Thursday, April 8th, 2010

Interview: The Dø

words by Matthew Wright | photo by Matthieu Zazoo

“We did not plan to record an album in the first place.”

Seriously? Right on.

That’s how my interview started with the French-Finnish band The Dø. After all, Guinness was an accident — someone burnt a batch of barley and said WTF, let’s finish this beer anyway. Penicillin was an accident too, and look how much good that’s brought to the world.

So the album, A Mouthful, is essentially tracks left on the cutting room floor by three indie films? “There’s only a couple of tracks that were used on other projects, such as ‘The Bridge Is Broken,’ which was the opening of a contemporary dance piece.”

Bully for us then, because the discarded atmosphere provided is awesome. The band had nothing but good things to say about the process of writing the tunes for film, but when it came down to it, they said, “The songs on the album were mostly born out of a will to cut away from the directors’ demands and restraints. It was vital for us — both wild and spontaneous.”

When asked if there will be another film score in the works they were unsure. “We’ve been working intensely on the second album.” Stateside we’ll have to savor A Mouthful until later this year when the second penny drops.

Olivia Merilahti is the Finnish half of the duo. She started with the cello at eight, followed by piano and guitar.

“I always wanted to sing,” she says. “I started singing in bands in my teens, not so seriously, and then I realized I could write songs. Singing jazz standards was something I also loved to do” — which aligns well with influences like Theolonius Monk and Zappa.

Dan Levy is the French half of the duo — he’s a composer who also supplies the band with bass and flute. Levy has been composing since he was five — or, at least, he knew at that young age that was the direction he was headed. He also has roots in jazz, something he played a lot of until he “discovered contemporary music.”

Both spoke highly of the silent third member of The Dø, percussionist Pierre Belleville: “[Pierre] is our official drummer. He’s been playing with us on stage for almost a year now, and is a great drummer. He is originally from the French metal-scene. We liked the idea of having someone who’s really different from our own artistic culture. Most of the drums on the album we usually play ourselves, since we’re always looking for clumsiness, but Pierre has played on some of the new tracks.”

The band estimates their next tour will commence around August, but check their website for definite dates, as they like to play havoc with schedules. In the meantime, there are are a lot of clips on Vimeo and YouTube that capture the energy of The Dø.