Dubai Sound City

Seven venues, 78 acts and three days of solid music... Discuss this article

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Doves

Andy Williams of Doves, one of the UK’s most famously private bands, opens up to Becky Lucas ahead of their highly anticipated slot.

Doves: you may recognise the Brit guitar band’s songs, but it’s darn unlikely you know their names. You see, Doves aren’t celebrities – they’re musicians. Which is a shame, really, because the story of their inception would make for a superb film biography. Starring Robert Carlyle, perhaps. In the ’90s, twin brothers Andy and Jez Williams and long-term friend Jimi Goodwin formed Sub Sub, a dance group inspired by Manchester’s famous Haçienda club. They scored a few hits, most notably ‘Ain’t No Love (Ain’t No Use)’.

Then, disaster struck. Literally. In 2000 their studio burnt to the ground. But rather than allow this bizarre turn of misfortune to stop them in their tracks, they instead chose to change musical direction completely, rename themselves Doves and release Lost Souls, an immaculately produced, soulful indie album that earned them hundreds of thousands of fans. These fans then proceeded to snap up their next three albums and flock to their gigs, including support slots with U2, Oasis and Coldplay. Talk about turning a crisis into an opportunity.

Now, nine years later, could another meltdown and reboot be on the cards? Should their studio managers be worried? ‘I really hope not,’ Andy, the band’s drummer and contributing vocalist, says in all seriousness down the phone from London. ‘We’ve got lots of fire extinguishers and we make sure the electrics are fine in this studio. I hope we never go through that again.’ What about another shift in musical focus, though? Should we expect a death metal makeover next? ‘As far as a direction change goes, we never rule it out,’ he says. ‘You’ve just got to attempt new things with each record, so that’s what we try to do.’

The critics tend to agree, describing this year’s record, Kingdom of Rust, as ‘unmistakably better than its predecessors’. But while the musos like Doves, the celebrity rags don’t really know who they are. ‘People aren’t into us personally, which is fine,’ says Andy. ‘It’s sort of like we live by ourselves, we die by ourselves. If we wanted that kind of attention, we could go about getting it.’

But sometimes that attention comes anyway. Doves admit they aim to create music that expresses the emotions people find hard to put into words. And that causes some fans to get a little too attached to the band. ‘We did have a stalker a few years back,’ Andy reveals. ‘I can laugh about it now, but this guy started sending letters to my home address and – well, I won’t go into it.’

Doves’ relative personal anonymity also stems from their lack of frontman: they all sing; they all write; there are no showy Brandon Flowers or Chris Martins. ‘I suppose Jez is the most prolific,’ Andy says. ‘But I think the reason we work so well is that we all bring new ideas to the table; we’ve always got a lot of material to choose from.’

This private attitude has caused journalists to get a little creative with the facts in the past. ‘I read that I met my brother Jez on the Haçienda dancefloor a couple of years ago, which was pretty funny. I was like,
“We have met a few times before that!’’’ Okay, so how about giving us some accurate behind-the-scenes insights instead? What are each band member’s most annoying habits? ‘Oh, we’ve all got plenty. But I can’t really go into it,’ he squirms. ‘Okay – Jez eats apples in a really annoying way, but that’s all I’m saying!’

Hold the front page! Does he have any more exclusives like that? ‘We’re talking of doing a “best of” album next year and a couple of new songs for that,’ he replies, swiftly switching back to the professional side of things. ‘Then we’ve got the UK tour in December and we’re talking about asking this band called Camera Obscura or a new guy called Bibio to support.’

How about some gossiping, then: what does he make of the other acts at the fest? ‘We love Super Furry Animals, Happy Mondays and Echo and the Bunnymen – we grew up on their music, so we’ll definitely be angling to see them,’ Andy says animatedly. So, if you spot three vaguely familiar lads hanging out with Bez, Shaun Ryder and Ian McCulloch, that’s Doves. You may not recognise them at first, but ask them to strum a tune and they’ll blow all the loudmouths away.

Doves play Dubai SoundCity’s main stage at The Irish Village.