The members of the Dublin alt-rock band Nova Dream liken their formation to a couple starting a relationship on a dating app. “It’s a bit bizarre when we tell people because I always say, ‘Oh, yeah, we met in a Tinder situation,’ you know?” laughs their guitarist and vocalist Gabriel Rizzo, when talking with Post-Burnout. “It’s a bit awkward, but, in the end, it worked out.”

“It took a while to get practising,” says bassist Joshua Bartschi. “I think when we first talked on BandMix, it probably took a week for me to meet Gabe.” “Yeah, so I sent him a message…it sounds very weird!” adds Gabriel. “Yeah,” laughs Joshua. “Tinder for bands!”

“I had some demos of the songs,” continues Gabriel, “and I was asking, ‘Are you a bass player and interested in the songs? Give it a go.’ I think it was, maybe, a week or two later and he came to my place and, eh…it sounds very weird, though! [Laughs]

“But, no, he came, and we started jamming, and there were people involved, so we started rehearsing with those people, probably three weeks later from that.” “No said space for rehearsal, either,” adds Joshua. “It was moving around a lot of rehearsal spaces.”

“It wasn’t fast, but it definitely wasn’t slow, because I know there are people who take, like, three months to meet a guy and play along with,” says Gabriel. “We were like, ‘Let’s try again next week and let’s try the week after.’” “Pretty consistently, we met,” says Joshua. “At least three days a week.”

After they became a consistent two-piece, they just needed to add a drummer to complete the project. After some trial and error, the guys eventually met the perfect candidate, one Mr Danny Maguire.

“It really was out of nowhere,” says Joshua on adding Danny. “We’d been playing together, we looked at a few drummers, we tried playing with them, and it just didn’t really match. Then, on a Facebook group, I think he saw one of our videos. [Laughs]”

“Yeah,” adds Gabriel, “we literally just started spreading the word on Facebook and Instagram, and that sort of thing, because, as Josh said, we weren’t really connecting with any drummer, not necessarily in terms of there was something wrong, but there wasn’t something that was like, ‘OK, this is it!’, you know?

“So, we connected with Danny through Facebook. Kind of new-age. [Laughs]” “I don’t think Facebook is new-age, anymore!” laughs Joshua. “It’s the old new-age, yeah!” says Gabriel.

As they practised, they developed their own unique style of alt-rock which incorporated elements of grunge, indie and post-punk. We asked if this sound was a pre-emptive decision or a natural result of what came out from them jamming together.

“It’s definitely a blend,” responds Joshua. “Because if any of us were doing it on our own, it’d be very different.” “Yeah,” agrees Gabriel. “Danny is more, like, American style of music, like Linkin Park, Guns N’ Roses, Nirvana, and Josh is more like…” “Anything weird!” finishes Joshua. “I tend to be into anything strange.”

“But Josh is also into, like, Pink Floyd and Oasis and that sort of thing, where we find our common ground,” says Gabriel. “I’m more ‘90s Oasis and 2000s Arctic Monkeys, and newer stuff, as well.”

Each member found their musical tastes expanding as a result of playing together. “I’ve definitely been influenced by Gabe and Danny’s music tastes,” says Joshua. “Danny’s very passionate about Linkin Park. I’ve started listening to that. A lot of memories come from that Transformers one, ‘What I’ve Done.’ [Laughs]”

“I’m a massive fan of Interpol,” says Gabriel. “Actually, that’s fair; he got me into Interpol,” adds Joshua. “And the first record has a lot of great, great basslines,” continues Gabriel, “so, I was like, ‘Come here. Listen to this. This is the shit,’ you know? But that’s definitely something I’ve got Josh into. I’m trying to convey Interpol to Danny, but I still have some work to do.” “The drums aren’t big enough,” says Joshua. “Get some ‘90s drums on it.”

Despite only officially forming in 2023, as a result of blending home and professional recordings and living within relative proximity to each other, Nova Dream have wasted absolutely no time releasing material. Since their first single, “Elephant in the Room,” in March, the band have dropped four singles and five songs overall between March and August.

When we ask if their release schedule has felt quick to them, Gabriel responds, “It felt very slow when it was happening, but now that you’ve put it into that perspective! [Laughs]” Gabriel says, “We had an idea of releasing one song every month, which…” “That didn’t happen!” says Joshua. “Yeah,” says Gabriel. “It wasn’t actually realistic.

“But, as we have our own space to rehearse and we just rehearse at Josh’s, so when we started the idea of, ‘Alright, what if we stop paying a rehearsal studio and just invest that money into something more?’, so we bought a couple of mics, and I have some equipment, as well, so one thing led to the other, and we started recording ourselves.

“So, in some ways, I think that made things easier, in terms of working out ideas. As Josh said, for us, it’s, ‘Oh, yeah. We’ll just release five songs,’ but then we’re talking about seven months!” Joshua concludes, “Today, I looked at Spotify, and they all said ‘2024,’ and I was like, ‘That actually is quite quick!’”

At the beginning of August, Nova Dream released their latest and, at the time of writing, most successful single, “Black Cinema”/”Rearrange,” which is their first single to feature a B-side. For this writer, the songs had a common theme of chronophobia. We asked the guys if they considered themes when writing music or if they looked back and noticed they were there upon completion.

“So, there are definite reoccurring themes – I call them ‘Nova themes’ [Laughs] – that kind of come back in the songs,” says Joshua. “Even though I’m definitely no lyricist; generally, Gabe is the lyricist! [Laughs] But I do write the lyrics with him, most of the time. There are things where I’ll change a line that will change the meaning, and it’s almost like when you actually look at the finished song, you’re like, ‘Oh, yeah, that’s what that means.’

“I mean, there is a general idea when going into a song of what it’s going to be about. I know we have different things, like sometimes we’ll come up with a title and work back from that. A lot of the time, we just naturally come up with the lyrics as Gabe’s playing an acoustic guitar and I just play bass to it, just like a mini-jam session, and the general idea comes together.”

On their most recent single, Gabriel says, “About releasing an A- and B-side, in some way, it’s more for ourselves than the audience or the people because, in some ways, we felt that those songs are connected, even though they don’t sound the same. Just themes, even the spirit of the song.

“Let’s say you take ‘Running Out of Time,’ which is, technically, from the same batch, it’s completely a different song, you know? In terms of the music. So, we always try to connect. It’s like a story, and you have to keep the engagement in terms of the story.

“We’ve also been working on the artwork. We’ve been trying to keep, more or less, the same kind of storyline. We’ve been thinking about when we change it. We’re thinking about this band in the long term, as well. I wouldn’t say we want to do ten records, but I would definitely say five! [Laughs] At least five!”

Despite their brief existence, Nova Dream have already built a receptive fanbase and listenership. “It’s definitely a big ego boost,” laughs Joshua when discussing their reception. “It definitely was surprising, and I don’t know if it was because I never really did it before, like release my own songs, but I remember coming back to it every day, saying, ‘How many listeners do we have today?,’ and, as it went up, I was like…” “This feels good!” says Gabriel, finishing his thought.

Gabriel continues, “It does feel good, but I think it’s hard, though, to kind of mention that. Obviously, it feels good to see that there are some people who are connecting with the songs. There’ve been some people who have been sending us messages like, ‘Oh, it’s so good! I love the song!’, and there’s a few people who’ve said, ‘Oh, I just wish I could’ve recorded and played this well when I was [your age].’” “That comment was a shock to me!” adds Joshua. “I loved it!”

“It definitely feels good in terms of knowing that, in some way, we’re doing things right,” says Gabriel. “When things go well, we try to celebrate it and enjoy the moment, but also not kind of be unhinged about it. It’s the same thing, one day, you’re on the top, and the next, you can be somewhere else. There’s never been a time where we’ve said, ‘Let’s just skip rehearsal. We’re just amazing. We don’t need to rehearse.’”

Nova Dream’s latest single, “Black Cinema”/“Rearrange,” is on all streaming platforms now. The band will perform at Sin É, Dublin on October 19th with Lounge Lizards and Oisín Ó Domhnaill. Tickets for that event can be purchased here. You can keep up to date with the band, their music, their live dates and their social media accounts here.

Tune into POSTBURNOUT.COM Interviews… tonight at 21:00 (IST) to hear this interview in full. Available on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Amazon Music Podcasts.

Aaron Kavanagh

Aaron Kavanagh is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Post-Burnout. His writing can also be found in the Irish Daily Star, Buzz.ie, Totally Dublin, The GOO, Headstuff, New Noise Magazine, XS Noize, DSCVRD and more.