ALEX EWELL AND JOE TRAINOR OF DUMMY

Never ones to stand still, Los Angeles quartet Dummy have released their latest record 'Free Energy' which describes their album as much as it does their ethos. Making an about-face to their cerebral and lo-fi ‘Mandatory Enjoyment’, the reverb-soaked, dance psychedelia of their latest release channels their restless approach to music and directs that spirit into a new and exploratory creative space. Joining us to share their insights and experiences from the new album, Alex Ewell, and Joe Trainor discuss the making of the record and how it summarizes the band’s current state of being.

After the rapturous praise of 2021’s ‘Mandatory Enjoyment’ and the widespread acclaim it deservedly received, was there an air of trepidation about starting work on album number two or were you all eager to flesh out new material that had been under your hat for some time which was finally seeing the light of day?

Joe - There was a lot of trepidation for this record, I demoed out almost a full record's worth of songs that were all trashed cuz they were all treading water, but I think it was necessary to expel all those ideas to have a clean mental slate. So, everything on the record was written for THIS record. It was very difficult to write because we knew what we did NOT want to do, but figuring out the path forward felt impossible at times. "Blue Dada" was the first song we wrote for the record that felt like we were onto something cool and new. We all wanna make sure whatever we release into the world is thoughtful and not adding to the trash pile.

Alex - After a long tour we were all burnt out on the band. Playing the songs off our first album hundreds and hundreds of times on the road, I really felt an urge to diversify our sound afterwards. There were ideas we had wanted to embody in our music forever - but never really knew how within the musical framework of our sound. So we spent a lot of time developing tracks that ended up feeling like they didn't fit once we had more songs written. But we learned from, and even took pieces from those demos and refined them into new tracks. This process was way longer than our previous projects, which came together pretty quickly by comparison.

In what ways did you want to both, retain your signature sound, but also push it in new and challenging directions?

Joe - For me drone and repetition are the signature elements in our music along with wanting to make songs as propulsive as possible. We pushed ourselves quite a bit rhythmically, and not relying on old bells and whistles of previous releases. The songs are definitely way more difficult to pull off cuz there are so many moving parts But, at the same time we wanted to allow for more space/minimalism, not be on 10, stuffing every nook with sound. "Independent" music has been stuck in the MOR era, whether it's indie rock or death metal so much of it feels like everyone is safely in their little boxes, not really earnestly coloring outside the lines, feeling very stock. We are trying to blend alot of ideas, and sounds together. With this record a lot of it was moving towards : How does a rock band make electronic music with rock instruments? Which is something I think we will continue to explore even further into the future.

Alex - Drone and ambient, atmospheric textural sounds are the elements we want to retain. Like Joe said, we were pulling more from electronic music for our new album, dancier rhythmic aspects, shifting away from the more nervy, indie-kraut-rock of our earlier work.

What were some of the difficulties you faced in making ‘Free Energy’ and conversely what pleasant surprises did you encounter during the writing and recording process?

Joe - The recording for the most part was far easier, we felt extremely prepared and also open to things evolving in the studio. "Nullspace" was a pleasant surprise because it was written between the two sessions in the studio, and really bloomed into something special despite it not being the most POP forward song, sonically it feels really exciting for the future.

Alex - The track Dip in the Lake was probably the most time consuming. Our demo had a piano sample from one of our synths, but we wanted to achieve that "sequence" sound with a real piano for the album. We ended up trying a few different techniques but eventually we had to arduously record each note individually and stitch them together in ableton to make it sound right. Overall just getting all the timings right in that song was a mind-numbing process. Conversely, both Intro-UB and Godspin were extremely quick to mix at the studio, being left mostly untouched from our demos.

On a technical level can you share with us some of the equipment you use and exactly how you use it to carve out your unique sound?

Joe - It's interesting we get this question a lot, but the reality is our gear is pretty cheap and standard. We don't have any really crazy pedals and use affordable synths. The wildest thing we use alot is in the studio is an old space echo rack unit. We just focus on sound design, and happy accidents.

Alex - Right now all our tracks are composed in Ableton, and learning to (somewhat) use Ableton was a big part of the process for this album. Going into recording our new album, we initially wanted to record and mix everything ourselves. We spent months working on our demo versions, recording everything at mine and Joe's apartment, even tracking drums by myself at our practice space. So when we ended up at the studio with Joo-Joo, we had already recorded almost everything. We ended up re-recording a lot, but that gave us a really good starting point to just expand upon everything. All our equipment is either budget, entry-level or second-hand, vintage stuff we've collected over the years. The FX section of my mixer doesn't work at all, so I have to use pedals usually. I used to be really into drone-ambient guitar (e.g. Stars of the Lid) so I bought a lot of delays and reverbs when I was a teenager.

Using a series of field recordings gathered from your time on the road, such as the sound rushing of water, the rumbling of the van, indistinct voices, and chirping birds, did these serve as perfect accompaniments to the tracks you were working on or was their influence more direct and actually provided the impetus to a song’s creation in the first place?

Alex - I guess for me field recording has always felt like the natural thing to do in certain situations, e.g. when the wind blows a pile of styrofoam packing peanuts around the parking lot, chiming into sparkling reverberations. But usually it's whenever I hear a beautiful bird song in a quiet place. We had planned to feature field recordings from tour on our album, so we all had a good bank of stuff that I kind of just dumped into Ableton. From there I decided to just compose something to accompany the sound collage, for the outro track Godspin. As I listened to the recordings, I remembered all the overwhelming feelings of anxiety that came with all these beautiful moments. The rollercoaster of emotions on tour. The composition started to take shape as a build into a cacophonous and overwhelming mix, to represent that experience. Equal parts beautiful and unendurable by the end.

Lyrically, was there an overarching theme throughout the record or is each track utterly distinct and occupies its own world?

Alex- The lyrics often feature contributions from both Emma and Nate, so there's an element of lyrical collaboration within songs. I'd describe them as poetic - intentionally non-specific but evocative, inspired by personal experiences but also the world and our society.

What was some of the subject matter you explored across the album and was it informed by more recent events or was it generated from an extended time frame and broad collection of sentiments?

Alex - I think it tends to be about some aspect of modern life, but I think that modern life is inextricably linked to the past, and feels almost stuck in the past. Like we all know that our way of life is no longer sustainable but we're stuck doing it nonetheless. With music, it's rehashing the same ideas over and over, with movies, it's sequels two decades on, trying to cling to a time that wasn't so... cursed. When prosperity was possible? I guess our stuff tends to be anthropological in that way, trying to cross wires between different threads of history, in an effort to move forward.

How considered was the track listing on ‘Free Energy’ to the sonic narrative you were wishing to convey?

Alex - It's very considered, but I'd say our approach is more focused on the dynamic; from quiet to loud, slow to fast, etc. The track listing feels like a composition in itself - to give each track the right context to compliment its different elements. Obviously a lot of tracks serve as intros or outros, but for the core songs we really spent a long time trying to decide the order.

Was there an added sense of confidence going into the studio knowing that as a band you have, not only evolved and refined your style, but also harnessed some lessons learned whilst touring that contributed to how you successfully approached your time recording ‘Free Energy’?

Joe - Every time we make something we tend to feel like "who's gonna like this?". After a few days recording in the studio we all started feeling like we were making something cool, but beyond that we aren't some overly egotistical band.

Alex - By the time we were at the studio, yes, there was a sense of preparedness, I'd say. But also just an openness - to do things differently this time, and embrace whatever we felt like sounded good. Overall we definitely envisioned the entire project to be eventually performed live, and we had a lot of ideas inspired by all our time spent on stage. But also a lot of ideas inspired by other bands - both positively, by our friends who are amazing artists - but primarily negatively, knowing what we want to avoid, from seeing so many bad bands.

Soon to embark on your upcoming European tour, can you share with us a highlight show that you have performed over the years that really stood out and what made it so special?

Joe - I can think of two, both memorable for different reasons. The first being recently opening for Botch, who as a teenager was easily my favorite band, and I looked up to their creative restlessness that painted outside the lines of "hardcore" music, plus being the first band I knew had a gay member, which meant alot to my closeted self at the time. The other was the final date of our US tour with Horsegirl in NYC, which also had Lifeguard on it. That show just felt like a europhic celebration of underground guitar music, the crowd was such a great mix of young and old. It was a blast having people from all the bands joining in on jams/noise, it was just beautiful.

Alex - Playing with Luna this past year was an insane honor, as lifelong Luna/Galaxy 500 fans. Our whole tour in Europe 2022 was an amazing experience. Most memorable show was in Rennes, where we played a huge and gorgeous venue called Antipode, and were all very worried that no one would show up. When we came downstairs the entire room was full! And the crowd had some enthusiastic young people who danced, and the energy was just such a surprise. We also enjoyed a downright luxurious dinner served by the staff there - shout out to them.