Ajay Bhattacharyya and Amy Kirkpatrick sit amongst the old couches in the basement band room at Babylon Nightclub in Centretown. A unique collection of objects are scattered around the room: dismantled plastic department store mannequins, piles of clothes, a laughing Buddha statue made of jade, and a neon Ottawa Senators bar sign, to name a few. Unique could also be a choice word to describe the sound that the twosome from Canada’s west coast create when on stage.
Bhattacharyya and Kirkpatrick make up electro-duo Data Romance, a music project born out of playing music together since the year 2009. Being high school friends from Victoria, B.C., they both moved to Vancouver to pursue passions outside of live music performance. Kirkpatrick worked as a lighting technician for respected music venues in the area, while Bhattacharyya studied sound design and television. Data Romance was never a project that was taken seriously until about two years ago.
“I started making beats after I got tired of drumming in a band,” Bhattacharyya said. “I called up [Kirkpatrick] and then we just started collaborating over the internet, as we weren’t living close to each other. We would send beats and lyrics back and forth.”
“It just kind of snowballed,” Kirkpatrick said. “It went from us doing it when we had some free time, to meeting the right people, and then we got picked up by a label. Now we do it full-time.”
With a unique sound also comes unique palette of influences from both members. Both Bhattacharyya and Kirkpatrick listen to a multitude of different genres, which show through in their sound. They have also done a series of cover songs for the web, reinterpreting a diverse array of artists such as Tom Waits, Deftones, Johnny Cash, and Patsy Cline.
“Musically, I try to stay on top of what’s new and exciting, and what’s turning heads,” Bhattacharyya explained.
“I’m usually in some obscure, hipster-blog corner of the internet, and you usually find some pretty cool stuff,” he said.
“You have to listen to some stuff that might not seem like the best thing in the world at first, but it grows on you and you can notice some positive, unique attributes.”
“That’s how I usually learn to do new things and get inspired to write.”
After releasing an EP that garnered acclaim from music press across Canada, NME, and even BBC Radio 1, the duo has readied their first studio full-length album. Titled Other, the LP will see a Feb. 19 release date.
“We grew a lot, we toured, got to play live, and learned what we liked and what we didn’t,” Bhattacharyya said. “That, combined with learning how to be a band on a label really made this process different, I feel.”
“There are lyrics on there that are written ten years ago, just because they fit the song,” Kirkpatrick said. “All of our influences since we were little are in there.”
Kirkpatrick went on to say they both lost sleep over the writing process, and called the writing process very artistic.
“We actually went through the whole process, instead of just meeting for a few days to record. It was noticeably different.”
Having wrapped up a tour with Dragonette and Young Empires, Data Romance has big plans upon the release of Other. More touring plans are in the works.
“We’ll do Canada, and hopefully Europe in 2013,” Bhattacharyya said. “We’ll probably get bored and do some other cool projects here and there,” he said.
“We’ll think of something.”
