Dunes have burst onto the North East rock scene in early 2017 with their blend of gnarly, riff heavy, Queens-of-the-Stone-Age-style-glam-rock.
We caught up with co front man John Davies to find out more about the band, their new single and just how dangerous their mothers are.
Hi John, if our readers are still to hear Dunes, how would you describe your sound?
Honestly, I’m not sure what we sound like. We have influences from electronica, rock, pop, metal, punk and everything in between. We initially started out with a stoner rock thing in mind but quickly realised that we’re all into a lot of different stuff like LCD Sound System, Millionaire, Talking Heads, Future Of The Left, so thought it would be more interesting to let more influences creep in, it seems to work.
Dunes have only played 4 shows together but you’ve been getting rave reviews as a live band. How’ve you managed to come out of the blocks so strong?
It just kind of ‘clicked’ when we started writing and rehearsing together so after a handful of rehearsals we sounded tight enough to play live.I think the fact we get along so well as mates is half the battle, people aren’t afraid to say if someone is playing something wrong which means problems get ironed out early.
Tell us about your new single ‘Love from below’
It’s a riff/song/idea I had kicking around in my head for a while but never really came to anything until I met the lads in Dunes. Once we started to jam the riff the ideas started flowing and it came together really quickly. People seem to love hearing it live and it’s had a fair bit of radio play and positive feedback so happy days!
Why was it important to you to give away all of the proceeds to charity? Is that core to the aims of the band?
We brought the single out just before Christmas and thought it would be a good thing to do. All the money goes to the Samaritans who do incredible work. We were in a position to help so we did.
You’re playing Central Bar in Gateshead Saturday March 11th. Who’s on the bill and what can we expect? Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaind and Waheela and us. We’re friends and big fans of both bands so to be honest we’re as excited to watch them as we are to play. We’ll probably sort the running order out on the night so make sure you get down early to catch all the bands. It’s a great mix of different styles of music, which is what gigs should be about. Who wants to watch three identical sounding bands? Not me.
Great to hear, and what’s next for the band?
We are recording an album soon which will be released in the summer, and before then we will playing more and more live shows.
Finally, Dunes have the best twitter bio ever with the tag line ‘sex and narcotic gods’. Are you applying for the job of the worlds most dangerous rock band?
My mam wrote that bio, you might be best off speaking to her.
Ha, thanks. We might. See you on the 11th.
Dunes play Central Bar in Gateshead on the 11th March and also support Idles at Think Tank on 22nd March Their ‘Love from Below’ single is available to stream or download from http://senddunes.bandcamp.com with all proceeds going to Samaritans