TWO gigs locally, an appearance in HMV Belfast; and, not least, the release of their debut EP, are just some of the things keeping the ‘The DMs’ busy.
The four-piece, who have been together in their present incarnation for the past four months have spent the summer recording with Enniskillen producer Joel Johnston at ‘Sycamore Records’.
Now, ready to take their newly recorded material into a live setting, the band played Charlie’s Bar on Friday night – and play in Enniskillen and in Belfast this weekend.
From Irvinestown, the band features brothers Darren and Mark Miller, on guitar and vocals and drums respectively, and from Enniskillen, on bass Francis McNally and guitar, Ben Forbes.
Darren explained: “Ben and I have been childhood friends with Joel. We all played music together in Portora – he went to uni, has come back, started the label and he needed a band – so there we were.”
The five track EP is to be released at a Sycamore Records launch night on Saturday in Level 7 at Blakes of the Hollow.
The group explained their genre as ‘basically’ rock, while Darren cited their influences as Foo Fighters, Queen’s of the Stone Age, Biffy Clyro – Pearl Jam, ‘alternative rock’.
“Mark and I had most of the songs nearly written, bar the single ‘Echoes’, but it was only when these two (Ben and Francis) came in thatit all came together,” Darren went on.
“The songs are quite different, Echoes would definitely be the heaviest. On some of them we kind of go rock pop. There was one I recorded the other day which is an acoustic one. We weren’t going to include it on the EP but it ended up being one of the better ones. But they’re all different songs and we’re looking forward to people hearing them.”
The release of the single ‘Echoes’ several weeks ago has resulted in 300 listens and downloads on the record label’s ‘Soundcloud’.
And, after a gig in Charlie’s Bar last weekend, the boys are now looking ahead to the launch night on Friday and an appearance in Belfast’s HMV store on the Saturday.
The band released their second single, ‘Changing Faces’ at the weekend, which is also available on the Sycamore Records Soundcloud page.
“I’m surprised by how quickly it happened. We just came into practice and were banging out these songs,” explained Ben, “It’s good to see how they actually sound recorded.”
Darren added: “It’s more of an advertising tool to get us into the gigs, be that Belfast, Derry, Dublin or wherever. That’s the main reason we did and then we’ll start working on a second EP. But we’re looking forward to getting this out there.”
The Sycamore Records launch night takes place on Friday, September 5, with performances from Jamie Johnston, Attack the Day, Conor Phillips and The DMs.