It’s Sunday evening at the New Era store in Downtown, Atlanta. The hat store is buzzing with life as media and fans begin to pack in for the event that is set to take place: a free J*Davey performance. The crowd isn’t your typical, you’ve got the J*Davey fans mingling with the urban New Era crowd and usually it would be a recipe for disaster, but tonight everything is just fine. After all the promise of Starbucks party platters, wings and Jose Cuervo is enough to make anyone get along.
In the New Era break room, sitting on a half broken stool tapping away at her BlackBerry is Jack Davey. Her signature half mullet/ mohawk has grown out into long layers, she’s wearing glitter leggings, and an oversized white shirt, burgundy shades and Taylor Gang converse. Her other half Brook D’Leau is off to the corner dancing awkwardly to the beats that the DJ is spinning for the rap battle that is going on. There is an outer worldly bond that the two share. Maybe the result of touring together, or working together but nonetheless, I make a point to comment on it. “Have you two ever dated?” I asked all bright and doe eyed. I was expecting no, but the two give me something else to hold on to: “Maybe in the underworld…perhaps,” Jack tells me.
The two met in high school when Brook went to prom with a friend of Jack’s. “She went to an all girls school we met there and didn’t find out until a year later that we were into the same types of music. And we decided to record one song and now we’re here,” Brook adds.
Here as in the New Era store on a Sunday afternoon treating fans to a free performance the day after there packed out performance at the Masquerade. The duo is still high off of there performance from last night. “After all, we’re not on a label so everything is a bit more rewarding,” Brook tells me. Fans are mingling around, taking glimpses into the back room and asking for pictures. In a room full of snap backs, fitted hats, hat cleaner…hats galore, the duo stands out. But the band that originated in Los Angeles and is a compilation of rock, hip-hop, soul and R&B, is used to standing out. Recently released from their deal with Warner Brothers, the duo produced, arranged and organized their “The New World Culture Tour”.
“It’s really about reinvesting your money into your business,” Brook tells me.
Concerning their split from Warner, Brook D’Leau explains, “I think they saw something they liked but had their own ideas of what they ultimately wanted it to sound like and look like and that didn’t coincide with we wanted it to sound and look like. So, we just amicably parted ways. It’s that simple.”
Jacks jumps in, “95% of the artist that signs and the other 5% are willing to take the fall. They are fabricated to a small degree and there is a very small percentage who are actually doing what they want to do, how they want to do it on a label. Most of the time its because of the fact that they have invested in themselves and don’t really need a label…the labels need them.”
It isn’t J*Davey’s first time to Atlanta so they are not at all surprised at the Atlanta hipster crowd that has come out for them, “We’ve been here a few times. I think it may be our third or fourth time,” Jack tells me,“It’s different. I just don’t know how. It’s really flashy here I mean it’s flashy in Los Angeles too. A little bit of the same but with a slower vibe. A little more laid back.”
Tonight, the duo will be performing a couple of songs from their five song Evil Christian EP that was inspired by the simplest thing…life. “Life is always the biggest inspiration. I don’t think you need any other inspiration beyond that. The things that you see in passing. That was the biggest inspiration for us.”
Jack tells me that they were so inspired when they were recording the EP that it took no time at all. “When we’re feeling it, it takes us no time, and when we’re not feeling it, we work on other things. That came together really quickly, it was a no brainer. But we don’t like to rush our creative process. It takes us a while to get it out there, but it’s always worth the wait”
For a woman who was once wearing a half shaved mullet/mohawk and whose burgundy shades in a dimly lit room is the center of attention, I can’t help but wonder what Jack Davey’s definition of glamour is. “Glamour is all relative. To me my lifestyle is glamorous but to another person it might not be. It’s all relative. In the grand scheme of things it doesn’t really matter. If your project is shit and you’re living glamorously its a facade anyway so we live as real as we are. Its pretty glamourous to me,” she explains.
Concerning her styles she is cites vintage, thrifting and chucks as playing a huge part. “Style is my inspiration. Everyday that I wake up, I’m a different person and my style reflects that. I guess my clothes inspire me. Whatever I see is what gets thrown together. I like my stuff vintage, and I’m also a fan of the Chucks.”
I ask the duo if they are Taylor Ganged and a bit of laugher follows suit. “We’re representing a new division of Taylor Gang. We’re not so cool and swaggy though. We’re the awkward division.”
We begin to talk about some of the sounds that they have been listening to while on tour and Ariel Pink and a few others are mentioned.
“It takes me a while to figure out what’s new and current so I wait six months and if it’s still relevant then I’ll listen to it,” Jack explains.
While on the subject of popular music, Odd Future comes up. “Every journalist that we speak to asks us about them,” Brook tells me.
Jack adds, “They’re cute kids. We’ve know about them for a long time. It’s great to see them finally get what they’re getting. But, they’re cute kids.”
We switch the conversation from music to art and Jack gets a chance to tell me about some of her favorite artists.
“I like Gordon Parks, I love Hedi Sliman. He’s a french fashion photographer who was a designer for Dior. I love Toulouse Lautrec, a lot of old art. When I see it it strikes me. Art encompasses so many things, I can walk outside and see a bomb on a wall and thats great art for me. I enjoy it all for different reasons, what’s not to enjoy? It’s all a way of expression”
With such refined names being thrown around, I’m interested to see what other icons J*Davey hold in esteem.
If you could invite one person dead or alive for dinner, or tea, who would it be? I ask them.
Brook replies, “David Burn.”
Jack on the other hand says Jim Morrison. “We’re kindred spirits. Or maybe…Miles Davis. I’d just invite them all and see which one showed up”
And with that my persona time with J*Davey comes to a dawn. The venue has reached maximum capacity, the line outside is stretching way to long and the fans are getting restless because they want to hear J*Davey.
