![\"vamp2\"](\"http:\/\/stylusmagazine.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/vamp2.jpg\" "\\"vamp2\\"")
<\/a><\/p>\nFor the past year, Vampires have been racking up bigger and bigger live shows, including the past two Element Sircuses and the always-packed Cabaret! at the Standard. When this guitar-and-drum duo plays, they navigate some sweat-drenched territory between southern rock and Interpol, whipping the crowd into head-swinging and dancing. And if that isn\u2019t enough, Josh Butcher and David Dobbs stop in the middle of their set, trade instruments, and keep on going. After building a local following, they\u2019ve gotten around to recording, with the help of Jeff Patteson of Home Street Recording and some new rented gear. Stylus<\/em> eventually wrangled a 15-minute phone call out of David Dobbs.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Stylus: How did Vampires come together? Stylus: All right, all right, so back to Vampires. Stylus: What kind of show are<\/strong> you trying to put on? What are you trying to do with your music? Stylus: Why wouldn\u2019t they know that they\u2019re already involved in it? Stylus: How do you mean? Stylus: So it was like a slow clap?
\nDavid Dobbs: <\/strong>I\u2019ve always been in bands, and I love music like Mogwai and Do Make Say Think. Pretty much any music that makes the heart go \u201cwhoa.\u201d I moved into the Mansion [a housing co-op on Wellington Crescent] on March 1, 2008, and four or five months later, this guy named Josh Butcher moved in too. He had just left the Absent Sound, so we started smoking weed together and listening to music; he loves Led Zeppelin and the Doors\u2026
\nStylus: What, you don\u2019t like Zep or the Doors?
\nDD:<\/strong> I don\u2019t discredit anyone, but tell me about the bands playing in the clubs in 1971. No one\u2019s talking about those bands! That\u2019s the kind of music that I want to be talking about\u2014it\u2019s hungry music, it needs to be fed. No one loved them just because they sold a bunch of records.<\/p>\n
\nDD:<\/strong> So yeah, Josh and I were talking about stuff. Around Christmas time, \u201908, I took a flight to L.A. seeing local venues and local bands, like the Smell and the Mae Shi. Try think of the word shameless, but with no connotation of the word \u201cshame\u201d\u2014it was just happening so fast, it was take it or leave it, it was nothing I\u2019d ever seen before. And I was like to Josh, I have this will and this desire just to be free. We approach this band open hearts. There\u2019s nothing really to call us, no genre, which is kind of the beauty.<\/p>\n
\nDD:<\/strong> Well I guess I\u2019ll tell it the way it was told to us after one of our friends saw us play\u2014he said it\u2019s like we bypass influence and go straight for the good stuff. I don\u2019t know what we\u2019re doing but, in some kind of clich\u00e9 way, we\u2019re trying to involve people in things that they\u2019re involved in.<\/p>\n
\nDD:<\/strong> Because it\u2019s been forgotten and put aside.<\/p>\n
\nDD:<\/strong> I\u2019ve seen so many people pay rent for their little spot by the stage and then just sit there and watch the show. I remember shows where everyone was running around\u2014and it was about where you were for six hours, just having a blast. I like to put on shows where the band is fodder for the night. I really get off on seeing people dance to a band. In L.A., they had this thing that I call \u201cthe clap,\u201d and they would do in the alleyway, they would do it in between bands, people would clap anywhere they wanted. It was awesome, because anyone can clap, and we can do it all together, if there\u2019s some group understanding.<\/p>\n
\nDD:<\/strong> They did it in a number of different ways. Someone might be coming in from having a smoke, they would clap, and then it would spark five people to clap in return. I thought, \u201cThere\u2019s a revolution happening here. I gotta bring this back to my home town.\u201d I felt a bit of duty.<\/p>\n