Dorje [Exclusive Interview]
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Shortly before they stepped onstage and owned Guildfordian alternative music hotspot the Boileroom for the duration of a sick set reviewed in full here, TMMP caught up with fast-rising British alt-metallers Dorje for an exclusive and rare off-camera chat…
You’re about halfway through a two-week UK tour. How’re you feeling right now?
Dave Hollingworth (Bass): I’m slightly in pain, because I put my back out at the Birmingham show.
Ben Minal (Drums): I feel good, because it’s nice when you get a few dates into a tour and things start to feel more routine, and you can just focus on relaxing and enjoying the show. The first show, for me, is always a bit nerve-wracking because I feel like I haven’t proved that everything’s fine until the first show. That’s how I always feel.
Rob Chapman (Vocals/Guitar): I feel the first shows have gone really, really well – but I got very very tired on the way back from Nottingham. So I’m recovering from being tired – and to be honest after this gig I’m just going to go to bed. Sleep as long as I can, and prepare myself for the next few shows.
Ben: We could try and make it sound more exciting, but…!
Rob: It’s very British though, isn’t it!
Dave: Yeah, I’m knackered! And there’s not enough tea!
Rob: What I would say is, every gig is progressively getting better. Not just in terms of, from my point of view, the performance, but also from the audience. They’re loving it. And that’s great.
Rabea Massaad (Guitar): I’m a little bit tired, because we had a really long drive back from Nottingham, but apart from that all good. I’m just up for the rest of the shows. Once you get on the road, you don’t really want to get off it.
What’s your favourite thing about playing live?
Ben: I love playing drums anyway – it’s fucking awesome – but playing live is really where everything you do comes together. My top moments are…
Dave: Me.
Ben: Playing with Dave. Anything I do with Dave feels like a peak life experience. Even just waiting for him to finish having a shit – I’m just like “I’m so glad it’s Dave I’m waiting for…”
But seriously, playing onstage is such an immersive experience. And for me it’s looking at someone’s face during a section I know is just filth, and they’ve got the gurn of doom going on. I just smile and go “…you dirty bastard…”
Rob: Yeah, it’s the feeling when you’ve gripped them completely, and they’re yours musically. That’s a nice feeling, and then you can play with that.
Dave: What I really like is that when you play a gig, nothing else is going on in your life. Nothing else goes through your head…
Rob: Yeah!
Dave: …so it’s kind of like a weird escapism, where you’re in an alternate reality. Nothing else exists in that little world.
Rob: That’s very true. It’s like someone starts reading a story to you, and then it ends and you come to onstage. And everyone’s cheering. And also, sometimes, if it doesn’t feel that way, I can push myself back into it being a story. I don’t like being aware of it though.
Dave: Another thing about gigging is being offstage and realising that the gig’s over and you do have to pay that council tax bill.
Rabea: It’s about the risk of getting shit wrong, for me personally. Because there’s people watching, it changes the game completely. If you’re in a rehearsal room that’s fine – you can make as many mistakes as you want, and there’s only the four of you to take the piss out of each other for fucking up. But onstage, it’s like a different mindset.
If you make a mistake onstage you feel really ashamed. Or I do. As soon as I do it, I think “…that was horrible, and people paid for that kind of thing.” So that’s what I enjoy – the risk of getting stuff wrong.
What’s the funniest thing that’s ever happened during a Dorje show?
Dave: It was actually at this venue, a year or two ago. Rob fucked his guitar into the floor and broke the toggle switch off.
Rob: Yeah, I had sex with my guitar onstage, and it went into the floor and the toggle switch went back into the cavity.
Ben: There’s a been a few for me. There was a guy who wanted us to write on his face for his birthday. He was pissed, it was one in the morning, the bars were shutting, everyone was having a good time, and we got our markers out and Bea drew a cock on the guy’s face. We didn’t realise the guy had work the next day.
Rob: To be fair, he wouldn’t really leave us alone. He hounded us everywhere with this pen going “Draw on my face, draw on my face!” So he asked to be drawn on; he didn’t specify what! I wrote my name – Bea drew a cock.
Also, the other night, I went to introduce a new song called Catalyst. I was like “This is a new song, and we’ve never played it live before. It’s called…” and then Ben started playing so nobody heard the name of the song!
Rabea: There was one moment which wasn’t funny for Dave, when he really needed to go for a shit onstage. Every time I looked across at him, the poor guy was like red face, looking like he was holding on for dear life. That was quite funny.
Ben: So brutal!
Rabea: It was pretty brutal. He made it through the gig though.
Dave: I’d just like to say thankyou for bringing that one up…
Rabea: He put his bass down at the end and just bolted!
Performing live can be a really intense experience. Do you get nerves or stage fright – and if you do, how do you get around that?
Rob: We just take the piss out of each other. A lot.
Dave: I’m normally fine.
Rob: I get my nerves a week before tour. But today I’m a bit more nervous because I’m tired, I’m keen to get my voice lubed up, but also there are a few people in the audience that we know – and that always makes it a bit weird. Not weird, but like, Dave’s mum is there…
Ben: It puts a more real slant on it. I got nervous about two days before the tour; I was like “Oh fuck, I really hope I’m well prepared, and I understand my parts, and blah blah blah, hope nothing goes wrong,” and then I was a bit nervous just before the first Brighton show. But since the first show was so killer, I walked onstage the nights after that just excited.
I feel good today. Probably about 10% cautious, wanting to make sure it’s all good, but I’m really up for it.
Rabea: the only time I get nervous is just before a part I need to get right. So not going onstage – that isn’t it. It’s literally the section just before the section I’m worried about. So for instance Aeromancy, with the guitar solo, I know a lot of people are listening out for it, and that’s where I get a little like “…don’t fuck up.”
Is there a spiritual element to what you do?
Rob: Lyrically, there is. Absolutely.
Ben [Quickly]: Rob thinks he’s God. [Everyone laughs]
Rob [Laughing]: For fuck’s sake… [More laughter]
Dave: I think it’s like an emotional vent at a gig for me. I think my personality type would be a lot different if I didn’t gig.
Rob: He’d be a nice guy…
Dave: Yeah!
Rob: It’s like a vent for you. A catharsis.
Dave: Yeah.
Rabea: As far as I’m concerned, I think when you’re onstage and you’re playing, whether it’s improvised or playing through songs, it’s a hypnotic kind of thing. You’re just in your own world, nothing matters, nobody else matters except the four of you in that moment making sure that sound comes out how you intend it to. I think that takes a certain level of…whether it’s a spiritual, mental, or meditative state that you all get into, it isn’t like every man for himself.
Ben: It’s an immersion.
Rob: I like that. I like synergy. When I’m really singing with maximum intent at one person in the audience, moving around from person to person…
Kind of like what Steve Vai does.
Rob: Yeah…you often get a connection, and it feels good.
What are your passions outside of Dorje?
Rabea: Skateboarding, which is hands down one of the best things ever invented. Also the stuff I’m doing for myself like Jamtracks, learning how to be a better lead player, and Toska, because that just exercises the side of the creative mind that doesn’t get exercised unless I focus on doing it because it’s a side project, and therefore it doesn’t always get the time. I’m very interested in writing more music for that.
Rob: Cookery, martial arts, all my work stuff – I really enjoy running a guitar company [Chapman Guitars] obviously, and then gaming. I love playing stupid games on the Playstation with me bird, just chilling out.
Ben: I like reading about ideas, finding ideas, whether it’s through videos or books. I like psychology, thinking about what makes us tick, health – all sorts of stuff, I’ll read about it. I’ve been on an ideas binge for a while. Obviously I run musicisum, which exercises my desire to create.
Tell us a bit more about musicisum.
Ben: Musicisum is an online music school that by the end of the year will be a big, multi-discipline school for guitar, singing, production, and drums – and basically it’s way of creating a music learning experience that’s more guided and fun and gamified and reward-based, rather than just “…here’s a thousand guitar lessons, now work it out!” So that’s something where I can literally sit down and think “…what’s the best thing I could possibly create in this area?” And I have the ability and the people around me to actually make that happen. I don’t songwrite, I don’t draw, I’m not very artistic outside of playing drums, and musicisum is like my personal creation. An experience for people who want to learn music.
Dave: Production. I run a studio [The Cove], and I’m usually busy either playing music with Dorje or Toska or recording other people’s stuff. Aside from that, I like to go for random trips to wherever – forests and stuff, just walking. I’m also quite into stuff like sacred geometry, quantum mechanics, and stuff like that. So in terms of searching for knowledge, it’s all that kind of weird new age crap that nobody thinks is cool!
Rob: Nice shapes. Pretty shapes and triangles.
What motivates you?
Rob: A really good meal. Really good friends, banter, just living a great life. Chilling, hanging out…
Rabea: That’s a hard one. I’m trying to source it to one point, where I really got motivated. Normally, I motivate myself by envisaging the scenario that I want to achieve. So if it’s something like getting in shape, which is a really good one for me, and it kind of yo-yos for me too. What normally happens is I just imagine, kind of like a daydream, but very vivid, just me doing the routines and getting up and making the smoothie and going and working out, coming back and it’s all very real, and then it becomes something else. It becomes real, which is what it’s all about.
That’s how I like to motivate myself, whether it’s guitar, music, or whatever. It’s the same process.
Ben: I’m motivated by the fact that life’s fucking short. And I know that I would feel like shit in my older age if I felt like I hadn’t taken risks and done stuff that I cared about. I’m really driven by wanting to feel happy, fulfilled, and excited. That is all the stuff I’m into – it’s based around making me feel like that. Learning how to do that more for yourself, and wanting to feel that “…yeah, I can shape my life in a way that makes me feel really excited and passionate, and have more of that in your life.”
Steve Jobs said that death is life’s greatest invention, because that is what gives it meaning.
How about you, Dave?
Rob: Shapes.
Ben: Vans and dry food? [Laughter]
Dave: My method is similar to Bea’s, in that I see it happening before it happens. Then it happens. I guess the only thing that motivates me that hasn’t been said is that I’ve done other jobs in the past that I don’t want to do again.
Rabea: Yeah, that’s a good one. Remembering what we used to do.
Ben: Knowing what you don’t want is just as important as knowing what you don’t want.
Rabea: Especially given what we used to do. Working in warehouses and taking houses off people.
Taking houses off people?
Rabea: I used to work in litigation. I also used to work in probate and bereavement, shutting down people’s accounts because they’d died. Didn’t matter what age they were, either. I had to shut down an account for someone who was 18, who died in a jetski accident. Brutal.
So what’s the worst job that you’ve had?
Rabea: Rob can go last, because his one’ll be harsh. I know Rob’s worked some shitty jobs. But for me, debt collection. No – Acorn stairlifts! Selling stairlifts to old people that had no idea what day it was, who they were, basically taking advantage of people’s old age. It was horrible. I ended up talking to people and finding out about their lives. I remember one old woman telling me what it was like being around London during a world war. [Finding out about people] was alright, but the job itself was shit.
Ben: I sold glue and adhesives to people who had visited the website of this company, and not bought anything but left an email address. So I had to chase up cold leads who might be interested in adhesive products! That was absolutely crazy. I also worked in a warehouse with these guys, and it was good fun but there were times when we were packing doormats and going “…this is fucking bollocks.”
Dave: Mine would be the same, but it was so much better when I was working with these guys. Prior to that I had to sit or stand in a very cold warehouse with an empty pallet one side of me, and a pallet full of doormats on the other side, and just sit there for hours and put tags on doormats. That was just shit.
Ben: One time we got to drive forklift trucks. That was alright.
Dave: That was loads better. Go on, Rob.
Rob: Carving the names of dead children into cemetery headstones. That was pretty bad.
Rabea: Fuck my life!
Ben: That’s dark.
Rob: It was pretty bad, yeah. But hey ho.
This question’s more cheerful. What makes you happy?
Rob: Great food, great friends, chilling out, my wonderful fiance Natassja Saliba, who I’m marrying this year. And all my friends in my band, and my level 12 witch doctor on Diablo 3.
Rabea: I’ve managed to nail it down to four, not in order though. One: Girlfriend. Two: Friends. Three: The ability to create music and be musically competent; I’ve got to this level from years of doing it. Four…
Rob: Heroin.
Rabea: …now being in a position now where I can honestly say I earn a living from playing guitar. Because that was the dream. Even if it’s not materialised on the main stage at Download – yet, and I say that with confidence – for me personally it is that. I’m earning money from playing guitar, which I never thought I’d be able to do.
Ben: I am made happy by connection with people. I really like talking to people, and I love banter and being funny with people. And I’m definitely made happy by perspective, how grateful I am sometimes. I get lost in it all when I take a moment to go “…fucking hell, life is mint!”
I feel really grateful to just be in the life that I’m in.
Rabea: And me. I make Ben happy.
Ben: Bea makes me happy.
Rob: Dave, what makes you happy?
Dave: All the same things, really. Girlfriend, friends, life in general, and not having to tag doormats anymore.
Beyond this tour, what are your plans for the rest of 2015?
Rob: Album release…
Rabea: Album release, more gigs, festivals…
Rob: Tour America with Chapman Guitars. Festivals, yeah.
When is the album [Centred & One, previewed below] coming out?
Ben: June.
Rob: Midnight on the 14th of June. It’s exactly between two of our birthdays.
Ben: It’ll be midnight when the pre-release drops.
Rabea: It’s the album and festivals for Dorje, probably securing some tours next year, and Rob’s getting married this year. We might even start writing album two, if we get a chance. For everyone else there’s musicisum, the Cove Studios, there’s Toska, there’s countless other bits. Chapman Guitars, Panama Guitars, so much stuff going on for everyone…it’s working, and that’s what we’re focussing on.
Ben: When I get back from tour I’ll be working on finishing the singing course for musicisum. Beasting that, getting that out, and then sitting down with Dave to work out how to create the best production course out there! Toska will record an EP…
Rabea: There’ll be a new Jamtracks package coming out from me, the Chapman Guitars tour. Loads of stuff.
Thanks for taking the time to do this! Great stuff.
Ben: No worries, bro!
Dave: Thanks man.
Rob [Standing] I have to piss like a racehorse…
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