Last Tuesday evening, fellow WVAU Assistant Events Coordinator Joey and I had the opportunity to interview The Dodos before their show at The Black Cat. We caught up with the band an hour before the show started and learned what the band is all about. Our talk with Meric (vocals, lyrics), Logan (drummer) and Joe (backing guitar) went as follows…

Me: All right, well… We are here from WVAU with The Dodos before their show tonight at The Black Cat! So guys, how are you doing? Is D.C. treating you well?

Meric: Uhh good, we‰’re good. Very good.

Me: Good. It‰’s good that you‰’re good. Well, you recently put out your newest album Carrier this summer, and it‰’s quite noticeably different from your earlier works of a more acoustic sound. What inspired this new direction?

Meric: Pretty much every Dodos song up until Carrier was written on an acoustic guitar, or with a drumbeat. The electric guitar, if any, would be like an overdub and this time we wanted to start with this overdub as kind of the central idea for the song. You know, just to see if it would change the makeup of our songs. Also, once you start playing the electric guitar, it’s really hard to not play really loudly.

Joey (WVAU): So, how did you all meet each other? How did The Dodos come to be?

Logan: We (pointing to Meric) met a long time ago, but we met Joe back in 2010 through a studio overlap.

Meric: Yeah, we were recording with a mutual friend and Joe, I think, stopped in to show us some of the movie he was working on. That ended up being my takeaway for a long time: that he was an actor and that he definitely got naked in his movie, so he was a pretty ballsy gentleman.

Joe: Yep, I got naked in two films, both unpaid. (Laughs)

Me: So, full frontal or what?

Joe: The whole kit and caboodle! The second time, I was smeared in mud. Yeah, but going back, these two guys recorded the entirety of the new record before I came about. It’s kind of amazing that they switched to electric primarily for this record.

Logan: Yeah, while Joe was smearing his body in mud…

Me: So you guys are touring until the end of November, what‰’s that life like? How do you stay sane?

Meric: It’s very military-like, for better or for worse. You easily side step questioning your life and your soul. But, at the same time where does your soul go though?

Logan: [Your soul] hovers about three feet above the van, looking down at you.

Meric: Do souls have iPhones?

Logan: My soul’s playing “Bedazzled”… or “Bejeweled.”

(Laughter)

Joey: What‰’s your favorite part of this process then?

Meric: Well, you‰’d think the music. But I‰’d say developing a new hobby and finding out you have hidden talent. That‰’s taking place on this tour in the form of a small, leather and rice-filled bag. Our plan is to showcase our skills on our last show in our hometown of San Francisco, and hopefully someone will discover us.

Logan: Maybe we should do it in L.A.

Meric: Oh yeah! They‰’ve got that industry man.

Me: So which songs do you have the most fun with, is it the ones that come naturally, or what?

Logan: The new record that we are working on. I think Darkness is our working title for that. It was just very difficult for me to play and before we went in the studio, it was pretty nerve-wracking and I envisioned myself messing up a lot, and I did some. Now that it‰’s done tough, I really love listening to it, because I feel like we captured the performance. I‰’ll probably have to work really hard to get back to playing it as well in front of an audience, but I really enjoyed making it.

Me: Is that on the setlist for tonight?

Logan: Nope. It is still in the oven.

Meric: There‰’s a song on Carrier called “Transformer” that was very hard to figure out all the parts to. We had numerous versions before we even recorded, and out of those versions, the drum beat had another set of versions. Then one day we were like, “this works, we did it!‰” and it was just huge. It came from an oddball place, and now it‰’s a very dynamic song.

Joey: What are your aspirations individually, and how does the band’s dynamic flow into this?

Meric: Just to make new records and get better at making them. There was a period of time when we were trying to make a record to get noticed and then that happened. Now we want to just draw in fans, more fans and become better musicians.

Me: So with that in mind, do you have any idea of how well a song will fair up to an audience when you first record it?

Meric: I may have an idea, but I‰’ve learned to totally not have expectations for that. Often times what seems like a turd before you take it to the studio ends up being the best song that‰’s fluid and just works.

Me: What about your song “Fools”?

Meric: No, I didn‰’t even want to record that song. That‰’s a perfect example of one that just became a great song.

Me: All right, so my last question is: How would you describe The Dodos to someone who has never heard you before?

Logan: That happens most when we‰’re crossing borders. The border guard will ask what kind of band we are and we‰’ll be short and sweet and just say a rock band. I used to say a folk rock band, but now I just stick to a rock band.

Meric: Instead of overselling ourselves by being like “we‰’re this but we‰’re also this,‰” we limit expectation by just saying that we put on a rock show.

Me: So you‰’d rather just let your music speak for itself?

Meric: I definitely don‰’t want to get into having to explain it so yeah.

Joey: So as a closing question, what kind of advice would you give an aspiring band or musician?

Meric: Stay scared.

Logan: Watch out for the Boogeyman. Joe here is kind of like the Boogeyman…