New band alert: Mo Dotti
There have been so many cool artists to materialize from this wonderful shoegaze renaissance we are experiencing, but if I have one gripe it’s that this current scene is more about celebrating itself than what came before it. But I don’t really feel that way about the Los Angeles band Mo Dotti, whose album opaque was one of my favourite albums of 2024. I was unaware of them before receiving the album from their publicist last summer, but it didn’t take long for me to hear something in their music that I’ve been waiting for from this new generation of shoegazers.
While I wouldn’t resort to labelling Mo Dotti’s music as “throwback shoegaze,” or even strictly shoegaze - at times it transforms into both dream pop and noise pop - I couldn’t help but hear hints of some past bands from the early ‘90s, a feature that made the album so alluring to me. For example, “really wish,” “wasted delay” and “never comes around,” are the best Lush songs that Lush never put to tape. And to be honest, I only wish Miki Berenyi’s upcoming album with her new band MB3 sounded more like Mo Dotti. But it isn’t just Lush that Mo Dotti harkens back to. The crystalline guitars of two-minute-long instrumental “wave goodbye” immediately transported me back to a moment in one of my favourite films, Gregg Araki’s Mysterious Skin, which featured both the music of Cocteau Twins and an original score by Robin Guthrie and Harold Budd. Then at the other end of the spectrum is “whirling sad,” a driving, abrasive bit of feedback-happy noise pop that lands somewhere between the Black Tambourine and This is Your Bloody Valentine-era MBV. It’s like they picked my brain about what I wanted to hear in an album.
These ramblings might make it sound like opaque is all over the place and completely indebted to bands they worshipped, but it really isn’t. It’s an album that masterfully demonstrates how to successfully mingle soft and heavy, and becomes more distinctly Mo Dotti the more you listen.
The band have just repressed both opaque and a compilation of their first two EPs, Blurring and Guided Imagery, on vinyl, which you can order here. If you’re gonna order opaque you should also grab a copy of the comp. It’s a solid companion, but worth the price alone for their excellent cover of The 6th’s “All Dressed Up In Dreams.”
Since you’re based in Los Angeles I wanted to check how everyone is doing in the aftermath of the wildfires?
Gina Negrini: We live a few miles away from Altadena, in Pasadena, but we have so many friends whose homes burned down. Some people can’t go home because everything burned around them and it’s not safe to live in. It’s very surreal and honestly a nightmare for the people whose communities have been decimated. It’s devastating. We're trying to stay positive, but it isn't easy.
How would you say opaque differs from your first two EPs?
It’s a lot more polished in terms of production. Blurring is sort of ramshackled together (the songs were all recorded by different people). The second EP, Guided Imagery, was more cohesive production-wise. I will say that the EPs are only EPs because we ran out of time recording and then COVID happened. Although the process was interrupted, we are sort of happy with how it worked out because we were able to have two releases instead of one. Opaque is an improvement upon Guided Imagery because we just knew how to better articulate what we wanted. Every process is a learning experience.
What did it mean to have someone like Mark Gardener of Ride master your LP?
Forgive the cliché but it's a dream come true. It's just really crazy that you can email someone you revere and they will listen to it and work on it with the intention of making it sound good. It's no secret we are huge Ride fans.
What was it like performing at the inaugural Slide Away festival last year?
Nicky [Palermo] reached out to us a few years ago when "Loser Smile" came out as a single. He said that he really wanted to play with us someday. A few years later, he asked us to open his festival in Los Angeles. It meant a lot to us to be included. We weren't as popular as some of the other bands on the bill, so we felt like we had something to prove, especially since we were representing L.A. (we are all from here). I've never played a festival before. It felt chaotic backstage to me because there were lots of people and I was nervous. But it really ended up being a party. Looking back I wish I would've relaxed and enjoyed myself a bit more, and chatted with more people. The music video "Lucky Boy" includes footage from the fest. It's a nice memory to have captured.
Can I get a quick summary of how the band formed?
I initially started the project as a solo act, and I wanted it to sound like Strawberry Switchblade, Pink Industry and Cocteau Twins. I never considered how difficult it would be to translate that live on my own, as I was pretty new to guitar. I started playing with Guy [Valdez], and eventually we added live bass and drums, instead of relying on loops.
Influences?
There are so many… too many. At the moment I have been listening to a lot of Ivy, Bowery Electric and Sonic Youth. These groups have definitely influenced what I am currently writing.
How did you discover shoegaze?
As a teenager… downloading music from blogs on LiveJournal in the early 2000s. Guy bought Nowhere on CD because a friend recommended it to him.
Favourite shoegaze band: My Bloody Valentine
Food of choice while recording:
Something compact and self containing, like a burrito or a sandwich. The less fragments strewn about the better. We also don't like to take long breaks so something quick for sure.
TV show the band watches together:
The album most played when the band is hanging out together or on tour:
Greg [Shilton] is the DJ on the road. It runs the gamut of dance music, indie rock and video game soundtracks.
An activity the band does together outside of music:
We work together at a movie theatre. Is work an activity? Greg and Andrew [Mackelvie] go to Disneyland together a lot. Guy and I go on lots of walks around Pasadena.
Where did your band’s name come from?
Tina Modotti, but I first heard about her because of the Fugazi song “Recap Modotti.”
Other names you considered for your band:
There’s only Mo Dotti. I wish I would have just spelled it Modotti even though there is a band in Italy that spells their name that way.
The hardest part of being a band:
Scheduling band practice.
The best part of being a band:
Band practice, traveling, having your songs on a physical release, making new friends.
Another band from your city that fans of Mo Dotti should know about:
Host Family, Clear Capsule and Shaki Tavi.
If you had to pick only one subgenre listed on your Bandcamp page to describe your music it would be:
Probably noise pop. Shoegaze as a term oversimplifies a broad spectrum of expressionist music. More than anything, we write pop songs.
Most of your lyrics are about:
The end of the world, climate change and alienation.
Favourite venue to play and why:
Any venue that gives us more than two drink tickets. Ha ha. Just kidding. Rickshaw Stop in San Francisco because the sound people understand our music, the lighting is always moody in the right way, and everyone that works there is really nice.
Favourite record shop in the world:
Monorail in Glasgow.
Favourite Los Angeles band of the 1990s:
Medicine and The Summer Hits. They're both really crunchy bands that will blow out your speakers.
