New Music

Rob Damiani - Don Broco “Bringing The World Anthems, Groove & Push-Ups”

Sep 4, 2017

4 min read

With the support of modern rock radio stations and festivals, England has had the pleasure of frequently churning out quality bands ranging from pop-rock to heavy metal. Born in Beford, Don Broco has evolved to captivate Europe, particularly the U.K, in the past few years and have finally announced their first musical attack on Australia; a December 2017 tour.

Tickling news of a third studio album have been dished out through the release of three anthemic singles titled ‘Everybody,’ ‘Pretty,’ and ‘Technology.’ Guitars are sounding huge, melodic hooks pour out at every section and an undeniably groovy dance feel floats constantly without ever sounding cheesy.

Lead singer Rob Damiani represented the band in an enthusiastic interview discussing the past, present and future of the band. He also provided some insightful descriptions of the band for music lovers still yet to get hooked.

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As a band that has only just previously toured places like America and Japan for the first time, one would expect an almost inevitable brew of nerves; there is always a chance the country’s music scene just doesn’t click. Surprisingly, Rob denies any anxiety then suggests the predominant feeling is just anticipation. The boys have been wanting to set their speakers down in Australia for quite some time and mentioned they have been very aware of the fans over here waiting in agony. Unfortunately, it just takes time to ensure there is a crowd large enough and eager enough to announce a tour.

“It’s taken a different amount of time to finally get the right theme out in Australia and the right setup to allow us to tour there so, yeah, we’re just desperate to get out and start playing shows to you guys to be honest.”

Taking the precaution is understandable due to the band having such an original sound. Rob describes Don Broco as “a rock band first and foremost,” “but we take a lot of influence from all manners of rock, modern pop, hip-hop and… everything.” It’s all about considering a diverse range of influences for the band and then churning out something original. Regarding influences, a particular band that all members agree upon is Incubus. This comes through particularly in the amount of attention paid towards setting a catchy groove. Doing so also allows those flavours of funk to shine. You know, “Get that groove, take it and let the bass do the talking.”

Judging by the sound of the latest three singles, it’s likely the new album will feature a thick library of heavy grooves. The recording process just finished, so the tunes are currently in mix world and will be likely to swim into the ears of fans early 2018. For those crippling with excitement, Rob offers good news to those sensible enough to purchase tickets for the upcoming tour.

“By the time we come out (to Australia), we’re definitely going to need to road test a load of new songs.”

Don Broco have a reputation for generating an electrifying amount of energy and fun at concerts, so the addition of new music will be the icing on the cake.

Rob speaks of how distributing music has changed drastically even over the past five years with the tilt towards digital downloads and streaming. With so much music being released, attention moves on quickly, so for this album, they have taken the approach of releasing songs as soon as they were happy; hence the release of three singles already.

“As soon as we get the right mix and we’re happy with the songs, we’ll put that out there and play a load of it in December.”

Now that the boys are signed to a world-wide label, it seems the band has a fire ready to be fuelled with even more touring after their debut Australian appearance.

“We’ve got a lot of plans so we see this as just dipping our toe in; letting people know who we are and what we’re about. Once our album is fully out next year we’ll be getting back as soon as we can.”

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To contextualise where Don Broco is at in Europe, they have toured with bands such as Bring Me The Horizon and have played large festivals like Reading so much it’s becoming a blur; “We’ve probably played it 5 or 6 times now as Don Broco.” After mentioning BMTH, Rob couldn’t help but to highlight the touring experience and idolise the performance energy and production going on in the band. The sense of awe created through performance is clearly something Rob and the boys push to create, enlarge and use to enhance their already epic and fun grooves.

By the way. Push-up pyramids are a thing at Don Broco concerts. Yeah. That’s how much the crowd gets into it!

“The pyramids are infamous in many ways in the sense, most of the time they don’t work and fail miserably and it ends with about 100 people on top of each other with no escape in the middle of the mosh pit.”

About five years ago, during a particular song named ‘Thug Workout,’ a spontaneous and now informal tradition was born. Rob goes on to tell the story of how a wall of death went on to be a wall of exercise. ‘Thug Workout’ is a “no song structure, just a load of riffs” type of song; a song Rob says is like an ode to System Of A Down. The song has a particular breakdown section where, in the concert, a lone mosh ranger splits the crowd in anticipation for the holy wall of death. The crowd is sufficiently spread, so the bloke takes it upon himself to share his exercise regime of push-ups. At this point the band have no idea what’s going on, but it seems to be Rob’s destiny to jump down from the stage and join Mr. Bootcamp. Before they knew it, the entire mosh-pit is in an ocean of push-ups.

“So yeah, that happened.”

Being in the mosh-pit is a workout in itself, but this is a whole new level. Hopefully Australia can keep the tradition going when they come over!

The most recent news in the active life of Don Broco is their secret performance at the Reading/Leeds festivals. After reminiscing in his childhood memories of being a festival patron and remembering the excitement when a huge secret band appeared, Rob explains that appearing as The Prettyboys was a last minute call; they were planning to have this year off playing. Leeds and Reading are one of the very few concerts where Don Broco leak a small trickle of nerves because they hold the event in such high regards. Appearing as a secret act was a breath of fresh air as no-one knew for certain that they were actually appearing. Rumours were bouncing around but the dire-hard Don Broco fans had a pretty good idea of their plan. The event ended up being a career highlight.

“The fact that everyone turned up to the tent, like it was crazy and packed out you know, just a carnage filled show, was amazing. So yeah, definitely up there with one of my favourite festival performances we’ve ever done.”

If Don Broco keep up what they’re doing then apply it to Australia, success and fans should spread like wildfire. Albums Automatic and Priorities are filled with some awesome pieces of music but it seems the new release might have enough power to top them. Rob was a 5 star bloke to chat with and his charisma reflects heavily in the music these troopers compose. Sit tight for the December tour grooves to erupt.

Interview by: Kurt Boldy

don broco tour