DMA’S are an Australian Indie Rock trio that are constantly pushing boundaries within the
indie genre. Following the release of their latest album How Many Dreams, the trio headed
overseas for a massive UK leg of their tour. Lucy Redfern caught up with songwriter/guitarist Johnny Took to talk about the creative process behind their newest album, life on tour and much more.
We first got chatting about the band’s latest album How Many Dreams and the introduction of a
lot of new genres which really made this album feel like a landmark of the bands musicality.
How would you describe “How Many Dreams” in comparison to your older albums?
‘Yeah, I think as a band we’ve always tried to have somewhat of a balance between our
something we are overcoming with more of a dance feel. This album was really just an amplified
melting pot of these three genres. Inherently it’s made the dynamics of the live set more eclectic as
well and feel better for us to play.’
Delving deeper into the bands creative choice to steer away from exclusively indie rock and put an
increased focus in dance and synth elements within songs such as De Carle, we spoke about
Johnny’s ambitions to expand DMA’S repertoire of genres further.
Are there any future genres or styles of music that you’d like to include in future music?
‘To be honest I’d like to do an acoustic record where the whole record is acoustic and
they’re all brand new songs, all done with the piano or the acoustic guitar. Something more lowkey
kind of sounding, just because it would be something new and interesting for us to do. The problem
is, as a performance it can sometimes feel a little bit medium tempo or slow. But some people like
that so we’ll see!’
Growing up in Sheffield, the indie rock scene was always quite prevalent in my teenage years and
DMA'S were always a name thrown around alongside a lot of your other classic indie rock
bands. We spoke about pressures of fitting this meld of the stereotypical indie rock band whilst
also trying to develop musically.
When recording the new album was there ever a sort of pressure to ‘fit the meld’ of a classic
indie rock band and sort of impress your OG fans?
‘It is something that crosses our minds from time to time. Especially because I think no
matter what genre you do, if you get discovered for doing that certain genre there is sort of an
expectation to keep putting out that music. But in reality, a lot of fans think they want you to make
the same album again and again. But honestly if you did do that, they’d probably get bored. I mean
we had to be true to ourselves musically and for us that meant playing with other genres, drum
machines, sequencers and stuff like that. It was just a learning curve that led us to our next
destination.’
DMA’S are certainly no strangers to life on the road, touring around the world and playing
festivals as big as Glastonbury. We got into speaking about the ups and downs of life on tour.
I saw you got married recently. Firstly, Congrats! But also you guys are obviously touring a lot.
How do you manage a touring life with maintaining a personal life?
‘Yeah, I guess with any job there’s pros and cons. One thing with touring is you might be
away for a month, a year, or a couple of months at a time but then you’ll be at home for like three
months at a time. So like I try to really do something significant with the people important to me
when I’m home. Even though you are away from your loved ones for a long time, when you’re home
you really get to be there. I’m also lucky that my wife is a musician so she understands that tour life
isn’t as glamorous as it seems on insta. We make the most of it though.’
Originally all the way from New South Wales in Australia, the trio have bet the odds in establishing
a fanbase all the way around the world. Their latest album, How Many Dreams bagged the band
their highest ever UK album chart, coming in third . We spoke about the bands increasing
popularity in the UK as well as the differences in touring in Australia vs The UK.
It’s crazy though if you think about it that you guys are a band from Australia and have such a
strong UK fanbase. How does it feel to know you have such a solid fanbase overseas?
‘Oh it’s one of the best things in our lives, it blows us away every single time, it never gets
old. Maybe the flight gets old because we’ve done that eight times this year, 24 hours every time but
once we land, we love it. We love the people here and both mine and Tommy’s dads are from the
UK so we have a link there. But yeah, its one of the most special things and we’re going to do our
best to make every live show as good as possible so people keep coming.’
Is touring in the UK different from touring in Australia?
‘Nah, it’s really different. Mainly because you can fit the whole of UK into the state that
we’re from (New South Wales) except there’s 67 million people living in the UK whereas there’s only
25 million people living in Australia. So like there’s just so many more people in such a smaller space
its way better for us. In Australia we’d have to be flying between shows but like here we can travel
an hour or two and be playing our music to an audience of completely new people. Definitely for
upcoming musicians it’d be a lot easier to tour in the UK and get exposure to more people a lot
easier. But then again, we recently did a 20 day tour in Australia where we got to play a lot of more
intimate coastal venues so that was really cool.’
Although sporting an impressive musical repertoire nowadays, The DMA’S admittedly come from
modest beginnings. We delve deeper about Johnny’s personal music inspirations.
You guys do seem to be on the road and making music quite a lot. Was making music
professionally, as part of a band always something you saw yourself doing?
'Honestly, it just sort of happened. We came from quite humble beginnings; you know just
playing a show with mates and you get to party and just have fun. But then you start getting older
and the gigs start getting bigger, you have to start taking things more seriously. Like if you’re playing
Wembley arena, people are paying good money for the show, you don’t want to mess it up. It wasn’t
long ago when me and mason were playing in pubs and busking. But yeah, we’ve become more
professional as we’ve grown a bigger audience. Not many musicians get the opportunity that we do.’
Do you remember the first song/ piece of music you wrote. Did you have a specific influence?
‘Yeah, I do. I was listening to a lot of Bob Dylan at the time. There’s this album called Blood
On The Tracks: I was just basically trying to copy him and write a little folk song. I mean the lyrics
were corny and the chord changes were basic but there were still moments in that process which
you know showed promise. It was very cathartic for me to use my guitar and writing as a tool and
actually have something to show for it. I’m sure Tommy and Mason’s experiences would be very
different but that’s where it all started for me.’
The DMA’S are a primarily self-producing band with massive accreditation into the songwriting
and production processes of their music. Johnny explains more about how the creative process
has changed over the course of the bands career.
Has the increase in your guy’s popularity as well as a development in technology changed the
production/writing process for you guys?
‘Oh yeah by heaps. We still do the old stuff but less because technology has changed and
more just because we’ve started taking things more seriously and have been doing things for longer.
Like we’ll still write things with just an acoustic guitar or piano but these days we can also make huge
electronic sounding type beats and use massive ethereal synthesisers. Oh and voice memos! (At like
4am when you wake up) When I was in high school you couldn’t just record things, you’d either have
to try and remember it or record it on a tape recorder or something like that.’
Do you have a favourite song off the album?
‘It changes all the time but honestly right now probably Get Ravey.’
Closing off our chat, I wished Johnny good luck on the upcoming tour, promising to come catch
their Rock City gig that I’m sure will be nothing but an example of the bands hard-work and
musical development (as well as a couple of standard mosh pits). Whether it’s an acoustic album, a
Glastonbury return or another anthemic single, it’s exciting to see what’s to come for the DMA’S!
Lucy Redfern
Edited by Alice Beard
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