Flagpole: What are your names?
Jack Blauvelt (guitar, vocals), Parker Lusk (drums), Danny Hurley (bass), John Riccitelli (guitar).
FP: Where did you guys get the name Dana Swimmer?
JB: If you want the real story, which John didn’t want me to tell. . . when I was four years old, my parents told me that I was having a sister, and they asked me what I wanted to name her, and I picked the name “Dana Swimmer.†And they obviously didn’t choose that, so years later. . .
**JR**: We birthed another baby and its name was Dana Swimmer
**JB**: Exactly. I got to get my way somehow.
**DH**: Of course that’s predicated on the fact that we gave birth to Jack’s sister.
**JR**: To set the record straight, we have not birthed any children.
**PL**: Dana Swimmer is in the band, and she does play songs.
**JB**: My sister plays with us.
**PL**: She sings on some songs.
**FP: Is she the one with the floor tom in the videos?**
**JB**: She actually played drums for us, first. It’s kinda funny—Parker was on guitar, and it’s like, the band’s reversed in roles.
**JR**: Yeah, Jack was the first drummer—or, he used to play drums, and Parker played guitar. . .
**JB**: . . .before anybody. . .
**JR**: . . .yeah, before anybody else was in the band.
**PL**: Just the two of us in the basement, jamming.
**FP: So what’s her real name?**
**JB**: Maggie Blauvelt.
**FP: How long have y’all all been in Athens?**
**JR**: I’ve been here for five years, Danny’s been here for probably four—
**DH**: . . .about four years.
**JB**: . . . and we’re movin’ in on Wednesday!
**FP: Did Dana Swimmer relocate to Athens, or did Dana Swimmer come together in Athens?**
**PL**: Came together.
**JB**: We met John down here.
**JR**: It started when they came down here for a party, and then we’d hang out and stuff, and then we decided we wanted to play together. And then we would just alternate—I would go there when I could afford it—it was pretty much just dependent on where my income was at—if I could afford to come out to Cleveland, I’d go out there, and if not, then they’d be forced to come here.
**FP: You guys were in Cleveland?**
**JR**: Yeah, all the way in Cleveland, Georgia.
**FP: Oh! Cleveland, Georgia.**
**JR**: Yeah, not Cleveland, Ohio!
[laughter]
**DH**: I don’t always correct people when they ask that because I just think it sounds more interesting.
**FP: Who’s the principal songwriter?**
**JR**: Jack.
**JB**: I come in to practice with the songs written.
**JR**: It’s fun because Jack’s really creative with it, but for the most part it just comes out of a simple chord structure—it’s like a blank canvas.
**JB**: I come in there with the song basically written. I feel like I come in with a baby and I let you guys dress the baby.
[laughter]
**JR**: He writes the chord progressions and has the overall vision for the song, and then we try to play stuff tailored to his vision.
**DH**: I feel like we’re real good about deferring to his vision.
[laughter]
**DH**: Really, we don’t throw any ideas out until we’ve given them a try.
**FP: Jack, if you don’t mind me asking, what are your songs about?**
**JB**: What are my songs about? Well, I’ll tell you. The two that we played right then—one of them was a love song, and it’s called “Signs of Symmetryâ€â€”it’s about seeing a little bit of yourself in somebody else, I guess. And the other one was just about Mother Nature. And they have two hidden meanings that I won’t discuss.
**JR**: I don’t know what they’re about, either.
**FP: So, Jack, did the band bring you to Athens?**
**JB**: Well, I always I wanted to move here, I guess. I was playing with Parker—I grew up playing with him, and we kind of evolved into a little bit of a band that was called Orangeabove that was from Cleveland, and I eventually met John, and it worked out really well with him playing, and then Danny. . . so yeah, it’s brought me here—it’s a better place to play than Cleveland.
**FP: How many venues in Cleveland?**
**JR**: There aren’t many.
**PL**: There’s like a Christian metal venue.
**JR**: But it was really cool practicing in Cleveland, ‘cause like—
**JB**: There’s no distractions.
**JR**: Well, we practiced in a barn–ish sorta deal—I don’t really know what it is—it’s out in this really open-spaced ground. So it’s been really cool and conducive to riding cool skate ramps and shit. It’s really relaxing out there.
**FP: So when did the band start?**
**PL**: January of this year, I would say?
**JB**: Yeah, we were playing the songs since then. Danny just recently joined a couple of months ago.
**FP: Did you already have songs written, and you kinda pulled a band together?**
**JB**: Yeah.
**JR**: We used a couple of old songs, and then we wrote, like—I’d say you guys came with like three old songs, three or four old songs.
**FP: So, did you know all these guys before you started the band?**
**JB**: I mean, I knew Parker and our old bassist, George—he knew John, so we went from there. John jammed with us one day and it kinda worked. The chemistry was right.
**JR**: Me and Jack, when we first met each other, we would hang out in my room, real drunk, and he’s play his stuff, and I’d play mine, and he’s got his own little weird style, and I had mine. And we always talked about it—talked about doing it, and finally one day we did. I don’t even really know how that—how did it come to be, finally? Do you remember?
**JB**: We partied here one night, and we wrote a song together.
**DH**: Then we started drinking.
[laughter]
**DH**: I knew John.
**JR**: Yeah, me and Danny played in a band for a while together.
**DH**: A band that I sang in called The Falcones, John played bass. When that fell apart, we kinda stuck together. John kinda brought me into the fold.
**FP: So you knew John?**
**DH**: I really didn’t know John until about a month ago. I remember once—I think at the party that John mentioned earlier—John was telling me about this buddy of his—it was a house show, and a couple of bands had played—he said, “Hey, this buddy of mine’s doing really cool songs.†And this crazy-ass-fucking dude with long hair who’s like six-five stands up there and starts belting a couple of songs out to a bunch of drunk people in a living room, and I was like, “This is pretty cool.†I totally forgot about it until they asked me to come play bass, and I showed up and it was the same guy.
**JR**: I think how it really, really happened was that we had a house show, and they weren’t playing, but they had some songs, and when all the bands were done, they were like, “Dude, let’s play.†And I was like, “It’s my house, go for it—play.†And they played a couple of songs and everybody was like, man, this is awesome!
**JB**: And John was like, “I want in.â€
**JR**: That was the night we started talking about doing it for real, for real.
**FP: It sounds like you guys like playing music in Athens.**
**JR**: Yeah, we love it!
**JR**: I graduated college, and I was presented with the opportunity to leave, but this town, the atmosphere and the people it and stuff—I can’t—this is the greatest town I’ve been in to play music. I wouldn’t wanna leave it. We had a dinner meeting with an executive producer in Atlanta. He was kinda pushing us to kinda like do things, like—don’t pass out free CDs—make ‘em pay a couple bucks and have legit album artwork, and don’t just play shows at bars—like, you wanna get out and play big venues and stuff, but like, I think we really like doing that, we like the kinda broken-down, poor man’s way of doing music in Athens.
**DH**: Even the biggest bands in the world have a grassroots phase. If they don’t know where they’re coming from, how are they gonna know what to do?
**JR**: I feel like our energy goes well with Athens, or it has so far. It’s just like fun, you know, drinkin’ music.
**DH**: Really, at its core, we’re playing dance-y, indie rock. There are few better towns for something like that.
Dana Swimmer plays this Saturday, August 18 at Go Bar with Dude Magnets and The Barlettas.
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