Cacie Dalager and Brad Hale are bright-eyed and affable (as those in their early 20s are wont to be), but the music they makes as Now, Now Every Children tends toward the dark and brooding. The band's show at Emo's Jr. tomorrow night will be fleshed out with bass and keyboards, but its full-length debut, Cars, features Dalager and Hale alone, banging out a series of Yeah Yeah Yeahs-esque, slow-burning songs. it's a series of long fuses leading to inevitable explosions; The gorgeous “Not One, But Two,” starts with Hale’s crackling drums and Dalager’s chugging electric guitar, and eventually blows up amid her understated vocals. Before taking heading out on their current tour, Dalager and Hale spoke with Decider about their band geek roots, expectations vs. results, and having you manager/best friend/label rep produce your record.
Decider: You met in high-school marching band. Does that still influence what you’re doing now?
Brad Hale: I think it influences the way I think about drumming, and how I don’t want everything to be so strictly rock beats. It makes me think outside of that, and subconsciously the musical memories I have from it, you could say, creep into it somehow, the syncopation.
D: Do you hear that percussive quality when you’re initially writing these songs?
Cacie Dalager: There are certain things I don’t want, or certain things we try to avoid every time, like the 4/4 steady rock beat. There are parts where I’ll hear a certain little thing of a drum part, or kind of an idea, but Brad usually is the master behind figuring out how to take my brain and make it into something that actually exists and sounds better than what I would think of.
D: How do the songs tend to sound to you in the end, compared to how you envisioned them?
CD: It depends on the song, but with Brad’s contribution, it usually ends up better than what I would have in my head originally. When we first started the song “Cars,” it started out on guitar and more upbeat, and happier-sounding. Now it’s more laid-back, and there isn’t even a guitar in it.
D: Why did that decision happen?
BH: We were getting pissed off at trying to figure out something, and Cacie just decided to start playing keyboard. I think I was having a really hard time with the drum part, and I heard this thing in my head, and I thought, “Okay, this is the direction we need to go.”