A moment with Davey Havok on his new band "Dreamcar", growing up punk and AFI
Every generation has its time, it’s inevitable. The quest for social relevance is an oversaturated and in some ways, an antiquated phenomenon that many, including myself, are guilty of. Though there are countless attempts that lay within the confines of artistic expression, there are few who are willing to spill blood for the cause, and yet the idea of musical tranquility comes in harmonious waves and although it may seem at times systematic, its relevance is forever cemented within the consistency and influence of sound generated by yesteryear’s leading composers. For musicians like AFI’s lead vocalist, Davey Havok, the continuance, and innocence of self-discovery are an ongoing journey that allows a disciplined musician, such as himself, to almost turn back time to what once struck a chord with him as a teenager. Now to his surprise, those same influences particularly of the eighties musical genre, DreamCar’s sound is hosting the rebirth of a burgeoning vibration of how it's supposed to be done, which Davey and the rest of the band are effortlessly annexing. The neon sound that is “DreamCar”, came about almost the same way Davey describes his introduction into punk and hardcore. The same elements that drove him to pursue a career in music as a teenager/front man, in a band that would ultimately lead to stratospheric heights and become internationally recognizable, was also the same approach for “DreamCar's” sound, which rest in likeness with his past, and his love for music as an adolescent. With a heavy schedule of touring with DreamCar and headlining shows in Orange County to making an appearance at Coachella, then transplanting to England with AFI, the veteran punk and hardcore artist took a moment with me to converse. Davey and I managed to speak and talk about music, life, vocal recovery, musical influences and the gathering of the new wave vigor quadrant band, DreamCar, which consist of No Doubt's bassist, Tony Kanal, guitarist Tom Dumont and Adrian Young.
Davey - “Hi William How are you, I'm restraining from singing”, “William it was really nothing to you” song by, (The Smiths) laughs.
William -To start, how has the touring circuit been, Coachella etc. and did you see anyone that stuck out?
Davey- It’s been great we're very busy and Coachella was really fun, I was happy to have the opportunity to play with a band nobody knows.
William- Who were your favs btw, during that whole experience.
Davey- My whole family that I stayed with at “The Madison across the street which is where we stay every Coachella. We all went down and saw “New Order” and it was so fun just a dance party. I got see Lorde and she was so genuine and so classy, I watched a bit of Hans Zimmer, and Tove Love.
William -This may seem like a three or four-part question, and please forgive me if I jump around, but I've been listening and observing your music for a long time and I've watched your voice grow over the years, and have witnessed your voice evolve into something that has become individually recognizable and almost operatic. In your own words, what has attributed to that and what were some of your influences.
Davey - Laughs
William-Laughs
Davey- (Laughs) Thank you so much. The two most impactful things on that growth were simply the emotional growth and experience and personal growth as well as the music that influenced me and to detail that, I grew up loving so many types of different music, but when AFI started because we wanted to be a hardcore band, we looked to all those DIY bands in D.C. Essentially what we were focusing on, as fifteen-year-old boys, was hardcore, and that’s what we wanted to play and that’s what we wanted to be. So, before I ever listened to BLACK FLAG and MINOR THREAT, I found “The Cure”, Duran Duran, and Devo, that was my upbringing as well as musical theater along with AC/DC as the first record I purchased in my youth. There are elements from my past that weren't informing what was going on with the inception or exception of AFI when we were teenagers. As we grew up, and as I grew and as I liked to express myself further, I found that the more nuances and better expression could be achieved through singing, rather than screaming and It kind of went from there. So when you're seeing the growth within the context of AFI, or outside of AFI, whether it be “Black Audio” or XTRMST or DreamCar or St. Jimmy, it's also influenced by all those parts of my musical upbringing that expressed more vocally than before in my musical past. When asked about Davey’s musical training and how one maintains the insightful vocal aspects as he does, he simply replied, “I train a lot and good vocal help is very difficult to find, like keeping your vocal chords from deteriorating. I most recently saw Frank Black from “The Pixies” just a couple nights previous and all I could think to myself was, “can you please give me vocal lessons, can you please give me lessons”!!!.. (Laughs)
William - How did DreamCar come about, can you give me some insight as to how this project was birthed?
Davey - Tony approached me and at that point, the both of us had been seeing a lot of each of other, more frequently than in the past. I started seeing Tony in vegan places, and he informed me that he and the guys, (No Doubt) were working on music and they wanted to know if I would consider singing in a band with them. We met and talked, and I said, “I’m totally honored to be considered and I’d love to hear the music. Havok spoke to me about the songs and the nostalgia surrounding the first four tracks that he heard which were,” The Assailant”, “After I confess”, “Slip on the Moon”, and “Kill for Candy”. The lyrics that you hear are identical to what I wrote those first two nights after receiving the songs because I was so inspired, I just went straight into it.
William - Many of your tracks have that nostalgic feel, and as the way I interpreted it, particularly the track “All of the dead Girls “, mirrored those striking key eighties notes we've come to love. Can you paraphrase some of the similarities between your influences early on in relation to DreamCar?
Davey- When I first heard those first four songs, it touched on the early days of the eighties aspect I heard. I heard the tracks of Duran Duran, TalkTalk, and New Order and that's what drove me immediately. I heard those little elements in there that weren’t intentionally coming from them, I know that. Each song that we wrote informed the next and as we built music we kind of saw who we were as a band and it just organically happened. With this project, there are ways I get to write and sing which I haven't before.
William - What’s your connection to the yay, (San Francisco)
Davey - It's my home, and it’s my family. I'm not living there anymore and I haven't for a while, but I'm often living there, and I'm often there living there at my friend’s in Oakland, (laughs) But it's still very much my home.
William - Are there any venues that are still here in the bay that you like to play at, either in Oakland or San Francisco?
Davey - I was so thrilled to play at The Fox Theater, which was not a venue that I grew up attending shows in because they recently reopened it and refurbished it. I was very excited to play there with AFI for the first time, then to be able to play the “Music Hall with DreamCar, that's one of my favorite venues. I've seen so many great shows there since I was very young. Of course, Gilman street in Berkeley, I'll shop on Gilman street, when Jawbreaker does a secret show, well if I can get In. (Laughs)
