Lovers League: “Your Voices Sound Really Cool Together. You Guys Should Start Some Kind of Project.”
Lovers League has been hard at work serenading Philadelphia with their sweet blend of harmonic folk-pop over the past year. Coming off of their first self-titled album that was released in June 2014, the four-piece band recently dropped their sophomore effort, 2.
Bandmates Dani Mari, Reverend TJ McGlinchey, Christopher Davis-Shannon and Dean Gorfti celebrated the release earlier this month with a show at Boot & Saddle with Levee Drivers and Vilebred.
Our Brianna Spause caught up with guitarist/vocalist Dani Mari, who has been “living on the turnpike” as she commutes from Brooklyn to Philadelphia to work with Lovers League.
Dani, who sung high praises of last weekend’s show. “Everyone sang along to our new song “Darling.” It’s a new song so it was really cool to see how everyone reacted to it and to see everyone singing.”
What is the story behind 2?
Reverend TJ McGlinchey and I basically sing each other’s songs as duets. For our last album, we had six songs. I contributed three and then he contributed three. For this record, it was the same process and we added a cover to this EP. We worked with Bill Moriarty, who has worked with Dr. Dog and Lotus and Toy Soldiers. That was a really cool experience to work with him and have somebody else with input on our songs and arrangements.
Things are moving along pretty quickly. 2 was released less than a year after Lovers League, your first EP.
We had a couple of different fundraisers to make this album happen. The first record we did, we recorded at Mill Street Records, which is Reverend TJ McGlinchy’s brother’s studio. After our first Record Release at Johnny Brenda’s, JUMP actually had a write up about the show. This guy had seen the article and he works with Bill. He checked out our music and wrote us an email saying, ‘Hey. Would you guys want to record your next record with Bill Moriarty?’ I have always followed all of the music he has been involved with. We were completely honored to have been approached by them.
Once we figured out that we just put out a record and we’re going to be working on another record, we thought, ‘Oh, crap. We have to come up with some money for this.’ We put out another fundraiser and had a lot of support. We really couldn’t have done it without the support from everybody. If we couldn’t raise the money then we couldn’t have made this album happen.
How did Lovers League come together in the first place?
The band was basically created because we were asked multiple times to create a band. TJ had a solo project, I had my solo project. We hosted a lot of different open mics and different showcases and we would just harmonize with each other here and there at different shows. We had lots of people come up to us and say, ‘Your voices sound really cool together. You guys should start some kind of project.’ That’s kind of how it came about, and people have continued to support us and give us good vibes about what we have created together.
What makes Lovers League work?
TJ and I have been playing together for a long time and have an emotional connection in harmonizing with each other. We have a connection with the audience, too. Seeing people sing along in the audience to it is a really cool feeling.
It started out as a trio basically. It was Christopher Davis-Shannon, TJ and I in the very beginning. Dean came on board with us and was a part of the first album as well. Topher is an awesome standup bass player. He brings a lot of energy to it. It’s really fun when we’re all playing together. You just look back and Dean is smiling and Christopher Davis-Shannon always shows us up. He’s always dressed to impress for every show.
What’s the plan for moving forward past this busy year?
We’re going to work this summer on playing festivals and playing some shows locally. We’re hoping by the fall we’ll go on some mini-tours and stuff like that. Eventually we would like to have a US tour at some point. Or would tour…
For our next record, we’re planning on taking our time and really trying to co-write all of the songs together. The first two albums, I would contribute half the album and TJ would contribute the other half and we’d sing them as duets. This time around, we want to try to see what happens if we actually start from scratch and co-write every song together.
So you’re aiming for a more cohesive dynamic?
Exactly. Christopher Davis-Shannon is also a songwriter and Dean gets involved in songwriting as well. So, we want to have all four of us involved in that process. With Christopher singing with us, having three part harmonies and stuff like that.
Is the goal to change your sound?
I think the core of the sound will be somewhat similar but we haven’t officially tried it out yet with all four of us collaborating from scratch, so it’s hard to say. It just depends on how we do it.
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