Greg chats to Johnny from DMAs

Aussie rockers the DMAs have a self-titled album coming out this winter, their guitarist Johnny called up for a chat about their travels around the world (including Auckland) and where on the planet Heatin Park is located

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
Welcome to Radio Hodakis Off the Record podcast.

Speaker 2 (00:06):
With Let's have a Chat with the DMAs Cured of Johnny.

Speaker 3 (00:11):
Hey, Hey, how are we going?

Speaker 2 (00:12):
Yeah? Really well, thanks mate. We're about some on the planet,
are you right now?

Speaker 3 (00:15):
I actually live in a small town on the outskirts
of Ballarat right.

Speaker 2 (00:20):
Oh.

Speaker 3 (00:20):
Sorry, it's about an hour and a half outside of Melbourne. Yeah. Yeah,
So all the other guys live in Sydney, but I
live in the middle of nowhere basically. Yeah, which is
which is which is nice. It's a nice change. I
grew up in Sydney, so living somewhere especially, I'm you know,
a little bit older now and like I can appreciate
the quiet time and all that kind of stuff. So
it's been it's been a nice change, and it's really

(00:42):
good for being creative and writing music and stuff.

Speaker 2 (00:44):
And so, have you got a bit of space around you?
Have you got animals around you?

Speaker 1 (00:48):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (00:48):
I got my little Jack Russell seven over there, but yeah,
no animals as of yet. But yeah, I got a
little bit of land and stuff, and yeah, it's really
really nice. Got to work out if.

Speaker 2 (00:57):
I'm going to do something with it though, Right, So,
at the moment, you've just got a huge lawn to mow.

Speaker 3 (01:02):
Yeah, yeah, that's right. Yeah, yeah, it's good to get
out in the sunshine and stuff. We're about to you based.

Speaker 2 (01:09):
We're in Auckland, but we broadcast all over New Zealand.
You guys have been here almost ten years ago.

Speaker 3 (01:16):
I know. We don't get over to New Zealand enough
for how close you guys are. And our guitarist Joel
is from New Zealand as well. He lives in Auckland,
so we're definitely going to get over during this for
this new album.

Speaker 2 (01:28):
Yeah, absolutely, when that comes out August seven, self titled DMAs.
You mentioned that your guitarist lives here. You've got fans
of all ages, one of them as old as ninety four.
I saw a video the other day of was it
your granddad who was watching you guys on the show perform.

Speaker 3 (01:44):
Yeah, yeah, that's right. He caught his first DMA show
the other day, which was very exciting. And that's actually
one thing I really love about our band is that
our demographic is quite broad and one thing that I've
really loved. So we just released our ten We just
had our ten year anniversary for our first album, Hill's End.
We did a big tour over in the UK, and

(02:05):
one thing that was really nice about that actually is
kids coming up to us. You know, we're not kids.
They were, you know, eighteen nineteen twenty and they were like, hey,
when this album came out, I used to dance around
our living room to this final, you know, with my dad,
you know, when I was eight, nine, ten years old,
and they've got these really beautiful memories of that. And

(02:25):
then now they're eighteen nineteen twenty and they're coming to
gigs themselves and hearing the music live and hearing those
songs live for the first time and hearing how much
that means to them is a facet of our career
that I didn't really think about, yeah.

Speaker 2 (02:42):
Which is really nice. It's a generational and if you
think back to when you were at nineteen years old,
who were you what records were blasting in your family home.

Speaker 3 (02:52):
My dad was a roadie. He used to do lighting
for Cold Chisel and In Excess and Neil Young and
Tom Waits and a whole bunch of people back in
the seventies and eighties. So he had a really good,
quite a vast CD collection. So that's kind of how
how I got into music as well through him.

Speaker 2 (03:11):
And how abre you when you saw your first Barnsey concert.

Speaker 3 (03:14):
Oh, I would have been really young, actually, I think
I was like eight or nine maybe, well, I think
cultures will play. They did that Ringside tour, which was
where they played in like a boxing ring, and then
and they had a revolving stage, so they were in
the round, you know, and then the stage would stage
would rotate, well, at least the drum, the drum riser
would rotate.

Speaker 2 (03:33):
Yeah, and you were just spend a little fellow back then.
I see little kids at concerts these days and the
parents took little enoughs over them. Did you have any
of that back then? Or was it just just get
blown your head off?

Speaker 3 (03:43):
Oh?

Speaker 2 (03:43):
No, I think I was.

Speaker 3 (03:44):
I think I was old enough back then, Like I
was probably like eight or nine back then.

Speaker 2 (03:48):
Okay, and you're back to the UK soon. I know
you guys have spent a lot of time there. When
I saw the name of your current single, Heaton Park,
I thought it was He's In Park in England, but
it's kind of spelled it differently. Wondering is there a
Heaton Park that exists somewhere in the planet, or is
it something you guys have made up.

Speaker 3 (04:04):
Yeah, yeah, no, we just made it up. It was
a bit of a tongue in cheek title because mainly
because we've played Heaton Park a few times with Cortinas
and a bunch of bands for festivals that they have
over in Manchester and it's a great venue and it's
very like Manchester anthemic kind of and that song does
have that kind of nineties britpop kind of riff and

(04:28):
feel to it, and it was kind of just like
a working but we spelt it like he didn't like
as in like getting hot or whatever. Yeah, as a
bit of a joke and a little and a pun,
and then we couldn't really and then we just was
kind of like, it's a fun name anyway, so we
might as well just keep it. I kind of like
keeping working titles as the official title. I think that
makes it there's something unique about it, you know.

Speaker 2 (04:49):
Yeah, Well we're taking the song, but I'm wondering what
kind of a journey the rest of the album is
going to take us on this.

Speaker 3 (04:54):
Album, so it's a fifth album. One thing we do
like to do is we like to keep kind of
keep moving or keep changing things up with our sound.
You know, I think if we just did our first
album five albums in the road, not only would the
fans get bored, but we I think we as creatives,
we'd get bored as well. With this new album. Like

(05:16):
our last two records were a little bit more dance rocky, anthemic,
a little bit higher produced, it feels like on this
fifth record we've kind of gone back to what our
original sound was like and definitely more guitar heavy, which
is kind of where we started as well. And I
guess that's why we decided to self title it, because
it was kind of like we went on a journey

(05:37):
and then we've kind of come back to our roots
a little bit, which is nice.

Speaker 2 (05:40):
Hey, look, all the best for your world travels throughout
the rest of the year, and hopefully you can make
it back to New Zealand sometime soon.

Speaker 3 (05:47):
Thank you so much. Yeah, we're gonna make a big
effort to come to New Zealand because, like I said,
it's been too long, and our Guitaristrol would love that too.

Speaker 2 (05:54):
Johnny from DMAs, thanks your time on Hurdaki.

Speaker 3 (05:57):
Thanks Eric, appreciate.

Speaker 1 (06:00):
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Speaker 2 (06:08):
Thanks mate.

Speaker 1 (06:08):
Find out more about this podcast and the people who
make it at hodache dot co dot nz.