Enticing us with enigmatic strummed guitar fused with faded vocals singing “California, baby girl, I’m coming for ya”, before we are hit by an immersive glitch and a punctuated sonic transformation, Dak Holiday opens his debut single, Hollywood (How are you?) with passion and emotion.
As the emerging artist serenades the West Coast, he sings of drugs, models, sex, love and being an artist. Speaking on the the themes of the track, Dak says Hollywood (How are you?) is about “Fantasizing about fame as a rockstar but all the worst parts of it, drug addiction, alcoholism, dying young.”
There are cerebral moments in the song and introspective lyrics when Dak Holiday sings, “now he’s strung out and fucked up, but at least he’s doing it on stage…” This moving lyric really contextualizes what a lot of artists go through and it is refreshing to hear a debut from an artist with such advanced and self-aware themes.
Dak also says that he was inspired by The Doors biopic…. “what if you get all the fame and fortune you ever wanted and it destroys you?” ponders the self-created multi-disciplinary artist.
“If you locked Kurt Cobain, Glaive, and Timbaland in a room with a sheet of acid and forced them to make a song at gunpoint it would sound like me”, exclaimed Dak Holiday when describing his sound. Whilst we agree, there are also elements of hyperpop, psychedelic grunge and experimental nuances throughout the composition that really help dimensionalize Hollywood (How are you?).
Dak, who is inspired by Nirvana, Blink 182, SUM41, Lil Peep, also aims to bring rock music back to the centre of the party scene and the centre of culture. He asks, “Are you with us?”. To which we reply, “yes we are are”.
Dak wrote and recorded the album with another band Sertraline Smile which he quit then connected with artist producers Que Violette, Alex Nam, and 2Star to finish the track, which Que Violette is also featured on.
We have added Hollywood (How are you?) to our New Music Spotlight playlist and cannot wait to hear more from Dak Holiday!