Brightest Young Things

Words by Phelps

New York’s The Dig hit the 930 Club on Sunday with Editors and The Antlers.  With a new album helmed by Bryce Goggin that builds upon the danceable, dirty rock anthems of their EP, the hard working 4-piece are working the road tirelessly this year to bring the party to the masses.  Stepping up to the 930 Club digs after last year’s DC9 show with Sean Bones, we caught up with vocalist-guitarist David Baldwin as they attempted to escape the midwest despite snowstorms and the cops.

David:  Hello?

BYT:  Hello, David?
David:  Yea!

BYT:  It’s Josh from…
David:  Is this Josh?

BYT:  Yea yea, can you hear me alright?
David:  Yea, I can hear you fine, how’s it going?

BYT:  It’s good man, I’m using the cell phone driving through DC, got you on speaker so… yea, first, I guess you guys are OK yea?
David:  Yea, yea, we’re doing alright, we actually just got pulled over but, other than that and the little Iowa mishap we’re doing well.

BYT:  You gotta get outta that state!
David:  Well, we’re in Ohio now, we just gotta get outta the Midwest, that’s the key!

BYT:  Well cool, I caught you guys a couple months ago at DC9 on the advice of a mutual friend, Sivan up at Michigan.
David:  Yea, he told me he spoke to you recently about us.

BYT:  For sure, so how’s it all going as far as these two big tours you’ve gotten on with Editors and Portugal. The Man?  How’d that all come about?
David:  Well basically we started working with Kevin French who works at Paradigm, he signed us over the summer and sort of put some tours together for us and we found out over the winter break we’d get these two tours.  The first one’s a little bit shorter, two weeks, but the next one with Portugal. The Man is gonna be like a month.

BYT:  All of those bands are nice, I caught Portugal a couple times over the past year.
David:  Oh, yea, none of us have ever seen them but we’ve heard a lot of great things.

BYT:  I guess you guys were tweeting with The Editors about your accident, is that how you bands are communicating?
David: (laughing)  Ah, that was actually with The Antlers but yea those guys are awesome, really great dudes.  Apparently they were driving down that same road right after us and they saw our van on the side of the road and were checking up on us.

BYT:  Well you just missed a bunch of shit in DC, so that’s good.  The city shuts down.
David:  That’s what I heard, was it snowing a couple days ago?

BYT:  Well we got like 40-something inches, places are still messed up but the federal or local governments don’t know what to do so everything just closed.
David:  (laughs) Makes sense.

BYT:  So, I spoke with you and I think Emile briefly after the DC9 show and you were about to go record, is that all done now?
David:  Yea it’s done, we have the album in the van, we’ve been selling them at shows but it’s technically not gonna be released until April but we have been selling them at these past couple gigs.  We got the cd’s right before we left for the tour.

BYT:  What label did you sign with?
David:  Uh, none, we’re doing a self-release.  You know, we have some publicists, some management, and Kevin working with us, but we don’t have… that’s the missing piece right now.

BYT:  Is going DIY, in terms of no-label, something you may be content with if this is successful?
David:  At this point we feel good about it because we have a really good team behind us but we also feel that, having a label, when we say it’s the missing piece, we definitely want it ultimately but it hasn’t presented itself up to this point.  We’re definitely happy with the way things have been going, especially on the booking front.  It helps a lot getting the cd and the tunes out there.

BYT:  Sure, sure.  Who did you work with on the album?
David:  Bryce Goggin, he’s got a studio in Brooklyn, Park Slope.

BYT:  Is that where all you guys are from?
David:  Well two of us grew up in New York, our drummer in Canada, and our rhythm guitar-slash-keyboard player in California.

BYT:  OK, well I’m sure it’s well treaded territory but how did the four of you guys come together as The Dig?
David:  Sure, well the bass player-singer and I grew up in New York and were playing in bands since middle school through college.  We met Eric in Boston during summer one year, we were in a guitar shop and we heard Eric playing guitar and we were like man, he sounds great, and started playing with him.  We started playing in this big funk band, as in the members of this band were numerous.  Just a bunch of kids playing funk.  Then back in New York we met Jamie.

BYT:  So that was a couple years ago?
David:  Yea.

BYT:  So, you guys gave me a demo or an EP at DC9 with a few songs… did some of those make an album, are they a lot different?  What were you influenced by or listening to when you made this album?
David:  Well the four of us have the music we listen to individually but we also have some music that we all listen to together.  We listen to a lot of old rock and roll, a lot of 50s and 60s music, just a whole range.  It’s hard to say what we were listening to while recording.  All of the songs we recorded are a collection from the last couple of years.  All the songs on the demo are on the album and we wrote some newer ones closer to recording.

BYT:  Do you have a preference?  We’d like to stream a song or two with the piece?
David:  Sure, how about “Carry Me Home” and “Two Sisters in Love?”

BYT:  Got it.  So for the summer, planning on any other tours or festivals?
David:  Sure, we’d like to focus on some bigger festival shows for the summer then start touring again like we are now in the fall.

BYT:  Well it seems like Paradigm is putting a lot of acts out there so congratulations on that.
David:  That’s the great thing about having those guys behind us, they have a lot of bands we can play with.

BYT:  Well cool, thank you guys for taking the time, I know it’s been a shitty couple days for you.
David:  No, no it’s been a lot of fun aside from that one thing.  It’s been a blast, definitely been the most fun tour so far.

BYT:  Have you played the 930 Club before in DC?
David:  Nah, I think the biggest place we played was DC9.

BYT:  Ah, well I think it’s about ten times that big.
David:  Wait wait, we played the Black Cat once.

BYT:  Another great DC venue.  Well 930 Club is great, really treats the bands well.
David:  Yea we’re psyched, really psyched, to play there.

BYT:  Well I’ll be out of town but definitely be at the Portugal show.
David:  Thanks so much for your time, we really appreciate it.

BYT:  Absolutely, I appreciate it too.  Good luck on this tour and the next, and take care.
David:  Thanks, you too.