Dig It! Magazine

Douglas in Fur are a relatively new band from London.

I saw them live a couple times already and interviewed them at The Cavendish Arms after their show which was a great one to see, the band gets along really well and that comes through their live performances too.

Their music is uplifting with nice visuals and great stage presence, they have a few singles out so make sure you give them a listen!

Amazing show! How are you?

Bradley: Sweaty! It was good, lots of fun!

What’s the history behind Douglas in Fur? How did the name come about?

Bradley: When Covid first happened, I heard about the two week lockdown and I had to go into it myself quickly, so I was in disbelief because it was just this thing that’s just been announced and basically I spent most of my time watching Twin Peaks that I had on my watchlist for a long time and I’ve obviously been a fan of the Velvet Underground before and I just went into this big realm of David Lynch and Lou Reed really, I completely switched off my alarms, I was going to bed at six in the morning and waking up at two, it just had no structure so I was just watching Twin Peaks and Blue Velvet just getting into the theory behind them all, all the little stories and meanings and I wanted storytelling within the band and I wanted the band to become a character in itself so I thought it could be a cross between The Velvet Underground and Twin Peaks so Venus in Fur- Douglas in Fur but also it’s like Douglas fir is also a type of tree in Twin Peaks, it sounds all over the place but it made sense to me at the time.

Dylan: and none of us is called Douglas! *laughs* 

When I was looking up the band I was wondering who’s Douglas?

Bradley: Douglas is a state of mind!

How did the band get together?

Bradley: I went to college with Ben and he seems to know every musician on the face of the earth so we’ve come across the two lovely chaps: Dylan and Chris, they’re not exactly new, they’ve been in it for fucking years but there’s a long history, I’ve known Dylan for years. But when the band first started, it was still during the lockdown, we were discussing more the idea of the band rather than doing the actual songs and we were doing it over facetime and things like that 

I remember our first rehearsal, everyone was like oh my god we’ve actually rehearsed now! It was pretty mad, this is the 32nd show in two years I think. Lots of learning what not to do.

Chris: I’d love to watch our first show and just go like: you’re shit!

Where was the first show?

Hope and Anchor

Do you guys get along in the studio? How does a recording day go?

Bradley: I think every recording day we had has been different, so for the first single it was just me, Chris and Ben because no one else had joined the band at the time. I played bass, we had a friend, Joe Cooper who got on the sax and then we had a bassist before Dylan and he plays on Stones in Your Pockets but that was a different studio and then we had a third one and also a live session one, and we’re just about to go back in the studio to record a new single and that’s gonna be the same place we did last, but yeah, single number 4!

When’s the album coming?

We have just about the right amount to pay the rent and afford a single, let alone an album but they’re gonna keep coming I think we’re just gonna have a greatest hits in like 20 years and that will be our album *laughs* just all of our singles!

Who inspires you guys? 

Bradley: I started doing vocals around 17-18 and I always believed I couldn’t sing, I could play the guitar and the bass and stuff but I gave it a go and started looking into singers that aren’t traditionally very good singers so Lou Reed, Ian Dury is a massive influence but there’s tons of influences really. We all got different styles but what’s interesting is that Ben for example is really into like funk drumming where I’m really into like old reggae stuff and dub bands from the 80s but Dylan is very into progressive rock

*Pointing at Chris* and you’re just everywhere 

Chris: anything with a guitar in it

Nina: Do you like the Libertines? It kind of reminded me of that sometimes

Bradley: Yes, I never thought because some of it can be a bit talky but actually one of the first things that Chris said to me when we first became friends was that -you won’t be able to see it- but we always make our guitar sounds like this *making waves with his hands* because I always thought that the early 2000s indie is just like that, so like The Strokes even early Razorlight were really cool. There’s this one Razorlight song, In The Morning, the verses I’m not very keen on, it’s just the intro, I was just like that’s what I want our guitars to sound like! If there was a two guitar setup in the band but there’s more modern bands like the Fat White Family, there’s loads and I can’t think of them on the spot but I like pop-y stuff.

I’ve had a massive kind of disco spree lately, I don’t know who is it by but it goes oh baby won’t you come back home…so good! I’m listening to it all the time! And also Womack and Womack Teardrops, it’s like 7 in the morning and I’m on my way to work listening to it, so good.

Do you have any weird stories from gigs?

Someone pooed themselves in the audience. I’m not even lying to you! It was an old man and he fell over. Dylan’s dad has a band as well and as a little kind of let’s get together and let’s play some music together, we played a show with them in a pub in Norwich and no one was really expecting it because your dad’s band is like country?

Dylan: yeah it was weird and completely different, we both played for an hour

Bradley: we just showed up to ruin everyone’s evening *laughs* and a few songs in, this guy fell over so we stopped the show to make sure he’s okay, then it happened a second time

Dylan: because initially we thought oh there’s a step there so it could’ve been bad, but he was at the age where you had a fall it can be bad but then it happened a second time so there was more to it

Bradley: happened twice and then he got kicked out and then there was all this commotion in the pub of like what’s that smell? Like something’s going on in the audience and so it was quite the night for us. Really interesting.

But there’s another one, we had a heckler, a guy came in, we were at George Tavern and this guy started dancing and it was funny for the first five minutes but he just didn’t leave and kept interrupting between songs. I don’t know if he hated me or really loved us 

Dylan: I think he was having a good time but was on something

Chris: too many things 

Bradley: but it’s character building isn’t it? Between pooing yourself and heckling I feel like in 32 shows those are the only weird stories we’ve had and we’ve played all over London and in some weird places but weirdly it had to be a very cozy pub in Norwich, very strange.

What’s the writing process like? 

Bradley: weirdly enough I actually think of the song titles before I actually come up with a lot of the lyrics or music really

So like a concept then?

Bradley: kind of, it’s like a brainstorm, I always have something written in my notes but I don’t know, i’ve always done that even when I was really young and started writing music and stuff I’d always think of song titles. We have one called -we don’t really play it anymore but it’s on the live session- called Net Curtain, and I had that name for like a year an a half, but I don’t push it, I just keep it in my head for a while and then something would come up and then I’d write about it but musically I feel like, I write the lyrics but I feel like I bring like a blueprint in, a rough idea and then everyone just adds their own flavour and I think that’s the best thing about being in a band from my experience because our band is like: okay guys this is what I’ve got and then the whole song becomes this package of Douglasness.

For example Aid for Urgency, I had that title for ages and Dylan actually came up with the riff for that and we riffed over that for so long wondering how are we gonna write this, we had like a Bossa Nova beat and then to this Womack and Womack sounding beat because I love them but usually I’m not finding music for lyrics or lyrics for music, I usually come up with it and then go oh these two fit together, that’s usually how it goes.

What I find so funny as well is that I feel like when you’re writing songs we all get so passionate about it but also so stubborn like It can’t be this way! 

And then one of us will say no it can actually and it turns out to be really good.

Dylan: it doesn’t matter if it sounds silly, you try it and if it doesn’t work you’ve tried it but there’s no point in trialing and sticking with it just because that’s the idea that’s been in mind, we want our songs to sound like shit whilst we write them because then when someone comes in with something better and on top of that you know that this is exactly what everyone thinks

Bradley: The thing I’ve learned the most about writing songs is that when you’re first writing it it’ll sound awful and that’s what really used to put me off but it’s literally just you writing for the first time, it’s a very collaborative expansion of like a blueprint of an idea sort of thing.

When did you guys know you wanted to become musicians?

Chris: I think it’s all from childhood

Bradley: yeah, there’s a picture of me at 18 months old hitting pots and pans, i’ll put it that way

Ben: you were a drummer first weren’t you?

Bradley: yeah a drummer first, three of us are drummers and then we realised Ben was really good and we all moved to our own instruments *laughs*

Dylan: I didn’t pick up bass till I was 16, I played a bit of guitar and my dad got me a bass guitar for my 16th birthday and I was sort of having this coming of age moment in music, but when I got that bass I didn’t take lessons, I just sat down and learned every single Beatles song *laughs* and that just got me into it and once you know you can play a few songs, because learning an instrument can be so difficult especially starting at 16, but when you learn songs you find out if you like it or hate it really

Bradley: it’s one of those things that I have always done but it just expanded and got weirder and weirder, I don’t know, for me it definitely evolved more for me not so much just the music but like artistically cause when I was creating, I got really into art, I can’t paint or draw for shit and I got really into film so I was like I can kind of channel that into music in terms of visuals, and that’s what gets me into doing visuals for the band, all that stuff so I think Douglas in Fur is an area in which we can put not only music ideas but just every creative idea we have.

Is there anything we should look forward to? New single maybe?

*Laughs* our greatest hits is coming in 20 years!

We are recording a new single next month!

Dylan: we have a whole bunch of ideas and visuals to go with that because these guys, when I wasn’t a part of them they did the Stones in Your Pockets music video and I think that’s the sort of thing you need as like a portfolio, to have those other elements of art in music and we go from a different angle again by having visuals as opposed to a music video and a lyric video that’s more stylised.

Bradley: we’d have a music video for every song if we could afford it, again it always comes down to funding *laughs*, like, we can record and that’s it.

Nina: If you could play at any venue, any country, where would you play?

Bradley: ah so many places man, I want to play a show in Paris, I don’t know where maybe Supersonic, that’s where all the cool kids seem to be playing these days, but just Paris in general, I’d love to be apart of that scene.

Nina: America?

Bradley: yeah! I’d love to, only thing is that it’s so far away! But most of my artistic influences come from 1980s New York, I’ve never been there but I know it’s very romanticised, I might just never go! *laughs*

But yeah we’ll play anywhere, I just want to play around Europe really

Dylan: I’d love to play in Berlin!

Bradley: that’d be amazing! What’s that famous club called? Berghain! But I feel like I’d need to get a set of neon glasses and start raving, maybe take a pill but we’re not that kind of music but that’d be cool wouldn’t it? Why not!

But yeah anywhere, we’re just grateful to play around London too.

Thank you for reading and special thanks to Nina who helped me with this interview! For info, anything really, head over to @digitmusicmagazine on instagram or send me an email: digitmusicmagazine@gmail.com!