This is an interview done with Dan & Grace of Shallow Alcove, read their story below! If you, or anyone you know, would like to be highlighted in The Zillennial Zine, shoot us an email at thezillennialzine@gmail.com or DM us on Instagram!
Q: Tell us your story! Where did you begin and how did you reach the caliber you’re currently at?
Grace: Dan and I met in college at Syracuse University, where we both studied music business. We were in a music law class together and we were paired up to work on a project, but we ended up feverishly talking about Bon Iver for the entirety of the class. After that, we spent the following month staying up until 5 am every night talking and writing music. We always liken the first month of our friendship to falling in love, except it was the most platonic experience ever. It was one of the most beautiful, rich, and formative times in my life. We started working together as this particular iteration of Shallow Alcove with our best friends and bandmates in 2019. After graduating college in 2021, our band sprawled out between New York City, Philadelphia, and LA. We make music together every chance we get.
Dan: It was really the most intoxicating feeling. It’s rare to find friends that you can play music with but it’s even more rare to make music with someone that just gets you on a different level. It cuts out all the small talk and introductions and gets right into the real stuff.
Q: What makes you love what you do? How long have you been making music? Would you call it your passion?
Grace: I started singing when I was 14 after my parents got me my first guitar. My first performance was of “All I Want” by Kodaline at my junior high talent show (lol). I started writing songs shortly thereafter, but everything clicked for me after I met Dan and everyone in Shallow Alcove. Ever since I started singing, music-making has always been the only option for me. I have never really thought about pursuing a different career. Among the many things I love about making music, I really adore the way I can mention something so highly specific and honest from my actual life in our songs that I think no one could possibly relate to, and then somehow people see themselves so clearly in it. I think that’s what I look for when I listen to music as well.
Dan: I’ve been making music since I was in first grade. I was a really energetic kid (honestly I still am), so I really gravitated toward loud rock and punk at a young age because it just felt like this massive explosion and expression of emotion and energy and anger and love or whatever potent emotions people can feel. When I started writing songs around 12, I was really inspired by Green Day. I would “borrow” their chord progressions and play them on an acoustic. Then I started realizing how sad the music and lyrics really were. After that, I was drawn to really sad folky stuff because it was so raw. I always had trouble expressing myself with just words, so music really helped me understand and express my feelings in a way that I was unfamiliar with. I think this is such a common experience for kids – they don’t really understand why they love music so much until it clicks one day, then it all makes sense. And once you find your people, the ones that feel the same way about music, it’s the greatest high in the world.
Q: What are some accomplishments or milestones you’ve reached lately?
Grace: We were recently asked to go on tour in Europe with a band we have loved forever, Tiny Habits. It has always been a dream of ours to go overseas, and it was something we hoped would be in the 10 year plan, but we had no idea the opportunity would come so soon. When we got the tour offer, I instantly burst into happy tears. I have always dreamed of going to Europe and to be able to go for music is actually the coolest thing in the entire world to me. Every member of my family screamed when I told them because they knew how long I’d dreamed of this.
Dan: The Europe tour offer still feels fake. The idea that music is taking us to different timezones and continents is something I’m never gonna be able to wrap my head around, I’m truly at a loss for words every time someone asks me about it. We love Tiny Habits so much and the fact that they’ve even listened to our music alone is mind-blowing. It means the entire world to us, and then some.
Q: Tell us about “Gracie”!!
Grace: A few years back, I found a home video of me talking to my parents at 3 years old. I’m gleefully singing into a little toy microphone, and my mom tells me that I’m a “rockstar”. It was as if she had awarded me with the Nobel Peace Prize. I carry on singing, and a little while goes by. Suddenly, I get sad. I pout and exclaim “I don’t feel like a rockstar, I haven’t done anything”. It felt like the first time I experienced imposter syndrome and insecurity, captured live on camera. The sentiment felt eerily similar to what I’m experiencing now as a 20-something trying to make a living in music. I saved this audio sample for years waiting for the perfect song to add it to, and finally “Gracie” was born. Gracie is about growing up and trying to stay connected with your inner child, honoring them with every step. It’s for every person who has ever looked through their baby pictures and had a tender feeling well up in their heart, realizing that every time they have ever called themselves ugly, they were talking to that little kid. We hope it feels like kneeling down, holding your younger self’s face in your hands, and telling them that they are beautiful and special.
Dan: This song is really special. We knew we needed to write more music for an EP. We knew we needed to write and record another song for our EP and were kinda just flipping through ideas and kept coming back to this “Thanksgiving song”, which then turned into Gracie. It was this wild experience where we sat down to write it while we recorded it and the song just wrote itself. Grace is my favorite singer and songwriter ever, so the feeling of recording and producing this vulnerable story while it was being written is something that is hard to put into words. When Grace pulled up that video with the sound bytes it all clicked. I’ve never had to produce a song with tears streaming down my face before this one.
Q: Do you have any advice for someone who is starting music?
Grace: For me, finding beloved collaborators was the gateway to starting. Music felt impossible to do all by myself, but finding a group of people that I trusted deeply and felt aligned with musically consistently brings out the best in me and holds me accountable. I learn so much from my friends and collaborators. It can feel intimidating, but I recommend going out on a limb and reaching out to people you admire in your scene and seeing if they want to play around and make music together.
Dan: Get involved with local music! I owe everything to my local music community of my hometown and college. Go see any shows you can (especially genres you don’t think you’ll like!), it’ll lead you to your people. Listen to as much music you can, write 1,000 bad songs for fun, create for the sake of creating, and make music with your head down – it’s human nature to compare yourself. Forget what’s cool or popular and make art that feels honest to you. It will find the right people.
Q: What do you want our readers to know about you and your music?
Grace: All of our music is written in order to heal our broken parts, based entirely on our completely honest personal experiences. Our goal is for people to put our songs in the car, look melodramatically out the window, and see their own memories flash by as they listen.
Dan: Our music is an honest look into our lives, it’s like a little house. We want you to step in through the door and sit on the couch and feel like you’re listening to your friends tell you about their day. Our favorite thing in the world is when people reach out and say they have related to something we’ve written because it feels like we get a look inside their lives, like a conversation about their day. It’s such a special feeling that we’re beyond grateful to have experienced.
Go Check Out Shallow Alcove Online!
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/shallowalcove/
Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@shallowalcove
Website: https://www.shallowalcove.com/
Everything else Shallow Alcove: https://linktr.ee/shallowalcove
Leave a Reply