Quick-fire Questions: 10 minutes with Dopamine
Hailing from Brisbane, Dopamine serve up a suitably sunny sound. In fact, serotonin might be a more apt name for the catchy indie slackers. They formed in 2018 at the Queensland University of Technology, but in the last year, things have changed significantly. They say they’re essentially a different band now, and that new lease of life and injection of purpose has bolstered their sound into something novel and fresh.
Blending Britpop, baggie, shoegaze and a hint of Aussie psychedelia, Dopamine have honed their sound into something that they can now commit to. It blossoms on their latest single, ‘Angela’. Speaking about the track and how the band arrived at it, the group explained, “It’s about coming back to a place that has a lot of memories for you. I don’t think ‘Angela represents a person but more a place. A place that encapsulated your life at a certain point but now is just a memory.”
They’ve certainly put their back into getting to this memory-crafting sound, too. As they continued: “We’ve just finished building our own studio, and this was the first track that we recorded and mixed there. We were working on an old song of ours, and it just wasn’t coming together. We were trying to get excited about it, but we were just sick of listening to it. We were probably a bit drunk and overconfident and had the idea to just write and record a new song that night, and this is the song that came out of it. All the songs were recorded in our studio that night. It sounds amazing!”
With that bold new sound blossoming and the DIY outlook giving them a spring in their step, we caught up with the band’s very own frontman, Finley Miller, and flung some questions his way. From his thoughts on The Beatles to critiquing a questionable ‘classic album’, this is what we garnered from ten minutes with Dopamine.
Quick-fire Questions with Dopamine:
1. What song would you want played at your funeral?
“‘Life’s a Gas’ by T-Rex”.
2. What one song does nobody appreciate the true complexity of?
“Most David Bowie songs. He had a knack for making complicated things sound really simple. You look into how they recorded ‘Heroes’—I mean, how do you replicate something like that?”
3. What song are you proudest of to date?
“I’m most proud of ‘Angela’, to be honest. I just love how we went fuck it and did it completely DIY. There’s a certain energy in that recording that I don’t think we would’ve gotten any other way.”
4. When are you at your most creative?
“Either first thing in the morning or last thing at night—that’s when I seem to write the most. But y’know, any time I’m just by myself with a guitar, I can usually get something going.”
5. What one ‘classic album’ would you happily delete from history?
“They’re calling everything a classic album these days, aren’t they? I saw that some magazine said that Harry’s House by Harry Styles was a classic album, like what is that about? I’d happily delete anyone from history that shares that opinion.”
6. What is one unknown album that should be a classic?
“On Fire by Galaxie 500. It’s not necessarily an ‘unknown’ album, but I don’t hear many people talking about it that much. It’s so good!”
7. What is your favourite Jonathan Richman lyric?
“‘The highway is your girlfriend as you go by quick. Suburban trees, suburban speed, and it smells like heaven’ – ‘Roadrunner’.”
8. Who the fuck is Mark E Smith?
“An enigma, a legend, a stubborn old prick”.
9. A book is being made into a film and you’ve been asked to create the soundtrack, what book do you wish it was?
“The Very Hungry Caterpillar“.
10. Have you ever been blown away by a musician during a recording session?
“So many times! For me, it’s always when you’re experimenting in the studio, and someone just gets a sound – like a wild guitar tone or a synth, and it works so perfectly. That sort of stuff just gives you goosebumps”.
11. Have you ever cried at a concert?
“I’ve definitely been close a couple of times. I’m an ugly crier, though; I wouldn’t burden my blubbing face onto anyone”.
12. Where is the best bar in the world?
“Pacific Hotel Yamba, NSW”.
13. What is the most annoying song ever?
“Honestly? Camila Cabello – ‘Never Be the Same’. It used to follow me around like a bad smell. Whenever I was buying clothes, this song would play. Whenever I was in an Uber after a big night, this song would play. Put it this way, if I was close to throwing up in an Uber – I think this song would send me over the edge”.
14. What has been your favourite album of 2024 so far?
“I think the new Fontaines DC album is really good; I’ve been listening to that a lot”.
15. Are The Beatles overrated?
“Not in the slightest. I think some of their live album stuff is, though. Like, I’m not interested in hearing The Beatles play at the Hollywood Bowl in 1960-whatever it is. Just people screaming and them not hearing themselves – nah, not interested, mate. I wanna hear the studio albums”.
