It will come as absolutely no surprise that today’s Headline Act come all the way from the land of valleys and choir-singers. And sheep. Always the sheep…
Simple things first – where are you guys from?
We’re all living in Swansea in South Wales, Three of us are born and bred Welshmen but our handsome drummer comes all the way from Italy, Tuscany to be exact!
How did you meet?
The two jacks have been friends since the first day of comprehensive school, we haven’t been able to get rid of each other ever since, Christian and Jack Williams have been friends for a number of years, both have been a part of the local music scene for years. We all then met when Francesco had just moved to Swansea and was looking for musicians, he met Christian who in turn introduced Jack Williams, and then finally Jack Lee was the final piece added to create Yaki Dah.
How long have you been playing as a band?
We first formed in February 2022 but due to some health issues and countless work responsibilities, we would say we’ve been a proper functioning band for just over a year.
Before you get sick of being asked… where does the band name come from?
When we first started thinking of a band name, we wanted to tribute our heritage of being Welsh, we were looking at countless different Welsh Lore books, Jack Williams is the man to talk to about anything mystical and historical when it comes to Wales. When we finally landed on “Yaki Dah” it was like a lightbulb moment. It means good health in Welsh; the actual spelling is “Iechyd da” but we thought we’d help everyone else be able to pronounce it.
What are your influences?
Our influences definitely differ between band members, our main influences are bands such as Black Sabbath, Those Damn Crows, Bring Me The Horizon and even The Doors.
Describe your music. What makes you unique?
The thing that makes our music unique would have to be the energy and the diversity we bring to each song. Not one Yaki Dah song sounds the same, if you’ve ever been to one of our gigs you’d know, you don’t have to recognise the song to know that it’s Yaki Dah playing.
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Do you have any particular lyrical themes?
Our themes often differ, we can go from singing about a crazy house party somewhere in Merthyr to having a more standard theme such as the age old “Sex, drugs and rock & roll”.
What’s your live show like? How many shows have you played?
Our live show is a bit crazy; we just enjoy playing live so much and it really shows in our performances. We love to get people up and dancing, if you’re not having a good time we’re not. We’ve played over 10 shows now and each show gets better and better.
What’s the wildest thing you’ve seen or done at a live show?
One of the wildest shows we’ve been a part of was our first show which was at The Bunkhouse in Swansea, it was a packed show and right at the end Jack Williams took a flying leap into the crowd. Picture the start of “School of Rock” just replace Jack Black with Jack Williams and you’ve already got a pretty good picture of how the stage dive went.
What kit do you use / guitars do you play / etc.?
Jack Williams loves his Fender Stratocaster with the Fender combo amp, he’s always stuck with it even after us begging him to upgrade, Jack Lee is in love with his Yamaha bass, it was a huge upgrade from his old Ibanez. Francesco’s gear is always the star of the show, his Ludwig drum kit is his baby. He loves it more than he loves us.
What, if anything, are you plugging/promoting at the moment?
We’ve got our new track “You, Me and Lee” out now, it’s our second single we’ve released and we’re extremely excited about it. You can find it on all major streaming platforms, and we’ve also got a lyric video on our YouTube channel [Or scroll down! – Mosh]
What are your plans for the next 6 months or so?
Record, record, record! Our next 6 months or so now is hugely focused on writing and recording our songs. We have plans to release an EP in the future so now it’s time to concentrate on that and just perfecting our live show to be able to deliver the best performance possible.
If you were second on a three-band bill, which band would you love to be supporting and which band would you choose to open for you? A chance to plug someone you’ve toured with, or a mate’s band we’ve not heard of before!
A band we would love to support is Those Damn Crows, with them being a Welsh band literally from down the road it’d be a huge honour to play with them.
The band we’d love to bring with us is a band by the name Zac & The Newmen. They’re good friends of ours after playing a good couple of shows with them, always love watching them live and just a great group of lads!
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