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Black Dog.
Black Dog is a new beast prowling Adelaide's local scene. Drawing
on influences such as Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd and David Bowie,
they've fused this love of musical greats to create their own
blend of rockin' tunes. I spoke to bassist and backing vocalist
Dan Walsh about their debut CD-EP 'White City'.
Since winning the Adelaide Uni section of 2005's National Campus Band Competition, life has been dandy. Part of this success was the chance to put songs to tape in a recording studio. Walsh explained how the whole process began: "We won some time at the Adelaide Uni heats, then we went into the studio. Prior to this band James Swift [drummer] and I were in a band and James King [guitarist] and Tim Huestis [vocals, guitar, organ] were in The Icons who were kicking around for a fair while. They went into the studio a couple of times but this was the first time as Black Dog."
The excitement of watching the seed of songs germinate and bloom must've been encouraging. I wondered what the original plans were for their music. "To begin with it only started with us wanting to produce a better demo than we already had. It grew from there as we added more days in the studio and then it sounded good enough to release it as an EP," Walsh begins. "We had been playing these songs for quite a while but we certainly made a few changes while we were there, particularly in the mixing and the production. As these things always go: you go in and do some recording and come up with a few bad songs which you wish you didn't record but we're happy with the five tracks we've got," he explains.
The recording process can be fraught with danger when it comes to hearing how these ideas turn out. It's natural to discover that certain influences may creep in when writing, Walsh explaining that there was a conscious effort to steer clear from any blatant profiteering from the greats. There must be a particular stand out track, I asked.
"Back In Line would be the one that would get airplay because of the structure of the song as we tend to write quite long songs generally and that one's quite a reasonable length. It fits the mould of songs that would get on the radio - verse/chorus, verse/chorus, bridge, chorus/chorus! We're quite happy with how Venus turned out - that was a new one before we went into the studio. We got to have a lot of fun with the mixing and put some cool effects on it."
Richard Moore was on board to produce, which is awesome considering he played with The Little River Band and wrote the music to The Lord's Prayer, the version of which rockin' nun Sister Janet Mead put to the top of the Aussie hit parade in the '60s! "He's actually my girlfriend's father, so that's where the connection's from. Richard came in a few times prior to when us going into the studio, helped us sort songs out and then sat in with the engineer most of the time."
So now that the finished product is done and all sparkly new there must be some grand plans in place for where the band is to go now. Rather than run head-first into the thick of things however, Walsh is measured in his response: "It's hard to say, we've just got this EP and we'll send it out to as many people as we can - record companies, radio, managers. It's also about getting supports from the right bands, trying to draw on other people's crowds and expose ourselves a little better. We're going to take it as far as we can and still have some fun with it as well."
The band have also tapped The Unspoken Things to play at their the launch, promising a fine night of retro-rock. "We played a demo night this time last year with the 'Things. Seeing as they're good fellas and having checked out a few of their gigs and liked what they do, we thought they'd be a good band to have along. Having similar kind of music brings a similar type of crowd - hopefully they'll become fans of Black Dog!"
Lauren Boxhall
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Black Dog launch 'White City' at the Rocket Bar on Sat 11 March with The Unspoken Things.
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