Interview Rock in Rock Island

Calls to sound the death knell of the music industry have rung far and wide since the beginning of the decade, but one rogue gang of hardcore music nerds have carried on without much regard for the drama on the charts. With the 2006 launch of Daytrotter, a website devoted to hosting unique in-studio performances by both blog darlings and hopeful newcomers, touring artists passing through Rock Island, IL are offered an opportunity to spend one day recording four tracks in a fully stocked studio. Though much of the staff is finally able to call Daytrotter a full-time gig, the unwavering goal of the project remains: To help bands help themselves. Founder Sean Moeller recently let The A.V. Club pick his brain about how bands can keep gas in the van and PBRs in the green room, and what it feels like to be compared to John Peel.

The A.V. Club: What’s the most interesting thing about operating Daytrotter?

Sean Moeller: In the beginning, we didn’t know what kind of impact Daytrotter would have, but getting to know these bands in a more intimate way has built a lot of really great friendships, and we’ve started to realize that we can have an impact in more ways that just having a cool website.

AVC: What kind of impact?

SM: For most of these people, the band is their full-time job. When they tell us Daytrotter helps them further the band and make the most of their time on tour, it feels good to know we’re helping. More and more, bands have to think like that—they can’t do all of the late nights and partying because being on the road is the only way they’re making money. Touring is not only how bands make money these days, but it’s their version of presidential campaign stumping; it’s where they meet people, it’s where they make friends, its where they’re taking advantage of generosity. If you stay on someone’s floor they’re usually fans for life.

AVC: Daytrotter’s growth has been mostly organic. How did it happen and how do you plan to continue growing?

SM: We have some pretty big plans for the next year, basically to help bands make more money, and I think they’re going to make a one-day stop at Daytrotter worth it for pretty much anybody. When we first started, it was more or less “come in and record some songs, we’ll throw them up on this website and hopefully people will check them out.” It’s to the point now where we know people are checking them out, and most bands that come in and record don’t want to leave. They’re out there telling their friends who they tour with, who tell their friends, and it just grows by word of mouth. It’s great for us, but when it’s all said and done it’s ultimately benefiting musicians who are out there working every day.

AVC: What makes Daytrotter different from other live recording projects out there, like Clear Channel’s AT&T Blue Room?

SM: The way we do sessions here is completely different from the way most big radio stations do them. We record everything to analog tape, we have tons of gear for them to use, and we let them take their time. We’ve never once told a band to play a specific song, and the artists retain all of the rights to their sessions. They own these recordings, and we like operating that way because bands can use the sessions to hopefully make some money.

AVC: Daytrotter doesn’t encourage or discourage bands from doing anything they want to with their sessions. Do you find that most artists want to try alternate versions or new songs when they’re in your studio?

SM: It’s just the nature of bands that are touring—the record you’re touring for is one you probably recorded six or seven months ago, so there’s bound to be new songs or different versions of old songs. It’s probably a combination of boredom setting in and the chance to play on all of our collected vintage instruments that they may not have back home. Now that the site has been up for a couple of years, the bands that come in here are familiar with the recordings we make here and have an idea of how they want to use the room.

AVC: It seems like recording a Daytrotter session has almost become a rite of passage for touring bands.

SM: Oh, I hope that’s true! We’ve been pretty honored by the reactions we’ve gotten in these first few years—people have compared what we do to John Peel. I think there are quite a few differences, but what we appreciate about that comparison is that Peel really made a difference and we feel like we can make a difference in helping bands. It’s bittersweet because the fatality rate of young bands is so high right now—so many great bands don’t make it past a second record, and we hope we can help more bands reach that goal of making music their life.

AVC: How do you find new music, and is it a goal for you to break new bands?

SM: I hope we can do that. I try to schedule the postings of the sessions so that we can get a little extra exposure for the smaller bands that we have a hunch about. For instance, earlier this week we posted a Sunset Rubdown session that we knew would be big no matter what, and so the next session we posted was Butane Variations, a great band that most people probably haven’t heard of.

AVC: How do you plan to expand Daytrotter’s audience in 2008?

SM: Right now we’re talking to Bruce Warren from World Café in Philadelphia about doing a weekly half-hour Daytrotter show on NPR, which we think would be really fun. I’ve always believed it’s too bad that this music isn’t reaching everyone who might enjoy it. There’s nothing wrong with a 50-year-old digging Richard Swift, and there’s a lot of music that we feature on our site that doesn’t have to be exclusive to college-aged indie kids. I think that the majority of our readership are people who already know bands like Okkervil River and Cold War Kids, but there are plenty of people out there who have never heard of those bands. You’ll never convince me that someone who loves The Beatles or the Rolling Stones won’t be able to get into, like, Dr. Dog. It’s not gonna kill them, and they might even like it.