IDKHow: “Every day is an adventure”

Last year the band played The Pit with just two songs to their name, which is a pretty big deal. This year, they’re on the biggest stage with a whole five songs. That’s a much bigger deal. Speaking backstage at Lowlands Festival, a poorly Dallon Weekes has just finished drying his clothes with nothing but a chair, a hairdryer and some sticky tape but as festival season comes to a close, he’s feeling good. “All of my problems are good problems,” he grins.

Playing the Main Stage of Reading & Leeds Festival Main feels, “Insane. It’s incredibly intimidating and really validating in a way. I played that stage before with Panic! but it’s been years and so to be back, with this band, on that stage, it feels good. We have five official songs out and we’ve been playing these festivals all summer, so every day is a little bit of an adventure.”

“We spent the first year of this band playing in secret. We would book shows and not tell anyone, just so we could find our roles and figure this band out. It was a lot of fun doing it that way. We spent a year telling people we didn’t exist but the fans found out what we were doing and we had to fess up. We’ve been playing catch up with that ever since. It’s been a real learning process in front of a lot of people.”

Last year, the band were known and adored, but it still felt like a secret. This year though, up there
on that big ol’ stage at Reading & Leeds, there’s nowhere to hide. “Well, there are a very, very few places. Very far stage left maybe. We’ll see. Ryan and I are a lot tighter and have a better handle on our show now and what it is we’re doing.”

I Don’t Know How But They Found Me has been “everything that I had hoped it would be from its inception really. And a lot of that is because we have 100% creative control on everything that we do and that was always the most important thing for me. I’m a creative person and I have to like what we do at the end of the day, otherwise I feel like I’d be wasting my time.”

There’s a vision for what comes next as well. “I’ve got a plan for this album and the next one that we’re going to do. But I don’t want to get too far ahead of myself cause we still have to record the first one.” ‘1981 Extended Play’, their debut EP, is “an introduction to the asthetic and the storyline for the debut album. But it’ll change and evolve over time, because I never want to have to do the same thing twice.”

“If it was up to me, the debut album would have been out six months ago. But we have a record label, they have a plan, we’re trusting them and so far it’s working, so we’ve got no complaints but we really do want to record this thing. Hopefully we get to do that sooner rather than later because the thing is written and ready to get going, so it won’t take long once we get that green light. We’re just waiting for that.”

There are also plans to expand their two-piece drum-and-guitar setup to involve more people. “That’s always been the goal, we just haven’t been able to afford it yet. When that day comes where we can pay someone else to be up there with us, we’ll make that happen.”

As for the live show, “I just hope that people forget about their problems and just forget about everything, at least for a little while. That’s what I always loved about going to shows when I was a kid and it’s why I love being on stage now. I get to forget everything for that small little window of time and everything just goes away and you’re existing in that moment. That’s what I want for other people. It’s what I want for us.” That Neverland escape is important, “Otherwise I think you’d probably end up in some kind of institution. It’s important to forget every once in a while.”

Say hello to your updated #RandL19 line up! 👀 👋 Featuring @miraa_may, @thisisminarose, @SomebodysChild1 and more 🙌 pic.twitter.com/0UuowyM5zl

— Reading & Leeds Fest (@OfficialRandL) August 15, 2019