Dave Archibald playing solo shows in New Brunswick this weekend

Dave Archibald of the Halifax-based Daveband is playing solo shows in New Brunswick this weekend in support of the long overdue vinyl release of their 2020 album, This Was Your Dad at 28.

Matt Carter

It’s not an uncommon story these days for an album release to last months. Years, even. The ol’ pandemic really threw a lot of unexpected delays into the mix, whether we’re talking about release dates, supporting shows, or vinyl pressing. Thankfully, music is – for the most part – a timeless creation. And so it comes as no surprise that more than two years after its digital release, Halifax-based Daveband is finally seeing its 2020 album, This Was Your Dad at 28, pressed into permanent form.

Recorded by Thomas Stajcer at Fang Recording during 2018 and 2019, This Was Your Dad at 28 ties in much of the band’s history with past and present members contributing to this catchy ten song collection.

“Thomas recorded the album and was our bass player at the time,” said singer songwriter and Daveband namesake Dave Archibald. “Our drummer Kevin MacIsaac was moving to Ontario so we wanted to get our best material down before he left. We got the bed tracks done in August 2018. Thomas and I slowly worked on it over the next year or so. With Kev in Ontario, we weren’t booking shows and were able to focus on making the record. Sometimes there were months between sessions; sometimes it was more frequent. With no shows, we were sort of in soft-hiatus mode so there weren’t any deadlines or pressure. It was really great.”

Plugging away when time allowed, Stajcer and Archibald recorded a total of nine tracks during those sessions, seven of which made it on to the album.

“We then added two acoustic tracks I had done with our original bass player Harley Alexander at his apartment in Montreal, and one additional track we had recorded in spring 2017 before Chesel Alexander (second bass player, later guitarist) left town,” said Archibald. “Thomas and I also got founding member and guitar player Campbell Woods in for a session to track some lead when he was coming through town, as well as Neal Read before he joined the band. So up to that point, all former and future players got on the album.”

The current lineup of Daveband features Archibald on guitar and vocals, Kevin MacIsaac on drums, Neal Read on keys, and bass player Corey Henderson.

This Was Your Dad at 28 was originally set for release in May or 2020 before getting pushed back a few months in hopes the world would have stabilized by then. But it didn’t.

“We eventually put the album out in September. 2020 when the Atlantic Bubble seemed unstoppable,” said Archibald. “I had some New Brunswick shows booked at that time but they got canceled when the Bubble collapsed. This Tipsy Muse show this Saturday is technically the make-up date 2.5 years later.”

Committing This Was Your Dad at 28 to a vinyl pressing was a goal of Archibald’s from the beginning of this project. But at the time the album was released, making the investment with no way to get out and play before audiences just seemed like a bad idea. On the one year anniversary of the album’s initial release, a crowdfunding / pre-order campaign was launched. Though the campaign was successful in raising the necessary cash to get the album pressed, a new crop of delays pushed things back another year or more. But it wasn’t all a loss. Time has a funny way of working things out sometimes.

“The artwork took a while,and there was a global vinyl shortage,” Archibald. “But Kev moved back to Nova Scotia and we started playing shows again, and then, kinda out of the blue and ahead of schedule, the real, actual, physical copies arrived last month.”

Five years in the making, moving, and shaking, This Was Your Dad at 28 has finally arrived as initially planned. A surefire hit for fans of Shotgun Jimmie and Apollo Ghosts, get on out this weekend and enjoy these songs the way music is best enjoyed – live and in-person. And while you’re at it, buy Dave a drink. He’s earned it.