Dakuta: Arise And Shine.

Dakuta launch Die Arise at The Zoo on Saturday.

With only a little over a year under their collective belt, local quintet Dakuta have laid down eight magnificent sounding tracks for their Die Arise debut release. As well as taking cue from a swag of modern rock acts, the band also pull together eastern influences a la Led Zeppelin or Tea Party to add to their already percolating musical stew.

“We recorded Die Arise with producer Stuart Stuart over the period of about 6 months,” explained guitarist Jonathan Samiec. “We learnt a lot from the experience and next time we go into the studio we would probably do some things differently, like mike up the amps instead of using amp emulators and effects.”

You’ve only been together a short time. Was it easy to develop your own sound or find musical territory everyone was happy with? How did you all originally hook up?

“Three of the members of Dakuta: Chris, Dave and I all used to go to school together over at Indooroopilly high so we have been jamming together for a long time. Cliffo the bassist and Brendan the vocalists were found through ads in the trading post. Our music has changed heaps over time, originally we were a metal band and through line-up changes we became a mellow/pop band. Since then we have been dabbling more with tribal beats and Indian melodies and we have started to find a sound we are happy with. Everyone in the band writes their own songs so we always have heaps of fresh ideas to circulate and work with.”

You don’t seem afraid to draw on sounds outside of what is usually in rock, where do you draw your main influences?

“Bands like The Tea Party, Secret Chiefs 3, Days Of The New and Tool, have influenced our musical styles. Even old stuff like Sepultura’s album Roots has played a role in sculpting our sound.”

After recording eight tracks, why not punch out a couple more for a full length album?

“Money. It runs out eventually. We are looking at releasing a new single and a film clip later on in the year though.”

What are you proudest of on the disc?

“Ummm that’s a tricky one. I guess we all have our own favourite tracks. I like the tracks Cards On Table and Broken Days”.

AC/DC’s bassist and Dakuta’s bassist’s share a name. Are their any other links with your famous namesake?

“I don’t think so.”