Die Twice
Through the creative challenges of chasing originality while staying true to an artistic identity one band from Exeter seem to be piecing together the puzzle and crafting genre bending rock that holds its commercial accessibility.
Die Twice are a four piece rock band, famed for their dynamic vocals and palatial guitar lines who are no strangers to indulging in the sights and sounds of various musical avenues. While the band's homebase seems to lie around indie-rock influences from genres such as dream-pop, blues, punk, soul and Latin have painted Die Twice in a shade it makes hard to put one's finger on.
Best represented by lead singer Oliver’s vocal dexterity and amorous delivery, this young band are leading the march of emerging talent seeking boundary pushing rock arrangements while keeping it accessible through catchy melodies and hooks, enigmatic lyrics, and popular song form.From fan favorite indie-rock anthem ‘Paris’ to latin inspired ‘Shakey Mosquito’ there doesn’t seem to be a limit to where Die Twice will draw influence from; to a point however as to not dissociate from their eminent core sound. Their latest release ‘Princess’ sees the band take a more guitar driven approach to their arrangement with a bolstering guitar riff as the main focal point of the song. Followed by the forceful vocals that get right in your face altogether were left with a blues style room moving anthem that sees the band look to already move their art in new directions away from previous work.
Looking over the band's discography from their beginnings in 2021 Die Twice have released three EP’s with each building upon the previous through matured song craft, professional production and daring experimentation. Their third and latest EP ‘A Beautiful Thing’ is undoubtedly a creative milestone for the band that sees them bring a progressively maturer sound to their recordings while holding onto the playfulness and ambiguity of their songwriting. This release saw the band take a brave step into experimenting with sounds they’d never touched before such as the back beat ska influence of Evelyn, the spoken word vocal approach and airy shapelessness of Eventually, as well as the soul inspired smoothness of Model. As a whole ‘A Beautiful Things’ lives up to its name by collectively standing as a set of five artistically diverse tracks that shape an image of a moment in the band's life, and vividly calls upon an experience in every listener's life.
Although every track on ‘A Beautiful Thing’ has its own right to greatness, lead single ‘Paris’ is (in my opinion) nothing short of a masterpiece, highlighting the band's strengths through their pristine songcraft, creative flexibility and Oliver’s ornate vocal delivery;of which one could relate to that of 90’s icon Jeff Buckley. What we receive is Paris is a catchy indie-rock anthem with dream-pop and blues influences that elevates up to a euphoric crescendo and leaves us open endedly hanging on the edge of our seats. Being the final track of the EP it perfectly resembles a semicolon in place of a full stop painting an air of obscurity over this band's already secretive identity and asking the question “Where are we going next?”
An open letter posted on the bands social media accounts upon the night of ‘A Beautiful Things’ release gives a new layer and depth to the pride and love this group feel towards what they created since forming, not just musically but socially through sharing priceless experiences together; of which you can only find from being in a band.
Four years into their music journey Die Twice have already broken ground by establishing a growing dedicated fanbase (of which I find myself part of now) and achieving an average of 2,000 plus monthly listeners on Spotify; which in today's music industry is a true milestone not too many achieve. Although I was devastated to hear the band pull out of their recent Northampton headline show, the anticipation and excitement I feel towards finally seeing Die Twice live is palpable and that I hope to share with others.
For fans of rough cut indie-rock that playfully moves around a medley of musical avenues, Die Twice are the next band to add to your discovery playlist.
