What is your name and how old are you? My name is Dario and I’m the singer/guitarist of Stella Diana. How old? I’m still very young 🙂
What is your genre of music? I love new wave, post punk, shoegazing and classical music, but I can’t reduce everything to these genres. Music is so sweeping and I/we listen a lot of it. Lately, for example, I’m listening Massive Attack.
Why did you want to go in to this genre? It’s something natural for us. Shoegazing is a sort of chaos; pure sounds, melodic noise and the chance to push everything over. We’d like to create a big wave of sound full of desire, dream and reverb…
How did you all meet? Give us a little bio about you. This line up has three years but I founded the band with Giacomo many years ago. At the beginning we played with a drum machine, then we found a drummer. During these years we changed ten drummers and we added another guitarist, a dear friend of ours: Raffaele. Now we are me, vocals and guitar, Giacomo on the bass guitar and Davide on drums.
How long have you been doing music? I don’t remember exactly when I started to get involved with music. I think when I was on high school. I played in a lot of bands with a lot of people, but you know, these are the kind of things where you only think about to rock and have fun. Stella Diana is my first (and the last) serious project.
What made you go in to music?When I listened The Doors for the first time. I was ten and I thought: ok, that’s right. I don’t know how I can do but I want to do this…
Are you signed? In the past we had two labels. Seahorse recordings for the first album and happy/mopy for Gemini our 2nd album. From 41 51 93 and now Nitocris, we have our personal label: Vipchoyo Sound Factory. An indie label created with heart and passion. We are available for each Italian or foreign musical proposal.
You are releasing an ‘LP’ called ‘Nitocris’ tomorrow, tell us more about it. Nitocris was an Egyptian queen, it seems she really existed. it is said that she was beautiful, but, and this is very strange, there is no painting or monument that represents her and this is terrible. It’s the same as it happens in our lives. We live, eat, work, make music, love, but for a strange reason, sometimes, people forget about us, about what we did during our life. It’s heartbreaking and melancholic. so with Nitocris for these reasons we wanted a very dark sound much darker then it was in the past. We worked hardly on the rhythmic and we think that this obsessive sound of bass and drums can take the listener to obscure lands full of atmosphere. We tried to make a fusion of shoegazing and 80’s new wave like The Sound or Echo and the Bunnymen united with Ride and Slowdive.
Tell us more about the background of the tracks individually. Each song is connected to the other. For us it’s a kind of a unique theme. Sofia is a slow and intense lullaby with the same words from the beginning to the end. F.U. Orionis it’s a march that explodes with its sonic guitars. Let me see. Oh yes there is Dedu’n. Dedu’n is like the ocean, a stormy ocean with a final psychedelic maelstrom. Psychedelic Furs is a gentle ballad. With M.9 we are very shoegazing, yes it’s short and shoegazing. J. Carpenter it’s a tribute to one of my favorite directors. Don’t you think that the synth is very “Escape from New York?” I put also a sampler of big trouble in Chinatown at the end. Aphrodia recalls to me something of Ride.
Will you be doing any gigs or a Tour? Unfortunately we had to cancel some gigs because I had health problems. But we are an independent band so we are always on tour 🙂
Now I’m ok and we are ready to rock around Italy. However, at the same time we are looking for a booking agency cause it’s impossible to do everything by ourselves.
Who are your influences and how do you get inspiration to write songs? Musically for me and also for my pals, joy division, Bauhaus, talk talk, slowdive, cocteau twins, lush, strangelove, cure, pale saints, mazzy star, ride, adorable, six by seven, the cult, Christian death, echo and the bunnymen, savages, warpaint, editors. It’s impossible to make a list. But I think also to Beethoven, Mahler, the Neapolitan School of 18th-century with Scarlatti, Pergolesi, etc. The cinema: lynch, carpenter, lucas, ridley scott, gus van sant, tarantino and the Italian school: rossellini, visconti, de sica, sordi, tot≥. In particular, for me, it’s philosophy because I teach philosophy, painting, and literature. I love Philip Dick, William Gibson and all the cyberpunk and sci-fi genre. All of this helps to create our sound and my lyrics.
Where do you see yourself now in 5 Years? Oh. Let me think. It’s a bad question 🙂 I’m writing a cyberpunk novel. I want to complete my literary saga and hope I have achieved my goals with the band.
When you’re not doing music, what do you do? as I said I teach history and philosophy, I like writing, reading, watch movies and concerts and, of course, being a fan of my favourite football team: Napoli. Giacomo is always very busy with Vipchoyo Sound Factory, his recording studio and our label and Davide plays the drums all the day.
If you could collaborate with one UK Artist who would it be? The dream became reality last April. In fact, we played with one of our idols: Patrick Duff of Strangelove. It was really amazing and after his gig we played FREAK together. So can I still have three options? Rachel Goswell of Slowdive, Andy Bell of Ride but I’d like to work with joy division producer, martin hannett. He was a genius.
If you could collaborate with one USA Artist who would it be? oh it’s very simple: hope sandoval of mazzy star and interpol.
Where is your dream venue or festival to perform in UK or in USA? maybe reading or something in N.Y. or L.A. but we have no preference. Give us only a careful and passionate audience…
What was the song you listened to most that influenced you to go more in to the music scene? primal of Slowdive…
If you could get one of your songs on a TV show, which would it be?Mmhh.. yes, F.U. Orionis
When you are at a gig, what are 5 things you must take with you or remember? the sheets with my lyrics, my plectrums, some bottle of water, a picture of Maradona as a lucky charm and I repeat to myself: keep calm, go easy, don’t worry: this will be the best gig you’ve ever done…
Do you have social media accounts so your new fans can follow you.
sure. you can follow us on facebook, twitter, bandcamp, you tube, tumblr or Soundcloud. Here are some links:
Website: http://www.stelladiana.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/StellaDianaBand
Bandcamp: https://stelladiana.bandcamp.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/stelladiana4
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/user/stelladianaband/videos
Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/stella-diana-1
