Departure Ave. - Tales from the underground

Imagine running into a friend you haven't seen in a long time who asks what kind of music you make. What track would you play them?

The track we'd choose is “Nancy”, one of the first songs we wrote and recorded during the sessions for “Yarn“. We think it's a track that captures well the transition between the first and second album, and also shows the different souls of this new record well. 

All four of us had different projects that shared the same space, a garage converted into a rehearsal room; we often stopped to jam together, and when those projects came to an end, it felt natural to try doing something on our own. Paradoxically, Departure Ave. came into being before we actually played together, because we used to hang out a lot at Lorenzo's place listening to records. When we finished recording "All The Sunset In A Cup", which was born more as a gift to ourselves than as the start of a career, we formed the band.

Both of your records were also born out of improvisation, but it seems pretty clear to me that with this second album, "Yarn", you managed to give things a more cohesive shape, even within the pastiche of styles and references that defines you. For instance, this time around all the tracks are fairly short. How have you changed from one album to the next?

Actually, we didn't consciously choose to shorten the tracks or give the songs a particular shape. By the end of the recordings we had a huge amount of material, including some longer pieces, but when it came time to put together a coherent record, we "discovered" that a certain number of songs were linked by the theme of the fairy tale, the short story. Right now we like working in a completely free way. We write the songs, and only afterwards do we try to put together a coherent whole, something that isn't just forty minutes of songs strung one after another.

The theme of this "Yarn" also seems more defined: you describe it as a "collection of little stories", and indeed, lyrically, in terms of length and spirit, the songs feel like haikus. Can you tell us a bit about the mood you were in while writing this record?

The album was recorded in two different sessions. The first, in April, was actually more focused on writing, and luckily we ended up with a lot of new material, which led us to scrap everything we'd written over the course of the year. Each song, in some way, is a product of how we were feeling in that moment. For example, "All He Could Hear" was written on a rather bleak day, both weather-wise and emotionally.

The record's fil rouge comes more from an aesthetic choice than a musical one. Andrea started showing us some beautiful images by Kay Nielsen, and the fact that we were staying in a house in the countryside probably made us even more susceptible to the storytelling theme. It felt natural to explore the nuances of the song form more, rather than long psychedelic jams, even though "Nyabinghi", for instance, is pure improvisation, lyrics included.

One distinctive feature of your music is its relationship with jazz, cemented on "Yarn" by Raffaele Casarano's saxophone. That's pretty rare in the indie-rock world - can you tell us where that comes from? How is your music viewed by that "other" world?

Lorenzo studies jazz piano, so his way of playing inevitably draws on his musical training. We're pretty obsessed with the jazz-rock records that came out around the turn of the '60s and '70s, and like everything we love, we try to filter it through our own approach. Raffaele Casarano, like Andrea, is from Salento, and when we sent him the songs he agreed to lend us his talents. In a way, the band has been adopted by Salento, where we recorded our first album and had our first live experiences away from home. The best part is that Raffaele picked up on aspects of the album that we hadn't even noticed ourselves. In a sense, he explained the record to us musically.

There are several noticeable influences on your records, but if you had to pick just one band out of all of them?

Sorry for dodging the question, but it's really hard for us to pick just one band. What we can tell you, though, are the three albums we listened to most during the recording sessions, ones that all the members of the band love: "Plastic Beach" by Gorillaz, "Ege Bamyasi" by Can, and "Sea Change" by Beck. Then again, we're never quite sure how directly what we love ends up reflected in our own sound. "All The Sunset In A Cup" probably had more obvious reference points.

From the story of how your records were made - quickly, with a lot of improvisation - one might guess that the live dimension is your favourite. Is that the case? What are you like live?

Live, we try to leave ourselves a little room for small improvisations at every show, but we keep it in moderation since we're an emerging band and we don't always have the time needed to bring out that side of the group. We'd love to be able to convey live the same spirit we bring to writing our albums. It's not always easy, because there are dynamics and internal logics to a given show that don't always let us express ourselves the way we'd like. For example, we still haven't managed to put together a set design and lighting setup that suits us, which is essential for music like ours.

You started out with a very independent approach: the album available in full streaming right away, a self-produced physical edition (now sold out). Now, though, "Yarn" is coming out on Bomba Dischi - can you tell us how that collaboration came about? From your point of view, what can an independent label still do for its artists today?

It happened by chance: through a friend of Lorenzo's, Davide Caucci from Bomba Dischi heard "All The Sunset In A Cup", and he immediately started booking us for some really interesting shows. "Yarn" is the album that seals our partnership with the label, which has now lasted a couple of years. A label, especially one with a solid roster, can raise a band's profile by taking care of everything that isn't music but is still part of the job - things that can otherwise drain a lot of energy from self-produced bands. Bomba Dischi is a young label that's interested in growing alongside the artists it works with, and it's good at understanding what makes each of its bands unique. Sometimes, unfortunately, independent labels end up operating a lot like majors, pushing hard for their biggest acts and leaving the smaller ones to fend for themselves. Luckily, that's not the case with Bomba Dischi.

Have you thought about approaching a label abroad as well? Which one would you choose, if so?

There have been contacts with foreign labels, who've shown a lot of interest in our music, we'll see what happens. If we could choose ourselves, we'd probably say Sub Pop, 4AD and Matador Records. But there are countless great labels out there, maybe less celebrated, that it would be nice to work with.

What's the perspective of a young band like yours on the Italian independent scene? Self-referential and provincial, as a somewhat detached observer might think, perhaps superficially? Why doesn't a band with a personal, exportable sound like Departure Ave. tour at least in Europe (generally very few bands venture beyond our borders)?

We're working on setting up our first European dates, they'll be coming soon. We believe that contact between Italian labels/bands and the world abroad has been growing a bit lately, just as the average age of bands is dropping, and some finally interesting things are emerging. The discussion around the Italian independent scene is quite a minefield. Interesting records keep coming out, and paradoxically, in niche circles Italy has actually built up a certain credibility, while in the field of independent pop-rock it's still struggling a bit. Words like provincialism and self-referentiality can certainly be applied to the Italian scene, as long as they're not uttered by the very people who rarely make the effort to listen to new acts, let alone go to shows. In short, by those who do nothing to help solve these problems.

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