ifitbeyourwill S03 E36 • Diamond Day

What happens when a traditional folk musician from Quebec meets a young guitarist raised on an eclectic mix of records? The result is Diamond Day, a band that masterfully fuses shoegaze, electro-pop, and dream pop into a refreshing soundscape. Join us as we chat with Beatrice and Quinn, the creative forces behind Diamond Day, and uncover the rich musical tapestry that threads through their lives. From Beatrice's upbringing amidst Quebec's folk traditions to Quinn's early days touring with Canadian bands, this episode is a journey through their musical evolution.

Discover the fascinating story behind the formation of Diamond Day, born from the creative divergence within their previous project, Rosier. Beatrice explains how her original songwriting style didn't quite align with Rosier's traditional framework, leading to a fruitful partnership with Quinn. We'll hear about their creative synergy and how they meld their distinct influences to produce music that both honors their roots and ventures into new, experimental realms. This chapter highlights the unique blend that sets Diamond Day apart in the modern music landscape.

We also explore Beatrice's inventive approach to songwriting, delving into the concept of "crooked" tunes and unconventional chord progressions that challenge mainstream norms. Learn how Beatrice and Quinn embrace the freedom of working as a duo, balancing maximalist and minimalist arrangements to craft intricate yet accessible soundscapes. Additionally, the episode celebrates the enchanting allure of French lyrics, exploring how the cultural landscape of Quebec influences their bilingual songs. Tune in to hear about their upcoming projects and live performances, and get a taste of the global appeal that Diamond Day brings to the table. Don't miss this captivating conversation that celebrates the artistic fusion of languages and genres.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:15

here we are, episode, another episode, I should say. I don't know what number it is anymore, there's too many, but we still are in season three of if it be real podcast. Today I have beatrice and quinn coming in from out west. They're in the western part of canada and they are diamond day, which is a relatively new band that came out of montreal I guess it's a fusion of boston montreal coming together and creating some really amazing shoegazy electro poppy, dream poppy. We're gonna get them to describe it a little bit better than that, but I want to just thank you guys for hopping on and uh and and sharing a little bit about this, your latest record, thanks so much for having us it's an honor yeah, so I I tend to start these with a little bit of like back in time hopping in the time machine.

Speaker 1: 1:09

Beatrice, you had just mentioned that you were born in Vermont, but you spent a lot of time growing up in the folk areas of Quebec. What was your musical exposure at that young age in the province of Quebec? Because I know that you allude to the traditional folk music that you were surrounded by as a person growing up.

Speaker 3: 1:40

Could you elaborate on that a bit? Yeah, yeah, so both my parents are folk musicians and they met sort of there's this scene between Quebec and New England, you know Vermont and all that area. There's a lot of strong like francophone connections. I guess we moved to Quebec when I was one and we just, you know, spent all of my childhood around folk musicians touring but also in like house parties, and so I grew up listening to like fiddle music and accordion and acoustic guitar and French song circles. So I definitely, you know that's most of my musical exposure has been that kind of stuff, so very different than this project.

Speaker 1: 2:28

Yeah, absolutely. We'll get to that too a bit. But, quinn, also, you come from a lineage as well. Your dad was a luthier who made guitars. Is it true that you started touring at 12? Like, what's that about?

Speaker 2: 2:44

Yeah, both Beatrix and I have been. Uh like, she was in her family band. Um, when you were like what?

Speaker 3: 2:51

seven or eight or something. Well, I started like tagging along learning the fiddle, so I don't know if I was equally part of the band, but I was on stage, so compared to her.

Speaker 2: 3:00

I'm a late bloomer but was I started playing traditional music and my dad's a luthier, so he there was a bunch of guitars around the house. I grew up playing fiddle, but I thought the guitar was really cool. I really wanted to play guitar but and they were lying around the house too, so it was like I just all I wanted to do was play guitar. I thought it was so cool and then so finally I just shifted my focus totally to that Um, and then, once I started doing that, people were hiring me to to accompany them. I was touring with lots of different traditional musicians, a lot with Ashley MacIsaac back in, like that's. That's when I was like 12 to 16 or something like that. I was doing that, and there's there's a lot of bands in Canada that that I was playing with so that was that was my beginning yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1: 3:50

And I heard too, quinn, that your dad had like an ultimate record collection. Um, that was also a source of inspiration. Um, like a 40 year old record collection, can you, can you?

Speaker 2: 4:05

shine a light on that a bit. He's got. He had a ton of records. He grew up in northern alberta and then moved to edmonton and he just had been collecting records since he was a kid. Um, but uh, they didn't all make it to victoria, that's where you know. Eventually they moved, my parents moved from Edmonton to Victoria and then I was born in 96.

Speaker 2: 4:28

And so the records that make their way there. My dad still complains about how he got ripped off. You know what he had to sell his records, but the most important ones were there. So there's a lot of jazz stuff. I remember burning like digitizing records when I was a teenager and there was a bunch of like John Coltrane and Miles digitizing records when I was a teenager and there was a bunch of like John Coltrane and Miles Davis stuff. And when I used to play video games with my friends, we would play Tony Hawk, pro Skater and you could. I found out that you could play, you could put your own music on it, so like we'd be playing, and then Miles Davis was like playing in the background. So that was all that.

Speaker 1: 5:05

Really cool. And, beatrice, you also had your dad had a band as well when he was, when you were growing up as well. Le Père du Diable, le.

Speaker 3: 5:16

Rêve du.

Speaker 4: 5:17

Diable yeah.

Speaker 1: 5:18

Le Rêve du Diable. So the the we'll translate that. What is that? The Devil's Dream.

Speaker 3: 5:22

Devil's Dream. Yeah Right, it's a pretty known tune, like traditional tune called the Devil's Dream. I'm sure if you heard it you know it. But yeah, that was his band.

Speaker 1: 5:37

And what kind of exposure did you have to that band? And your dad playing.

Speaker 3: 5:42

I never heard that band because I wasn't born when that was happening.

Speaker 1: 5:46

Okay, okay.

Speaker 3: 5:47

That was in the 70s. It was one of the first bands to actually go on like musicians doing traditional music on stages in Quebec. That wasn't really a thing, it was more just like you would hear it in people's homes. It was more just like you know you would hear it in people's homes. So he was part of that movement of bringing that music, you know, in different towns and touring and stuff like that. And then he had a couple of other bands. But my exposure was definitely just hearing my dad play fiddle on the couch every day. That was my life and I guess my parents didn't listen to that much music when I think back on it. They were mostly playing it and my mom would just be singing songs all the time, stuff like that. So that that was my upbringing that's so cool, I mean so.

Speaker 1: 6:39

Both of you come from this foundational background where you, you know family was involved in music, doing music. You guys started collaborating in 2019. What brought the two of you together?

Speaker 2: 6:55

We started doing. Well, beatrix has a band that's based in Montreal called Rosier and it's they started. It's kind of stemming all from that traditional part. Everyone, everyone in that band, all their parents are musicians and dance callers and they do square dances in Quebec and play play different, like flute and fiddle and bass, guitar and things like that.

Speaker 2: 7:20

So they, they are like the children of that generation and they started their own, their own group, which slowly was like evolving into something that sounded a little bit more of an indie rock band. And they were called you can pronounce it better?

Speaker 3: 7:38

The band was called Les Poules à Collin.

Speaker 2: 7:41

And in 2019, they wanted to do a big shift in in how they sounded. So we made an album together, um, I was producing them, uh, and so that that was the first time we ever collaborated kind of on. Something was was through that band and they changed it into rosie. Um, and then there was beatrix is really doing a lot of bringing songs to that band and taking traditional songs and morphing them into something else. So she's got quite a backlog of material and there was some of it that didn't fit with that group, and so that was kind of the beginning of how we started. This was, you know, she had, she had a, a lot of stuff that that didn't really work for that, and so we would, we would kind of workshop it and record stuff and just experiment and yeah, Cool.

Speaker 3: 8:35

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 8:35

Yeah, I was listening to the Rosie um as I was getting ready to talk with you and Beatrice what, what? How did that get started? How did that group come together of kids, of musicians?

Speaker 3: 8:51

It started when I was a kid. I was 12 when my first rehearsal with that band. But we're basically just all childhood friends, like Quinn was saying, all of our parents are musicians and a lot of our parents have played in bands together also, like in the the 90s and early 2000s. So we met just as like friends of our parents basically, or friends of, yeah, of our parents kids, um, and we I was playing fiddle, someone was playing banjo, someone else was playing guitar we kind of just were like, oh well, we all we have all of these instruments Like we could potentially like try something out. Some of us even learned just new instrument Cause it's like, oh well, we're not going to have like two piano players. So, like one of the girls learned bass Cause it was you know, like it was that time where it's just like kind of diy like something out, um, and that's been going on, yeah, for since 2008 now.

Speaker 3: 9:51

So it's it's been quite a journey and we're still together and we've brought quinn along to to do some producing, some arranging with us, and the project has changed a lot over the last 15 years, but it's still the same people and we still do some French songs, french traditional songs, that we sort of rearrange, and a lot of people probably wouldn't even know that that's the source of all of our material, but it's still pretty ingrained in my music making for sure, like that's kind of what I know best. Yeah, absolutely in my music making for sure.

Speaker 1: 10:24

Like that's kind of what I know best. So, yeah, absolutely Well, and I I listened to a few of the the releases that were put out as Rosier and I mean it evolves over time, right Like it. It has this definite folk home grown quality to it, but it does have this airy poppy sensibility to it as well. How do you determine what song goes with what band Like? How do you like? How do you determine that?

Speaker 3: 10:57

Well, for Diamond Day we're. We're mostly like writing the songs, like we're. None of the songs are traditional Like. So I guess that's one of the big things with my other band was I was starting to bring my own songs, but then it was kind of like, well, where, how do we, how do we fit like my original songs? But then it was kind of like, well, where, how do we, how do we fit like my original songs and these like traditional songs.

Speaker 3: 11:18

So, and we do like some of them, some, I think some of them work, because I think it's a fun little activity to try to like write sort of like a folk song or something that sounds like that. But I guess that's probably when we first decided to really focus on a separate project was when I was experimenting with songwriting and Quinn was experimenting with production and he started building his own little studio and doing some mixing and stuff like that. So when both of those experimentations kind of combine, it was like, whoa, this is a cool sound where we kind of individually have things going on and then when we put them together then something even cooler comes out of it so right yeah that's really cool.

Speaker 1: 12:04

And Quinn, what? What was it about Beatrix songs that that you? You saw that they could go off in this kind of shoegazy, dream poppy direction? What was it about the essence of the songs that she was bringing to you, saying, you know, these probably don't fit much with this band, but maybe they could be something else? Like, did you have a vision already with those songs as to maybe a sound that might be able to be coerced out of the song she was bringing?

Speaker 2: 12:36

Well, her style of her is very like. It's kind of like an inside joke. If Beatrix brings a tune or a song that she wrote to the band or whatever and we'll all listen to it and it'll be like it's always very unique, like she just has a very unique sound and also, time-wise, like in traditional music, there's this thing called crooked. You know, like crooked tunes. If you've ever heard of that before, it's like there'll be added measures or measures or added beats or taken away beats, and it's a part of traditional music that there aren't really other styles of music Like it's not something that's very common in pop music or rock music or like any genre, and it kind of, as far as we understand it comes from square dances and when a traditional music that is so ingrained in her, in her writing, that that she's not sometimes not even aware that it's there. It's just she has such a unique sound.

Speaker 2: 14:05

So, um, and also when it comes to chords, uh, like beatrix would never write like a, a really simple, like pot, like one, four, five kind of I mean she could. But, uh, but like a? A really simple, like pot, like one, four or five kind of I mean she could but, but like a GCD, GCD, like a standard like right.

Speaker 4: 14:22

Yes, her song I have to work on that.

Speaker 2: 14:27

Yeah, so I don't. It's, it's hard. It's like when you hear the songs, it's kind of it's like wow, this could be so many different things and it's hard to not just keep it as is. Like some of the latest Rosier stuff is really really similar to the demos, like we'll just. She recorded her guitar through her computer laptop for a demo and it just sounds so good. So it's like we just decided well, that's going to be the guitar, you know, and they'll click, bleed, like probably one of the tracks you heard before coming on. You can hear some of the click and it's just like well, the guitar sounds so good and the click is just sounds amazing. So let's just keep that, you know. So yeah, sometimes it's like hard because she's created this song by herself with the guitar and it and you, but then at the same time it's you get excited about.

Speaker 2: 15:17

How could I reimagine this? So if, like kevin shields would, would be writing songs that had added or taken away measures, um, you could imagine it like that. Or the way that she's writing songs like harmonically, the, the chord progressions, or like the melody that could you have to decide of, like what the chord progression would be, based on a melody and it's not going to be like a normal one four, five thing. So thinking about like the shoegaze style or or like broadcasts or something like that they all like it just brings your mind to different places. Um, and it's really fun to experiment with that, you know. So I don't know, it's, it's just fun if she's bringing such cool songs.

Speaker 3: 16:00

So you know, yeah we both really love and like we listen to that kind of music. So I think it's it's fair to say that, like we want to make music that we enjoy listening to, like we're yeah, it's just a fun experiment to to try to do that and to hear and then finding out that there are similarities with like I think about, like elizabeth fraser and the way that she sings, like in the concert like.

Speaker 3: 16:28

It really reminds me of some like celtic singers that you would, I grew up listening to and like people like the, the intricate melodies and the performance, and there's something about that that's. That's really cool and we're not sure exactly how they like how did they coexist? But somehow there's something in there that works.

Speaker 1: 16:50

So we're going to keep going. And, beatrice, did you have an idea that, like I, have these songs that won't really fit? Were you informing Quinn as to, maybe, a direction you wanted to go in, or was it really you just stumbled upon it, like through experimentation and just going through the songs and trying to figure out what kind of layers and what kind of added instrumentation that you would add to it?

Speaker 3: 17:20

I guess it depends. Every song was different. If we're speaking about the record that we put out, sometimes Quinn would have sort of a song already like a backing track kind of thing going on, where I would come in write a song on top of it. But it really just, I think, came down to us having like being very in sync with like what we like, and we, although we did do a lot of individual work um, where things were really evolving is when we were just sitting in front of the computer and being like oh, I think this should be like this or this, like this, and having the freedom to do it as well, because it's just the two of us, so we can literally do whatever we wanted. It doesn't matter that we don't have someone playing that instrument in the band, we can just figure it out or like sample it or having that freedom. I think neither of us had projects where we could do that, so that really informed, I think, the arrangements and stuff like that.

Speaker 2: 18:21

And I think that this album is more like we're working on new music and we're trying to really have it be more minimalist. But this one is extremely maximalist and it's sometimes hard to figure out how how can you have like this many tracks and have it still sound like not too confusing or annoying or something? So that was a big, that was a difficult one. For us is like we just wanted to. We wanted it to sound like some tracks that you're saying, like some of them were conscious decision, like we want this to sound like curve or like wanted to sound like cocksure twins or something, and then so that it's like it's just such a wall of sound.

Speaker 1: 19:01

um, so we just tried to, on some of these, try to do the maximalist vibe, but have it be, uh, you know digestible for the listener right, right, and having a bit of distance on the record, I mean it came out february 29th, 2024 of this year um, what are your guys impressions of it now? Like, having put it out and you know it's kind of gone through, it's this the record cycle. Um, with that distance, did you guys achieve what you had hoped to achieve with this record?

Speaker 3: 19:35

I think so. And yeah, like artistically definitely, and we had our little. I mean, this is, like you said, like new project. We hadn't anything before and that was literally the scariest thing in the world, was like releasing an album online. It's just such a strange time for musicians. Time for musicians, um, but also that fear kind of evolved into something else, because the internet has been sort of like our, our saving grace as far as a band, just because we've made so many connections through sending our music to people.

Speaker 3: 20:11

Um, but we, we just listened to it again on our drive from montreal to victoria and it felt really good to to hear it from a perspective where you're not working on promoting it and you're not working on you know, like it's just there in anything. And there were songs on there that we had been working on for like four years like, or like the initial idea was like made four years ago. So it's it's kind of relieving to to have it just and you can't do anything, you can't touch it. You know it's just of relieving to to have it just and you can't do anything, you can't touch it, you know it's just out there and that's how it is.

Speaker 2: 20:45

The amount of time that you spend. Like if I'm working on a track with someone and I spent a day on it, then I can take a day off and it'll be like I never heard it or something like that. But like that same principle is with this. It's like if we were focusing on some of those songs like really intensely for six months, and you give it a six month break and you come back to it. I think we're kind of at that point right now and and yeah, it's it it definitely feels more hands off, like I'm not noticing, like I when we listen to it. When it first came out, it's like I can, I can write down like every like mix note or everything that I thought was, but now it just sounds like music. So that's cool, that's wicked.

Speaker 1: 21:24

And what song do you guys like together? When you are hearing it, you look at each other and are like yep, got it Nailed it Like is there a song that was that first one that was like that's the sound, like that's it, like that's. I think we should build the whole record around that sound. Is there one song in particular that does that for you guys?

Speaker 3: 21:47

I'm not sure that I have that feeling. I have that feeling now maybe with things that we haven't released, like, but that came from the process of making this record. But I would say that the song that was the easiest to like just made it. It was like oh well, that's that's kind of like a perfect song, like immediately, like it was. We come over here, um, and I think that was pandemic sort of music making. We were in victoria, we were I think that was like the first month of like a major lockdown in Canada. We were stuck here in a way and Quinn had like rented a drum from Long and McQuaid and he was practicing drums Like we had Apex.

Speaker 2: 22:29

Tornado.

Speaker 3: 22:30

Yeah, every day we had these like very methodic things oh, let's go like each make music for this amount of time or whatever. And that's when I wrote the bones of that song. And then we had we set up like a very shitty little studio like in his room. He had the drums in the room and we just made that demo. And when we decided to actually make the song for the record, we just listened to the demo and it was just kind of like wow, like that happened so quickly and it was sort of a magical process. So I would say, probably that song is that for me.

Speaker 1: 23:07

Cool. What about you, Quinn, Is that? Is that ring true to you as well?

Speaker 2: 23:10

I completely disagree. Probably, I'd say, if there was one that encapsulates the vibe of the entire album, maybe it's that. It's really that one feels kind of simple because and you can tell that it came together fast at the same time there's there's different tracks poke into different like directions, genre wise, and the the track santraville is really cool. I like that one, and we, we recorded it pretty fast as well, and I just mumbled lyrics, um. And then I asked beatrix, can you, can you think of this as if it was in french? And like, phonetically, what does it sound like in french? And then she wrote those words down and then that was, that was the final lyrics, for the song was just phonetic, uh, translation of whatever I was mumbling um.

Speaker 2: 24:06

And then we were really into this band, feeble Little Horse, they, they had just come up with their album, um. So then we got Sebastian, the guitar player and he produces that stuff too to produce that track. So then we I just sent him the files and he just, he's like, he's just a wizard in, uh, he just like totally made it super efficient. And then we heard it back and it really felt like a way better synthesized version of that song. So that one I feel like is a is a cool collaborative track that is more in that kind of one I feel like is a is a cool collaborative track that is more in that kind of authentic or like more like shoegazy, indie rock direction.

Speaker 1: 24:48

Yeah, yeah, I hear you french lyrics. I love the simplicity of it too, right, it's like a handful of lines, but again that that you get mesmerized by it. Like totally, totally quinn, like it's very and and I, I, I struggle with classifying it, you guys, as shoegaze, because you do play on all these different genres which it's almost like you're building a new foundation for something else you know, and I mean who knows what name you know, people like me, or writers, or reviewers will come up with. But it definitely has a spine of that, but there's so much more to it as well. At the same time, um, as we kind of come to a close here, guys, what, what's on the docket for 2024? Um, I, I heard that you guys uh said you're writing new songs. Um, is there anything you could tell us about um shows or what's coming down the pipe for uh, diamond day?

Speaker 2: 25:48

we've got a tour coming up on the west coast that we'll announce soon, but it'll be some from vancouver and then down into la and we're, we're, we'll be, we'll be announcing that soon. Um, and then we have, we're excited to. We released one so far, no joy, from quebec. There she did a remix of our song, uh, noisemaker. But we will be excited to to put out some more. We have I don't know if it doesn't matter, but we have a whole bunch of remixes, that that of people that were really, really love their music.

Speaker 4: 26:26

So that'll be coming soon.

Speaker 2: 26:28

And uh, anything else.

Speaker 4: 26:32

No, like just yeah, we're.

Speaker 3: 26:35

We're just excited to make more music and there's some songs that didn't make it to Connect the Dots that we're excited to release Some stuff in French for our Montreal, our Quebecois people.

Speaker 1: 26:49

J'adore ça, j'adore Merci, merci. I mean, I love listening to French lyrics and I was so pleased to see that some had made the right onto this. That's getting heard all over the world, which is great, yeah he always insists on having.

Speaker 3: 27:07

He's like you should write something in French, and I'm just kind of I roll my eyes and like, okay, like it sounds exotic to him or something.

Speaker 1: 27:13

But yeah, well, I mean, quebec's a very exotic place to most of the rest of the world, right, because it's in Canada, but it's, all you know, french and like I guess the Anglos were like 10% or something like that, so it's a very interesting demographic for sure. Yeah, I'm so glad that you took me up on this and I just love how it started and where it's going, and I'll definitely be listening for the next tunes to come out and hopefully I'll catch you on the stage sometime soon definitely.

Speaker 2: 27:54

We'll be out there soon, so thank you for having us it's been a real pleasure.

Speaker 1: 28:00

You guys take care, uh, and all the best with the record and the touring and the new songs, cheers.

Speaker 4: 28:19

Thank you. Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh. I pull the line right down, pull my string when all the limbs are numb, pick it up and see me stuck in the thorn. Be gone already, done. Wanna fall. Maybe you can hear my voice. Look down on my animal. How did you hear my voice? Just a little bit, don't you know? Don't you know? I don't want to be all alone. I don't want to be all alone. I'm lost. I'm lost. I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see I'm closing my eyes, One of mine.

Speaker 4: 30:40

Baby, you can kill my face, locked down, like my animal. How do you hit my face, Just one of one. Baby, you can do it first Locked on, let my animal out. How did you hit my back? Feel like what's meant to feel? Like To feel like I D died a million times. When I fall, baby, you can kill my face, locked down, led by an animal. How did you hit my heart? I just did, just did. How do you hit my heart Just when I'm fine? Baby, you can kill my thoughts. Look down on my animal. How do you hit my heart Just when I'm fine? Have you hit my body? Just stay in my mind. I hear you calling the bell. It's always you forcing the note I said I'd like to get.