they listed an array of bands. Jason Call, the bassist, named The Ataris and Paul Simon, while Stu Clay, the drummer, named Death Cab for Cutie, Gatsby’s American Dream, and also said he listened to hip hop and jazz. When I asked the guys how they would categorize their music because of this wide range, Spencer Abbott, the lead guitarist, said, “it’s hard to say, our music ranges a lot because we’ll write a song depending on our mood.” And for all the people that haven’t heard the band before, I asked the boys what their favorite song was. Kenny Choi said, “Middle Middle, it’s fun to play, I like the name, the lyrics mean a lot.” And Jason throws in, “It’s kind of more mature than our other songs.”

Since the guys have been on tour for a while, I wanted to know what they liked about being on tour, or what they looked forward to. Stu said, “You kind of live minute by minute, and you’re not stressing about things a week ahead, and fun things that you can never really plan out. And you can’t really put on paper and then all of sudden something happens and you have a lot of fun.” While Kenny said the reason why he looked forward to touring was because “after touring when you’re home you feel really worthless, so leaving is good.” And of course, this tour being an acoustic tour, I asked them what they liked more about playing an acoustic show. Kenny said he liked acoustic shows because they were “simple, you don’t have to break a sweat, and it’s low key.”

Having done two tours, pretty much back to back, I wanted to know where the guys liked to play the most and what they did on their down time. The boys all agreed they loved playing in San Francisco and Dallas. The boys also agreed that they liked to long board and go on the computer in their down time (the band puts up a podcast that they update when they’re on the road, that can be found here.)

What impresses me the most, and what really separates this band from all the other ones, is their age. All the boys are 21 or younger, Jason, 19, having already gotten his associates degree. This sparked a little debate between the boys whether or not an associate’s degree was having finished college or not. Let’s just say we never got to the end of that discussion.

Looking towards the future, I asked what they had planned for the rest of 2006, and they said more touring and more writing.

And for the girls out there that are looking to get together with one of the boys, they all have girlfriends except for Kenny.