We’re not sure whether interviews are usually conducted over Wagamamas take-outs and Guinness, but Rob and Trev of Nottingham 5-piece, Dog Is Dead, made it seem as ordinary as breathing.
After warm handshakes all round and a recommendation of the Yaki Udon, they talk football, Korea Town and their recent tour: “The whole tour’s been really fucking good. We’ve had a blast everywhere we’ve gone. We’ve been everywhere. Right up to Glasgow and we even experienced the Irish charm of Dublin. It’s great going back to these places and being received so much better. It really validates our work. We’ve had great tours before, but it’s been like, every night has been really, really enjoyable!”
The sold-out Cockpit gig was the penultimate show of a string of UK dates, played on the back of their recently released debut album All Our Favourite Stories. Latest single, ‘Teenage Daughter’, which is arguably the most drenched in intimacy, flair and melodic craftsmanship, was released last week alongside a video filmed in Korea Town, LA and directed by Grouplove and Childish Gambino director Jordan Bahat: “The bastards wouldn’t send us to Korea town! We knew we wanted to get involved in whatever was going on. We said we wanted to do a documentary style cinematic film thing that pulled on your heartstrings; someone’s tale that was extraordinary to us but monotonous to them. To find those things you have to go quite far afield. When they sent it back it was like “That’s genius!”
Since their hotly-anticipated album release, the band have been played relentlessly on XFM, have played live sessions for Huw Stephens and have recorded heaps of live sessions for local radio stations: “Since the record’s come out, there’s been more attention on us and people are really listening to what we’re doing. It seems to be coming together. Every time we’re on the radio we get a surge on Twitter and Facebook, so yeah it’s definitely opening their eyes.”
Frontman Rob’s humble and humbling take on their success is almost that of embarrassment, and his answers require a series of doubts and self-corrections until he’s where he wants to be: “Opening their eyes? No, ears. Opening their ears! I’m such a wordsmith”, he laughs, “and I write the lyrics as well!”
“We’ve not been lucky enough to hear our song yet on the radio, but it seems to be played a lot over football montages on TV. Me and Trev are the least football and pub people (“I take the pub home!” Trev laughs). I’d love to do the montages live, like we’d play live as Ronaldo scores another header and winks at us. That’d be fun.”
Of Leeds, the two are very fond: “Leeds and Reading were two of our favourite ever gigs, man. No, I can’t say which, not when I’m in Leeds! Our best ever show was our album launch show at this place called The Boat Club where we used to play when we were 13. It was absolutely ridiculous. It’s this tiny little place in Nottingham where we live but it has a hell of a history to it. Like, Jimi Hendrix, Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, they’ve all played there! That was a wicked gig.”.
Of the future, they revel in the possibilities: “We hope to take this album to Europe and America next! We have loads of Youtube comments from Americans like ‘When’s it out here?’ and we have to be like ‘Ermmm, We don’t know!’. We’re gonna play everywhere we can and have a good time doing it, you know.”