Queenstown’s set to play host on Tuesday night to Auckland indie band Daffodils and Sydney psych-rock band, The Lazy Eyes.
It’ll be the first time both bands have played in the resort, with opening act The Lazy Eyes returning the favour after Daffodils opened in Melbourne for them earlier this year.
“I feel like it’s quite a cool contrast between the two different sounds of our individual bands … I’m excited to hang out with them a bit more and get to know them better,” singer and guitarist Theo Spike Salmon says.
He describes Daffodils’ sound as pop-rock, new wave inspired, but says their musical tastes have definitely widened since the band’s beginnings at Rockquest 2016, where they came runner-up to Maori heavy metal band, Alien Weaponry.
With drummer Isaac Keating, singer, synths and keys player Jade Bryham and bass and backing vocalist Louis Graham, Spike Salmon says, at the time, he didn’t envision the band going this far.
They released their first EP, Boys, in 2019 and are now touring their second, Stay the Night, in Queenstown, Dunedin, Christchurch, Auckland and Wellinjgton.
“After pulling it together so quickly, just before Rockquest, and then doing so well int hat year, I think we’re all like, ‘oh, we can actually have like a proper go at doing this long term’.”
While Stay the Night was a bit waylaid by Covid, the pandemic also gave the band a chance to revisit songs and make changes.
“Mostly in terms of how they sounded, it gave us a little bit of space to think about what stuff we could strip back and what stuff we could sort of lift up a bit more.”
While songwriting’s a collaborative process for Daffodils, the latest EP’s given Spike Salmon the chance to articulate some things, especially around mental health, that he may not have been able to otherwise.
“That last track on it, Something I Do, was quite therapeutic for me to write and feels quite therapeutic to perform as well,” he says.
Daffodils and The Lazy Eyes, Sherwood, Tuesday, 8pm. Tickets $35.50 via Under the Radar
