Project Description
Interview with
MARCEL GADACZ
From
DREAM ON DREAMER
Interviewer: Laura Hughes
.
Dream on Dreamer was formed in 2009 by founding members Marcel Gadacz and Callan Orr who have since been producing music with the aim to instil themes of ambition and passion. The band has been built off the belief that nothing should be done by half measures and you’re either all in or not at all. It is with this strong sense of passion to be able to present themselves as nothing but the best that they can be, that they have decided to call it quits, eleven years since the bands inception.
However, they are not leaving their dedicated fans empty-handed, instead they are celebrating the end with a brand new album titled ‘What If I Told You It Doesn’t Get Better’ and a national headlining tour. They have always held their fans to the upmost highest regard, and are thanking them for allowing them to be on this amazing journey for the past decade. The band has had an incredibly rewarding career racking up over 50 millions streams, touring 24 countries, supporting some of the biggest names in the industry, as well as receiving multiple award nominations, including ARIA’s Best Heavy Rock Album. They have maintained their status in the heavy music scene, it will be sad goodbye when they finally part ways.
Amidst all of the chaos in the world right now, I got the opportunity to talk with vocalist Marcel Gadacz about the past eleven years of Dream on Dreamer, and their farewell.
.
.
What has the last eleven years of being in a band taught you?
It taught me that as arrogant as it might sound that you, as an individual person, will be capable of achieving anything you put your mind to.
Has there been any low points of being in a band that has taught you something as well?
Yes, definitely. As much as positivity and beautiful things happened, a lot of other stuff happens as well, and that all combined shapes your individual life; and I feel there has been lots of aspects where I look back at even financial stress, that artists experience through building the potential completely unsecured career, it’s literally very stressful and uncertain environment to have lived in. Because as you can probably imagine nothing in life is ever guaranteed, and definitely some aspects where like how are we going to do this, what does it take for us to be able to do the next step. There’s aspects of touring where it is sort of like ‘why would I want to be put in those circumstances in my life?’. When were in our twenties it was like well there are some of our friends trying to build houses, and you are just trying to survive, mean while you are playing in front of thousands of people every night. In somewhat, you have to live up to that persona of that somebody that is performing their art to a crowd of people who I guess who don’t know anything about yourself except they love what you do. It’s just a very crazy experience that I could have ever lived with, and it puts some many things into perspective too; I’m a big fan of always developing myself and not to stand still, and I feel like what most bands have experienced in touring life have gone through that most people in their eighties have never gone through, it is such an experience. So for that I feel that every artist is always, I guess, it is always admirable to give up everything around them, and focus on something that has so certainty.
So that has taught you to be very resilient in a sense…
Yes very much so, and also psychologically can warp what regular life can be like, and also what the priorities of life are. There is so many things that you find out that you just have to somewhat be okay with anything and everything to always happen in the most unexpected way. Not a lot of people live like that because of the insecurity, and if you want security you can never be an artist.
Has you being an artist ever stunted you in where you’ve wanted to be?
It’s just one of those things that is very relative. I have experienced things that those people would have never be abled to experience, so guess from that ‘what is really important in life?’, it the importance that you come out of school and then forced to be in a job that you might not like, and then live on and participate in the problem of the world, in my eyes. I guess I’ve always wanted to have a liberal life in some sense, it’s not like that this is an easy path as I said, but it’s a path that I will never regret because it strengthens you as a person so much, like as you said before about resilience, you learn how to find the beauty in the most weirdest ways, and that’s what I’ve always tried to do with music; you find yourself when you lose yourself, and when you come undone you learn so much as being an artist if you do it for the right reasons, if anything it just benefits you later in life.
What has been the most pivotal point in your career?
I couldn’t probably put it down to one, but I feel like the most pivotal point would be that, like we’re talking MySpace days where MySpace was a platform where people found their favourite artists, and we were right on that at the end of end it, we’re still very much a band that started off on MySpace, and having seeing that people sincerely care about what we create, I think that’s one of those things where it underlines anything, and I guess it really makes you see that it’s somewhat worth it. Artists aren’t necessarily meant to be educated on people, and they are spending a lot of time doing that, and when people get anything out of what you create that’s a step forward of you should be doing more, especially when get onto your first tour and it’s like whoa we have reached a stage of where we can be a touring band, and then it gets international and you see other people around the world who don’t even speak your language; it’s such a beautiful experience, that I’m never going to regret what I’ve had to give up for the past eleven years, I wouldn’t be able to make any of that happen.
.
.
What has it been like preparing to let go of the band?
If anything, it’s not so much of letting go of this, it’s more so that we need to look at it from a point that would’ve never really dreamt of achieving the things that we have achieved, and for anything that has come now these are just extra bonuses that we get to get to experience, we’re not throwing the towel in because we don’t want to do this anymore or things aren’t working, things are working better than they ever have, especially growing up to be more of an adult now. It’s just that when you’ve set out things that you’ve wanted to achieve something, and when you’ve reached that point where it feels so natural and so liberating for that to be it. We’ve achieved literally everything we’ve set out, and we have probably achieved those things many years ago. There’s a relationship that you have with that part of your life that you don’t necessarily like to let go of because that’s all you know; I’ve only ever really known this in terms of work, and it in terms what I put my heart and soul into, I’m not talking about all the personal life that takes a lot of priority in life too, I’m just talking artistically and musically, that’s just one of those things where if anything we’re letting this chapter end on the very highest note, and that’s why we’re putting out another album no really expected because who does that? People make albums because they feel that this album will be the next thing that will our break through, but for us it doesn’t matter where it goes this is going to be the last album for time being, and this is the end of the chapter and we are giving you another album to listen to and remember us for what we are and what we always were.
How do you think your new album will compare to your previous, and how has your music evolved since the beginning?
With this one, because we were in the mindset of this being out last album, so we really didn’t have any limitations. We’ve always been into heavier music, as well we’ve been into slower softer music, everybody has their own individual taste, and I feel like with this album we are really showcasing what we’ve done eleven years ago, and what we were passionate about eleven years ago, and also what we’ve turned into of the progress of our time. The ten songs that really showcase every single side that we’ve ever had; you hear everything on this album, you hear catchy songs, you hear big breaks and big breakdowns, and big heavy bridges, and lyrical content that is somewhat draws you in a way. We’re still sticking to our guns, we’ve never sold out, people always like to say that, the band goes softer means they’re selling out, like what is selling out? Not that I’m accusing you of saying that, I’m just saying if somebody was to ask why have they changed so much, because as an individual person you grow so much, and if anything personally for me I don’t like standing still, I like to further develop my skills, like I’ve been screaming into the microphone for part of our career, and I would be angry and getting nosebleeds every show because I’m in such aggressive state, like that’s cool and was very much what I needed at the time, but what’s next? What was next was to develop a skill that I’ve never had before which was singing, and being able to deliver other aspects of my voice and my artistry, and learn something that I was completely unaware of that I could do; and perhaps maybe that is something we should maybe all do when we find we’re standing still, we need to step into the dark, step into the unknown, and then really challenge ourselves again, because that’s always what life is going to be, it’s a challenge it’s a learning curve. We’re never going to know everything, we’re never going to be totally happy or satisfied, we need to keep going and that’s how I live my life.
Over the years the albums lyrically have become more and more personal and important to you, what made you make that switch, and did it provide a platform of catharsis for you?
When you look at the lyrical content of it all, I feel like we’ve had the same topic from the get-go, there was hope, there was love, there was lost, and I feel like that’s something that everybody has in their life, you’re not human if you don’t have that. For us, for how it changed from coming the heavier, the idea and the base of it all has stayed the same, it’s just being delivered in a different way.
.
.
Did Dream On Dream provide a platform for you send a message that you wouldn’t have had otherwise?
Majorly yes. The straight up answer to that is yes, because it allowed us to be ourselves, to find ourselves, to be lost together and to be us, and to try because that’s all we can do in life, everybody just tries no one knows, no one knows anything everybody just tries and pretends they know and that’s whats beautiful about it all, we can all try together and it’s not some much that it’s a one way street, like I don’t know more than you do in terms of how someone should or shouldn’t be, we’ve probably all know some aspects of it that others don’t know, but in terms of music it definitely has. I still when I listen to music I personally like, that helps me, I’m on the overside in a sense, I’m providing music for people to listen to, but I also still love listening to music so I’m somewhat someone that is being helped to be guided along the way; and that’s what music is, that’s what music should be like, be guided together, just make each other a better person; and there’s so much going on in the music world right now where it’s almost, I wouldn’t say unacceptable because that’s what society has created in a sense, but I feel like there’s a lot of stuff that I really really disagree with, but who am I to make those judgements? That’s just what I take from it. I will always make music until I die in a sense that it’s sort of my outlook on it, it doesn’t mean it’s the right outlook; it’s just all you can do as a person I guess is try to be true to yourself, or find a way to be true to yourself.
How have you approached writing this last album?
To be quite honest I think we didn’t really think about it that much, in terms of we’ve always really had our flavour and we’ve just stuck to it, like we found what our strengths were and we showcased those more. In the first albums we kind of just tried and hoped that people get it; this is just one of those things where we’re just showcasing what we’re good at, and it doesn’t mean that there needs to be huge political content, although I would really like to do that in my life, Dream On Dreamer wasn’t the platform for me to bring across my opinion in a political sense, so it’s always been true sense of life and very much I guess journeys. We think about our personal experiences and showcase those and hope that people may have experienced something similar, or maybe perhaps look at things differently after listening to the songs.
If you could pick an album or a song to encapsulate Dream on Dreamer what would it be a why?
For some reason the one that pops straight up in my mind is off ‘Songs Of Soulitude’ and the song is called ‘Society to Anxiety’, and I feel like that’s a song that tells it all. But then again, in terms of developing into what we’ve become ‘Runaway’ off the last album has really based artistically, it’s just one of those songs that’s so raw and heavy but at the same sense so beautiful that I still to this day would get goosebumps from the very start until the end, because it’s such a perfect climax at the end where I feel like this is what Dream On Dream is about, I feel like the last album ‘Runaway’ or even ‘Let It In’ they’re songs that are really showcasing what we can do as a band, and what we’ve been able to achieve, which is define beauty incompletely times of despair, being lost and finding your way out.
.
.
Connect with DREAM ON DREAMER
Website | Facebook | Instagram
Twitter | YouTube
.
.
CLICK THE PIC TO VIEW THE NEWS
.
