The Dials

The Dials have been familiar faces on the Brighton music scene since 2002, playing their own peculiar blend of psychedelia, surf, folk and jazz garage. Dermot Watson, Andy Taylor, Rich Parrish and Joe Allenby-Byrne sound like The Zombies, Funkadelic, Caravan and Miles Davis jamming at the UFO Club on a rainy September night. An early lineup emerged... busking trad country numbers with banjos on the seafront, but when the band went electric in 2005 their demos were picked up by fan Mark Lamarr, who persuaded them to play a series of sessions for BBC Radio 2. Their eponymous debut album in 2007 showcased a bewilderingly eclectic collection of songs which somehow won the hearts of small pockets of radio DJs and listeners worldwide. Their showcase at NXNE in Toronto was described as pure energy, hard-howling, Brit-infused honky-tonk. After famously requiring a fire crew of nine to rescue them from a bank vault in which they had become trapped whilst recording 2009s Companions of the Rosy Hours, the band disintegrated in a whirlwind of passive aggression. Dermot and Andy shut themselves away and began writing the album which would become the critically-acclaimed "The End of the Pier" (2013). Self-produced and recorded all over Brighton with a rotating cast of musicians including Gordon Russell (Dr Feelgood), the album was eventually released with the current lineup established. For the last three years, the Dials have been recording in UNKLEs Toy Room studio in Brighton with Ben Thackeray (Patti Smith, Nick Cave, My Bloody Valentine, Gruff Rhys) producing. Featuring pump organs, mandolins, Moogs, mellotrons, pastoral folk and Bavarian waltzes, That Was The Future will be released on vinyl and CD on October 13th 2017. The band are still talking.Read More