Interview: DARKO

Punk rockholiday is over and we are home again. Exhausted and happy to be home to catch some sleep, but at the same time sad to leave that paradise. It was an amazing holiday with many great bands. This year, in our opinion, the “smaller” bands exceeded the “bigger” ones.

On the last day, just hours before he went on stage, we did an interview with Dan, singer of a great British band, Darko.


How would you describe your music, any special influences?

Definitely hard fast trash punk. Influences? I think when we first started out to do the band we wanted to be somewhere between Strung Out, Rise Against and Wilhelm Scream. And we kind of achieved that, I think.

You played in Slovenia a couple of times before, but never here, in Tolmin. Are you excited to play on Punk Rock Holiday?

Yeah I’ve kind of been building up to it the whole week, like not trying to be too nervous playing on that big stage. But yeah today is the day, it arrived, and I’m kind of easily amping myself up, like slowly putting you foot down on the throttle. I’ll be bouncing off the wall by the time we go on stage.

You are opening the main stage. Do you think that it’s better to be the first band on main stage or the last on beach stage?

Uh, I don’t know. For a band like us it might have been better for us to play on the smaller stage, the beach stage. We’re not very well known. This opportunity that we’ve got the main stage, though, is just insane, you know. I’ll let you know after the show (hahaha). And we’ve got a lot of friends, so we’re not going to play to no one, we’ll definitely play to someone. But it would be nice to play to some new people as well, that haven’t heard us. And playing the main stage here is just the perfect place for that.

What do you think about the European punk rock scene?

It’s really cool. Everyone is just so into it, everyone is just so nice. People come on the shows, they pick up a CD, it’s fucking great. I can’t think of a better way to spend my time.

Since you played in Slovenia before, have you noticed any differences between Slovenian and British scene?

People here (in Slovenia) go a bit more nuts for it. The English could be quite reserved and laid back. You won’t always get the Mor(r)ons in your moshpit or them being the moshpit, as they were on Saturday night. It was just them and that was really sweet of them. That wasn’t English. Not every, but some of the English bands would sort of just watch the other English bands.

You are on tour quite a lot. How does that go with your “normal” life?

I wasn’t working myself when we started the tour, when we first came out a couple of years ago, so that was ok, just getting the time of. And then when I started my current job, I told my employer what I do. And we sat down at the beginning of the year and I said “This is what I’ve got planned with my band for this year, can we work around it?” And he said “Yeah”. So, I’m pretty lucky. But weather I have a job when I get back or not, that’s another question (haha). All the time off I take, I have to take unpaid, it’s just unpaid leave.

We think with your “rusty” voice it would be great to hear some acoustic versions of your songs. Have you ever done an acoustic set or taught about doing that?

We have done. There’s probably video footage somewhere of me playing acoustically, where I just play the guitar and I do some of the dark Darko songs, slow them right down and do them in a complete different light.

The show was ace, there were almost as many people as there were on the headliner Satanic Surfers six hours later. Dan was obviously satisfied during the show. After the show he told us: “first like this, but hopefully one of many more to come.”

I saw them playing a couple of times before, even in front of only 20 people and I’m really happy to see theme having such a great of show, because I know how much effort and time they've put in the band.

If you missed your chance to hear them in Tolmin, make sure to check them out on Bandcamp or the next time their tour passes your country.


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Vegan gourmands. Good beer lovers. Punk rock and folk music listeners. Blogging enthusiasts.

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