Maryland’s The Dangerous Summer have been quietly building a following in the UK with their ultra melodic brand of pop-rock.
Uplifting and melancholic in equal measures, the band are influenced by classic bands of the genre such as Jimmy Eat World and their sound has the potential to propel them to the bigtime as they prepare to hit the UK for a run of shows at the end of this month.
We caught up with guitarist Cody Payne ahead of their UK invasion…
What have you been up to since your formation? Why have we not heard that much about you on this side of the Atlantic?
We have just been touring so much in the US and Canada, we are still trying very hard to make a name for ourselves over here while at the same time trying to get our name out over there so that when we do get a chance to tour over there we will have fans coming out and knowing the songs. We are excited to finally be making our way to the UK at the end of April.
What inspired your debut album ‘Reach For The Sun’ and where did the title originate from?
We just wrote a lot of this album during a sort of dark time for us as a band, we hadn’t been touring, a lot of people had forgotten about us so we were just home and decided we were going to make the best album we could and hope that people like it. It was just supposed to be a positive title about getting through our dark days.
How long did it take to write and record?
We spent probably 3-4 months writing the album and then another month recording it. A lot of the vocals and lyrics were written in the studio as well as a lot of the music. In my opinion we were very unprepared but somehow it seemed to work out for the better.
How was the process?
Writing and recording RFTS was fun, it was scary because it was our debut album and obviously that is a critical point in a bands career, it’s either when you can blow up or you can be put on the back burner, and most of the bands that are put on the back burner don’t really see the day of another album. It was definitely exciting though because we feel that we are good at creating the sound that we play, we feel that we write very well together so we knew it was going to turn out awesome, especially with Paul Leavitt producing it with us.
Which bands have influenced The Dangerous Summer and who would you most like to tour / play with?
So many types of bands have influenced us over the years, the obvious ones being Blink 182, Jimmy Eat World, Millencolin and more recently we listen to bands like Against Me, Tegan and Sara, Passion Pit, Phoenix, MGMT, Death Cab For Cutie and a ton more.
What do you like and dislike about touring?
I love almost everything about touring, it’s awesome, it’s pretty stress free for the most part. The bad parts aren’t really even that bad, like not showering every day, not making a lot of money (hopefully this won’t always be the case), not being able to sleep in a bed every night. When it comes down to it, it’s always worth it and I would always rather be on the road rather than at home doing basically nothing.
What are you looking forward to about hitting the UK?
Definitely, coming over to the UK was one of our main priorities especially with our album about to come out over there. We have never toured over there but we know there are a lot of people who already have our album that are listening and that would be there as soon as we announce some dates. It’s hard to make it happen when you are a small band but we’ve done it!
What are your plans for the rest of the year?
We are just going to be writing a lot and touring when we have the right offers. We will definitely tour more in the US and Canada, hopefully gonna make it to Australia as well. We will probably finish writing the next full length and hopefully record it as well!
What do you hope to achieve in 2010?
We just want to see ourselves further along than we are right now. We don’t really set any strict goals to meet, we just like to see that we are making progress and until that progress stops, we will continue to make music and travel the world.
Are there other bands from the US that the UK might not have been introduced to yet but should know about?
Weatherbox!!
The Dangerous Summer release their debut album ‘Reach For The Sun’ in the UK on 12th April 2010 and they head over here shortly after that for the following dates with Hopeless labelmates Anarbor:
Apr 26 Sugarmill, Stoke
Apr 27 Academy 2, Birmingham
Apr 28 Academy 2, Bristol
Apr 29 Club Ifor Bach, Cardiff
Apr 30 Academy 2, Liverpool
May 1 Academy 3, Manchester
May 2 King Tuts, Glasgow
May 3 Academy 2, Newcastle
May 4 Civic Bar, Wolverhampton
May 6 Kings College, London
www.myspace.com/thedangeroussummer
www.twitter.com/dangeroussummer