My Darling Fury

When most people think of a great music scene, they think of L.A., New York City or any other big city hosting a music festival. But people skip over smaller cities and towns which often leads to overlooking some great smaller bands. For right now, I've focused on Richmond, Virginia. A city known for its love of music and the arts, Richmond boasts an impressive amount of local bands, some of which are working on touring the country. And I guarantee that when they begin to tour, they will take America by storm. Check out 20 of these up-and-coming bands from Richmond so you'll be ready to rock, groove and dance all night when they finally come to you!

#4 - My Darling Fury - Rant Chick

#48 - Seldom does a song stop me dead in my tracks. This, however, is the exception. Richmond, Virginia band My Darling Fury recently released their debut album Licking Wounds, and it’s unquestionably worthy of your investigation. The band has been likened to a collaboration between Andrew Bird, Fleet Foxes and Aimee Man, and that comparison isn’t far off the mark. Frontman Danny Reyes, with his pliant, gorgeous voice, is one of the first openly gay lead singers in recent memory, whose mere presence doesn’t drip sequins, glitter and sass. With an instrument like that, he doesn’t need theatrics. Brilliant musicianship all around, the band crafts emotionally complex, musically inventive indie pop-rock. Honest and extremely raw, the climax of “Blots in the Margin” still gives me chills. - Pop Matters

Local atmospheric indie rockers My Darling Fury are hard at work on their new album, entitled A/O/K, and today we're bringing you a preview of the sounds they've got in store for us all, in the form of an exclusive live video for their brand new tune, "I've Been Bad."

The video features a live in-studio performance by My Darling Fury, filmed with multiple cameras and capturing the performance in high-fidelity sound. This is fun because you get to watch singer/keyboardist Danny Reyes use his effects processor to create multiple vocal loops in real time. And of course, "I've Been Bad" is a captivating song in and of itself, featuring as it does the signature ambient, reverberating sound My Darling Fury has perfected over the last few years. Between Todd Matthews' high, melodic basslines, Clark Fraley's ringing lead guitar, and Joel Hollister's rumbling, tom-heavy beats, the musical background creates the perfect sound bed over which Reyes can work his vocal magic. Watch it all go down right here:



As with their debut album, Licking Wounds, My Darling Fury has turned to crowdfunding to finance their follow-up, and the Pledge Music campaign for A/O/K is in full swing. You currently have 46 days remaining to order yourself a CD copy of the album for $15, so be sure to take advantage of this offer and get in on the ground floor of this campaign. Of course, as with any good crowdfunding campaign, all sorts of weird and awesome rewards are available for higher pledges, including getting the band to record songs for you (covers are $250, originals about a topic of your choice are $600), a custom-built arcade console crafted for you by Fraley (a steal at $875), and even an executive producer credit on the new album (available for a $2500 pledge--and highly apropos, considering that financing productions is exactly what an executive producer does). Check out the full range of options, and get a copy of your very own, by going to My Darling Fury's Pledge Music page now!

And while you're at it, the band is also currently competing for a slot on the 2015 Bonnaroo lineup. They're competing as part of a March Madness-style SonicBids bracket challenge, and have made it to the third round, but could use your help to surpass their current opponents. Head over to sonicbids.bracketeers.com, give My Darling Fury your vote, and help local RVA talent find its way to the stage at Bonnaroo! - RVA Magazine

My Darling Fury’s works are always a singular fusion of craft and experiment. Its 2013 gently revolutionary anthem “Blots in the Margin” was one of the best songs of the year. The collaborations -- notably with Classical Revolutions, Richmond hip-hoppers Photosynthesizers and dancer Annielille Gavino Kollman -- are both adventurous and ambitious. If they don’t break through to whatever's left of the mass market, it won’t be for lack of courage or merit.

The “Aches” debuted in video form at Kollman’s last Dogtown Dance Theater performance. Part of the band's in-progress next album, it's a departure from its previous, more acoustic approach.

"The lyrics here are more sparse,” lead singer Danny Reyes says. “There are fewer 'organic' instruments ... a complete lack of acoustic guitar ... and it's overall more percussive.” The sound is both intimate and huge, moving from tense earthbound emotion to soaring escape.


Those who contribute to My Darling Fury’s crowd-sourcing of its next album here can download their own copy of the song. But if you want to check it out first, you can stream it here free. - Style Weekly

It’s cold as hell outside and I’ve just gotten to Lamplighter Roasting Company. I’m meeting with Danny Reyes. He’s in his mid 20's and has a dark beard and a matching short mop of black hair. His smile cuts through the beard. He’s cold too, but he’s willing to sit through the frosty weather with a warm cup of coffee in his hands.

(Click the play button below to listen while you read)



Reyes is the lead singer of the local band My Darling Fury. He and his bandmates have made waves around town for the last few weeks, if not longer. They finally released their first album, Licking Wounds, last week. The album is about love, isolation, being yourself, and, at times, about the interactions Reyes has had as a gay man.

Reyes grew up in Miami, Florida. Both of his parents came to America as part of the 1980 Mariel Boatlift, an event immortalized by the movie Scarface. Almost 130,000 Cubans fled their home in search of a better life in the States, and Reyes’s parents were part of the mass immigration. A Baptist minister, Reyes’s father found a congregation and began working in Miami. It wasn’t long before Reyes was born, a first generation American, and it was even less time before he got his first chance to sing.

By the age of four the young Reyes was on stage as part of church productions. ”It’s church; they do that to kids, make them stand up and sing.” But Reyes says he’s never been shy – and the church kept his vocal chords busy. By the time he was in 5th grade, he was already singing solos for the choir. He kept singing through high school. From there he knew that singing was his passion, and something he wanted to do the rest of his life.

Voice and piano lessons were a large part of Reyes’s upbringing, and of course the church choir. He would conduct the “group of old ladies” by the time he was 15, helping to translate religious songs, and even getting the chance to write some of his own.

“I’d chunk along on the piano, and someone would help along the way. I’m good at making harmonies, so people were willing to work with me,” says Reyes. “It was cool, being 15 and being able to queer out about the costumes…” How could a young Cuban-American gay boy not jump at the chance to talk about sequins in a church choir?







By 15 Reyes knew he was gay, but he had been questioning his sexuality for some time before. He remembered sitting down at the school lunch table and his friends were talking about being bisexual. “I tried to throw a red herring and said, ‘Oh, whats that?!’” says Reyes jokingly.

He had a girlfriend and they would make out and hold hands, but Reyes never really had a sexual attraction to women. By the time he’d hit puberty, his attraction to men was fairly solidified, even if he tried otherwise. “It was something I struggled with… I prayed about it. But by 15 I knew.”

When he came to this realization, Reyes knew his parents would take it well, or as well as anyone can hope. His father had a degree in psychology, and he’d heard him discuss the sexuality of one of his piano teachers, speaking about it in an accepting way. “I knew it was a safe-zone, it wasn’t going to be adversarial.”

Of course, coming out to your parents is rarely easy. Reyes and his mother had spats, but considering their heritage, both culturally and religiously, Reyes understood where they were coming from.

“You do what you know… not to justify modern homophobia, but my parents didn’t know any better,” says Reyes. “Aside from having a very religious background, the truth is, it [the Bible] says what it says, and if you believe in the word of God, what can you do?”

But the waves made by his sexuality were eventually smoothed over, and throughout young adulthood Reyes succeeded as a vocalist. He entered a magnet high school in Miami for arts and performance. There he honed his skills, though he admitted he’d never been a great student.

When Reyes was ready to head off to college, family and financial issues hampered his future. He had hoped to attend a vocal school in Boston, but his grandmother asked him to stay close to home, and he ended up with a full scholarship to a Florida International University. It was a kind of win-win – staying with his family and getting his college paid for. But, in the end, higher education would not pan out for the aspiring vocalist.

“I was always a bad student… With the music scholarship, I didn’t have to get certain grades… but I was more interested in the band I was in.” Reyes spent two years at FSU Miami before making the jump to RVA; with the promise of new musical opportunities, he said the choice was easy.

Reyes has been in Richmond for about five years. He’s first local band, Gills with Wings, failed to reach the success he had hoped for – but even he admits success in the music industry is a challenge. ”I know it’s unlikely, it’s not a lot of people who get to make a living making music.”

But with My Darling Fury, Reyes believes hi - Gay RVA

“This live video of “Over, Under” was filmed at Fulton Hill Studios in Richmond, VA, which is where My Darling Fury rehearses.”

“The building was originally a school built in 1916 which has been converted into studio spaces for artists. The band rehearses in the basement of the school and the owner generously allowed us to film in the auditorium. The extremely high ceilings and huge acoustic sound in this airy auditorium was a perfect match for a live performance of “Over, Under.”



We were very fortunate to have five very talented friends join us to shoot footage with their various cameras and phones. Other friends also lent us gear and created animations to run on the projectors. With only a window of two hours to capture footage, we couldn’t have done it without all their help.

The theme for this song was given to us by Grant Yelverton. We used a kickstarter campaign to fund our debut LP and had a pledge reward category that allowed the backer to choose a topic for a song. Grant’s choice for inspiration was “flight, any meaning.”
—Todd Matthews, bass - The Vinyl District

This new live video from RVA indie pop quartet My Darling Fury is an amazing musical and visual document. Produced during a two-hour window of time at Fulton Hill Studios, where the band practices, it captures a new song that was originally written as a reward for My Darling Fury's Kickstarter campaign to fund their debut album. The band "had a pledge reward category that allowed the backer to choose a topic for a song," bassist Todd Matthews told The Vinyl District.



Reward recipient Grant Yelverton chose “flight, any meaning” as his topic, and in response, the band put together "Over, Under," which does indeed evoke flight with its spaced-out arrangement. Particularly towards the beginning of the song, most of the instruments are silent for at least some of each individual measure. Guitarist Clark Fraley throws in the occasional lead, and singer Danny Reyes makes intermittent use of his synth, but most of the song's first two minutes is driven by Matthews' bass part, with drummer Joel Hollister playing a skeletal drum part on a stripped-down kit featuring only a bass drum and two cymbals. With this arrangement in place, it is Reyes' voice that's left to carry the lion's share of the song's early moments. The chorus swells toward a fuller sound, but towards the end of the song, things grow even more quiet, breaking down to percussion as Reyes layers his voice through the use of a loop effect, eventually backing himself with looped three-part harmonies as he sings a nimble, soaring final verse. The song plays to the strengths of the group and takes their music to a new level of intense, hypnotic beauty.



The black-and-white video for the clip is simultaneously as stripped-down and full of atmospheric grandeur as the song itself. Shot by five friends of the band on video cameras and smartphones, it offers a detailed look at the moment-by-moment creation of this deceptively detailed and intricate song. As projections by The Awesome View play on the wall behind the band, the members dance, clap, and perform with an infectious joy. The auditorium of Fulton Hill Studios, which was originally built a century ago to serve as a school, makes for an evocative backdrop, and as Matthews points out, "the extremely high ceilings and huge acoustic sound in this airy auditorium was a perfect match for a live performance of 'Over, Under.'" So enjoy the performance captured in this video, then head out to The Camel next Wednesday, May 28, to catch My Darling Fury performing live and in person as part of RVA Playlist's Fourth Birthday Celebration. The bill will also feature The Trillions and Vexxine, and admission is free! For more info, click here.

By Andrew Necci - RVA Mag

My Darling Fury released a music video for their song, "Over, Under" (off of new LP Licking Wounds) on The Vinyl District. The catchingly simplistic video utilizes light and shadows to capture the eye as the music captures the listener’s mind. Todd Matthews did a wonderful job as audio engineer, producer and editor to help create an intoxicating mixture of visual and aural art.

It’s close to impossible to listen to the beginning of My Darling Fury’s song without thinking of Radiohead. Dreamy guitar and bass lines linger as trembling vocals slowly begin their ascent. As the song continues, it morphs to include synthesized patterns, heavier bass and percussion. Pedal effects aid in the transition from psychedelic-art rock opening to pop-rock ending. You can catch them next Wednesday, May 28th, at The Camel in Richmond, for the RVA Playlist Birthday Party, with The Trillions and Vexine. --Hannah Brady



Over, Under - My Darling Fury from Todd Matthews on Vimeo. - The Deli

It was time for a dose of non-CanCon, and that came from My Darling Fury, out of Virginia. They were a band of dreamy popsters with a lead singer who was not afraid to dance. The band switched between instruments frequently (somehow a band with two keyboards also had a double bass) and eventually got into the groove, which pulled the audience along with it. By the end, there was barely anyone who wasn’t dancing along or clapping. It seems to be a soft touch that does the trick. - Grayowl Point

After finishing up a recent series of tour dates with Kishi Bashi, Virginia’s My Darling Fury are now premiering to the world their bright and bushy-tailed new track, “Spilled Milk”. An intentionally positive spin on a negative interaction with a former romantic partner, the track turns sunshine into darkness with glittery landscapes of instrumentals and lead vocals by Danny Reyes which soar high over everything. Indeed, the vocals are the shining focus of the track and what encourages listeners to come back repeatedly — and to those who understand its intentions, Reyes’ fascinating incorporation of English idioms will be charming. Explains Reyes in the press release:
“Typically, I’d write a song about what a jerk that guy was but this time I thought I’d focus on the guy who was there and tried to console me. This song has a lot of American idioms and sayings in it: life is a cabaret, when life gives you lemon make lemonade, no use in crying over spilled milk, make the bed now lie in it, I shit the bed, and paint the town red. It will be impossible to translate into another language.” - Danny Reyes - Redefine Magazine

"My Darling Fury is truly a beautiful thought in indie pop. I'm really looking forward to hearing more!" - Kishi Bashi

“Some of my earliest memories of listening to vinyl are due in part to my father’s collecting of Ventures albums.”

“As a kid, I loved flipping through all of them to see the cover art on each album. I developed favorite songs like “Out Of Limits,” “Walk Don’t Run 64',” and “Pipeline.” I don’t remember which album was my favorite. Golden Greats is a good candidate. They tended to put the same songs on multiple albums, it seems.



When I was in ninth grade I was introduced to The Cure. Not the actual band members though, that would have been quite amazing. I started playing guitar the following year. I would try to learn the songs, working from my rudimentary catalog of chords. I was influenced by the timbres they used and certainly their melodic approach.


This affinity for The Cure later manifested in record collecting. I guess I was following in my father’s footsteps. I had a modest collection at a point. One of the rarer ones was the first 7? release of “Killing An Arab” on Small Wonder Records before they went to Fiction. I really like almost all of their records. Disintegration might be their finest from start to finish.



I guess if I had to have a guitar hero of sorts, it might be Johnny Marr of The Smiths. He is a master of creating melodic layers with the guitar without the harmonic space getting cluttered. Hatful of Hollow has alway been one of my favorites.

I first had a cassette copy of it that a friend made for me. Years later I saw copy on vinyl and had to grab it. It wasn’t that it was a particularly rare record but I was taken by how cool the art looked on 12? by 12? material.”
—Clark Fraley, Guitar and Synth

We’re delighted to debut “Blots in the Margins” from My Darling Fury’s upcoming release Licking Wounds on store shelves November 5. - The Vinyl District

Richmond, VA's My Darling Fury harbor a constructive rage against the face of modern qualms and conflicts. The machines of opposition are met with a minimal orchestral sensibility, a certain flurry of deeply expressed fury that acts upon an enduring and personal songwriting and arrangement strategy. Lead by Danny Reyes, percussion backed by Joel Hollister, bass control by Todd Matthews, with guitar and keyboard duties from Alex McCallum, and Clark Fraley; these five horsemen conquer the inward fears and master the processes of self-healing on this exclusive stream of their just released album, Licking Wounds.

From the get-go, Licking Wounds lifts off with a song for the marginalized, a song for those stuck in the margins, or simply swimming in the proverbial margarine, on "Blots on in the Margins". A lullaby for the downtrodden, "Margins" bucks the downward trends and downward dog yoga addicts with an attitude that takes control of the pen that maps out life's autoCAD blueprints and designs. "We'll take the plan, and we'll write the whole thing again." From making lemonade out of crates of lemons, "Spilled Milk" sucks it up as "Perfectly Mad" makes it's way through a seven minute course of life like a slug carrying luggage and singing all the while.

An album of many aspects, facets, different sides, and different surfaces; "Magic Creatures" gives a moment of choral and pastoral piano lead beauty. "The End of the World" is an apocalyptic crash course where cataclysmic scenarios bring the start of new chances, new lives, new opportunities, and new songs. Attached companionship of the corrosive kind are lamented and longed for on "Friendly Parasite", where empathetic sentiments are stitched up like Stockholm syndrome, where "love is just a bug you learn to like, and that's alright". Brutal non-conformity is depicted like calumnious invitation on "Schoolyard Warrior", to the sordid matchmaking profile detailing of "Frail Thing". Closing the album are some of the biggest battles against today's largest bank backed automatic tellers like the pains of poverty on "Overdrawn" to the sincere and center stage sweep of "In The Ring". To borrow a quote from today's featured conversation with Danny Reyes, the lasting message MDF leaves you with are that the answers and questions thrive from within, during patches of duress. "Our most collaborative, our most sympathetic, our most creative, our best versions of ourselves [are] when times are tough."



Danny Reyes gave us an intimate portrait and view into My Darling Fury's full-length labor of love, songs of struggle, songs of resistance, and songs born out of the conflicted keys of life.

The existential block knocker "Blots In The Margins" begins the album and it's song with thoughts of "plans, thought up by some big man". Are going for a kind of, sound of humanity breaking out of ideas of being just a happy mistake of occurrence?

When we first started working on this song, the Occupy movement was gaining momentum. Although I was never involved in it, I drew inspiration from it. With the 'big plan', I had our modern social and economic orders in mind. It’s easy for the oppressed to accept their circumstances if they feel as though things are the way they ought to be, the way they’ve always been. The 'big man' is a shadowy figure, the anonymous father-knows-best who put the plan into action. He stands squarely between those who benefit from the plan and those who suffer because of it. The big man represents the ideologies that support the systems in place, he’s the premise. Accept the premise and the argument follows, irrespective of the outcome for the persuaded. Get a population to believe that a system benefits the hard-working and punishes the lazy. Tell them that there’s a class of contributors and a class of moochers and they’ll accept that the few haves are deserving and the have-nots simply haven’t done enough. Although a socio-economic struggle was the source of inspiration, the song deals with alienation in broad terms and represents all systems where a few are beneficiaries at the expense of many-it is a call to arms for anyone who has been marginalized by a big plan. I think this is why it connects with people. We all know what it’s like to get the short end of the stick and we want to be prodded to snap the stick in two.

Licking Wounds feels very concerned with moving through the motions of moods in different stages, like the responsive cues of "Spilled Milk", "Perfectly Mad", and then everything is flung into this orchestral realm of a kind of enchanted possibility like on "Magic Creatures".

Yes, that’s right. That’s the reason we felt Licking Wounds was a fitting title, despite it - Impose Magazine

Behold the orchestral folk awesomeness that is My Darling Fury. The band is getting ready to release Licking Wounds, its debut album on November 5. “Friendly Parasite” is a cleverly-titled opus that gets stuck in your head despite your preference (or lack thereof) for classical pop. Conjuring the falsetto of Antony & the Johnsons, lead singer Danny Reyes (Gills & Wings along with guitarist Alex McCallum) uses his powerful voice and excellent control to control the mood of the music. He caresses the words with his silken timbres. The lyrics liken love to the title, saying, “Love is for the birds, that’s what I’ve heard/But they’re all wrong/It’s just a parasite/A friendly parasite.” Here is a second track just made available:

"Blots in the Margins" is just as lovely as the previous one with a soothing Americana violin (by Stacy Markowitz ACTUALLY bowed double bass by Todd Matthews in the high register. Genius! Markowitz appears on another track). Dramatic cymbals provide a necessary roughage for the seamless song. Reyes goes to some pretty vulnerable places, belting out high notes with the most confidence and unwavering.
Check out My Darling Fury on 10/21 on WDCE 90.1 FM- The Mike Larue Show AND the album release show on 11/9 @ Hardywood Brewery, 6 pm. I would think seeing this band live would be life-changing!
- Sounds of RVA

Hello everyone. Between apartment hunting in NYC, working myself into the ground, trying to wrap up my first novel and staying healthy and sane in this nutty city, I've neglected you, the readers. Sorry about that. Leaving on a vacation tomorrow and wanted to hand out some audio-visual candy before I left. If something fantastic, whether it be a new video or soundcloud audio clip, arrives while I'm away, I'll be sure to drop you a note. In keeping with a bee-like theme, Videocracy is dead & Cross-Polination has begun. Here is a varied collection (both visually and stylistically) of the most recent new videos out there; the ones that caught my attention. I shall leave a "brief" critique with each of them. We begin with the lovely Oh Land, whose two albums Fauna & sophomore self-titled set Oh Land are quite the gems. Here are the videos for "Renaissance Girls" and "My Boxer:"
"Renaissance Girls"
"My Boxer"

https://www.facebook.com/OhLandMusic
Absolutely LOVE the video for "Renaissance Girls." Fantastic choreography, lovingly crafted and real artistic growth for Nanna Øland Fabricious. The more I listen to this song, the more I'm enamored with it. Loving the grey hair. Redefining sexy. So...onto "My Boxer." Not a particularly interesting concept or video, although she's quite cute riding about on her bicycle, puppy dog in tow. The song is catchy, while thankfully not screaming sell-out. I was curious as to how poppy her sound would become after receiving such attention in the media. She's not shooting for mass appeal it appears and I'm alright with that. Neither single will set the charts on fire or gather her the attention she deservedly received for her second album and it's single "Sun Of A Gun." Third album Wish Bone will definitely be an interesting affair.

MY DARLING FURY

"Blots In The Margins"

https://soundcloud.com/mydarlingfury
Pardon, the banality of this statement, but I feel like I've been mining and struck gold. I must thank a friend of mine for sending me in the direction of this stellar Richmond, Virginia band. An article from the local press likens the sound of My Darling Fury to a collaboration between Andrew Bird and Aimee Man. That comparison is not far off at all. Frontman Danny Reyes, with his raw, gorgeous voice, is the first openly gay lead singer in recent memory, whose mere presence doesn't drip sequins, glitter and sass. There's no four to the floor aesthetic to be found and he's surrounded by a bloody fantastic group of musicians.

I hadn't heard of this band before this evening and I feel like I'm privy to something quite special the world isn't lucky enough to have discovered yet. I can only hope that changes. I've just listened to this song twice and their Soundcloud offerings and immediately came to the conclusion that we are in for a treat if the LP is chock full of songs this great. If you'd like to help them raise funds for their debut album Licking Wounds, click here:
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/396141248/my-darling-fury-make-their-debut-album-licking-wou - The Sonic Archive

The dreamy soundscapes of My Darling Fury are both haunting and beautiful, reminiscent of acts such as Andrew Bird meets Fleet Foxes meets a bit of Rufus Wainwright.

The vocal melodic phrases are long and wide-ranging, placing a strong emphasis on evocative lyrics with a broad emotional span. The use of bowed double bass with effects adds atmosphere and a sometimes psychedelic quality. Two guitarists juxtapose acoustic and electric guitars and also employ creative sound effects, both on guitar and synthesizer. On the drums, mallets on the toms are often used to create a rumbling feel, and inspiration for grooves range from hip hop to classic rock.

Listen to Blots In The Margins from new album Licking Wounds, which is out on the 5th November – order from their Bandcamp here. - The Mad Mackerel

I can't believe it's almost December already. 2013 whirled by much faster than I had hoped for. Here are my lists for best albums, artists (both new and seasoned) and songs for the year. The album releases have started dwindling now that the year is about to come to a close and I thought it appropriate to share with you my favorites thus far. Enjoy!
-Ryan

Top 10 Best Songs of 2013
1. My Darling Fury - Blots in the Margins
2. Phosphorescent - Song For Zula
3. ÁLI - Cocoon
4. Hozier - Take Me To Church
5. London Grammar - Wasting My Young Years
6. Tove Lo - Out Of Mind
7. John Grant - Glacier
8. Alice Smith - Fool For You
9. Studio Killers - All Men Are Pigs
10. Jef Barbara - About Singers - The Sonic Hive

Every so often, you hear one of those voices you just can’t get enough of. You know, of the Neko Case and Jeff Buckley variety? These folks could sing the McDonald’s Value Menu aloud and you’d weep. Enter Danny Reyes of My Darling Fury. This guy’s voice is perfection. We hear the Richmond-based singer gets compared to Freddie Mercury often, but we also detect a little Andrew Bird and Beirut here and there. Welcome to Swoon City, folks.


The band wraps up a successful Kickstarter fund today and is set to drop their fully funded debut, Licking Wounds, sometime soon. You can still pre-order what’s sure to be a mind-blowing set of songs here. - The Donkey Jaw

It’s not often we get a LGBT-lead band that’s not set to super-bassy dance beats here in Richmond, VA (Except maybe Deerhunter when they come this weekend!) But every once in a blue moon we hear some tunes that are local and really worth getting excited about.

Loyal readers of GayRVA, let me introduce you to My Darling Fury:



With pipes like Andrew Byrd and song-writing akin to Aimee Mann, we love this band. And you can show how much you love them too by heading over to their Kickstarter project and throwing them a few bones.

Now lots of folks have a Kickstarter these days, but few are as successful as Fury’s. The band hopes to release their first full length album and, though they’ve reached their goal, there is still time and options available for people who’d like to support awesome local music.

Openly gay lead singer, Danny Reyes, spoke with GayRVA briefly about the success the band has had so far, and what they hope for in the future.

Reyes said the initial success of the Kickstarter was a pretty big surprise. “We weren’t sure what to expect, so we set a goal that we thought was realistic to reach in a month… So its been great.” The band managed to reach their $5,000 goal within 3 days.

Reyes described My Darling fury as indie-rock, but “it still has choruses and standard pop form. The melodies are wide-ranging.” And his vocals are more than capable of supporting those impressive ranges.

Reyes writes the lyrics, and while he said some of the more romantic songs don’t specifically address a gender, those that do are sung by a male to another male. “A lot of the lyrics are, well, gay… we don’t hide anything about it.”

So head on over to My Darling Fury’s Kickstarter page – if they reach $6,500, all backer’s get vinyl stickers, at $7,500 the band will be able to record 2 additional songs, and at $10,000, the band will be able to set up a live special performance for all those who helped them reach such a mighty goal. - Gay RVA

There isn't anything wrong with average. Great mansions are built of everyday bricks. The average strawberry is delicious. There are hardworking bands in every town wafting heartfelt songs of love and loss. But even among the talented, the bell curve distribution rules. Most rank somewhere in the thick, enjoyable middle. It's a challenge to rise above the appealing clutter.

My Darling Fury is not your average band.

In its debut video for the anti-marginalization anthem "Blots in the Margin," the music swells from spare acoustic guitar to a dramatic thundering of tom-tom drums and bowed bass. Singer Danny Reyes holds the screen with a direct, sympathetic gaze while the song builds from reflective lament to full-throttle, passionate optimism. It's a revelatory, tour-de-force performance, charging headlong toward the vocal cliff and somehow taking flight.


"Blots" drew bassist Todd Matthews to the band. The conservatory-trained musician is a frequent performer with the Richmond Symphony and member of free-range chamber ensemble Classical Revolutions. Matthews was expecting to hear an aspiring garage band when guitarist Alex McCallum sent him a Sound Cloud link. "I became an immediate fan," Matthews says. "The beauty of it, the musicality, the way it tells a story and moves you emotionally."

The frequent use of bowed bass adds a new layer to a sound that was years in development. Reyes was a vocal performance student when he met McCallum through University of Miami guitar instructor and Virginia Commonwealth University graduate Chris Whiteman. In 2007, the three formed Richmond-based Gills and Wings. "In the beginning we were a little more glam rock," Reyes says. "A lot of Queen and Freddie Mercury. We had a couple of songs played on MTV's 'The Real World.'" After a few years of trying, the band broke up before breaking through. The other players left town, but Reyes and McCallum resolved to give it one more shot.

During the next year they wrote songs and put together a new band. Clark Fraley was invited to join based on the sound of his guitar in an adjacent practice space. When the original drummer didn't work out, Fraley brought in Joel Hollister. Their first gigs were in late 2012 and they've been ramping up since. On one memorable June night, amidst the semi-posh chandeliers and mirrors of the Hippodrome's Speakeasy, they seamlessly followed a Classical Revolutions performance of Brahms String Sextet in B-flat with a polished set featuring dancers from the Latin Ballet.

The structure of every song is the result of extensive group experimentation and negotiation. "We overlap in a fairly narrow space," McCallum says. "Danny and I have done stuff that is more pop. Clark and Joel prefer a darker edge. Todd has no tolerance towards anything that sounds artificial. We all know when everyone is going to like a song."

Released on a Facebook sea of pink equal signs the week of the U.S. Supreme Court marriage equality arguments, it was initially tempting to see "Blots" as an attack on institutional homophobia, but Reyes says the inspiration was the Occupy Movement. Deconstructing Reyes' lyrics for songs such as "Friendly Parasite," "The End of the World" or "Spilled Milk" reveals a playful pursuit of evocative imagery alloyed with a next wave, 21st-century disregard of heterosexual songwriting convention.

Early this year the band won a songwriting competition sponsored by Songwire Studio. The prize, several days of recording in the Shockoe Bottom studio, gave the group a running start on a 10-track CD. A Kickstarter campaign opens July 27, with performances set for August. The target CD release date is Oct. 26.

And then? "With the music industry so up in the air I have no idea what it takes or how it happens," Matthews says. "We'll try to take it step by step. And try to get as many people to hear it as possible." During the long summer days he's applying a classical ear for detail to the sonic minutia of the recording mix. It's a big, noisy world, and there's only one chance to make a perfect first impression. S

A Kickstarter campaign will launch July 27. My Darling Fury plays the Tobacco Company on Aug. 11 at 8 p.m., and the Camel with Floodwall on Aug. 19 at 9 p.m. - Style Weekly

I've got a vague bit of attachment to Virginia -- the state that My Darling Fury hail from. I worked there for two years (while living in DC), and actually voted for Obama while on the State registry.

Mumbling aside, "Satisfied" stood out to me for its quality vocals, quality instrumentation and quality production. All-in-all, the single represents a fantastic foray into the indie rock zone, reminding me just a touch of Wilco and Fleet Foxes.

If you dig what you hear, be sure to check out more from the band here. - Indie Shuffle

My Darling Fury is an elegant and unique alternative dream pop trio composed of Todd Matthews (bassist and sound engineer), Joel Hollister (percussion) and Danny Reyes (frontman). The inspiration for their sound and lyrics comes from the “unpredictability of life and love”, which seeps out of their music. I can say I’ve never heard anything quite like My Darling Fury. The diverse musical backgrounds of the trio creates a thick and layered style that incorporates rhythmic sounds from Cuban-American Danny Reyes’ cultural music and a contemporary edge derived from the band members natural creativity.

“Satisfied” is an absolutely memorizing track. Reyes’ fluttering and velvety voice laid upon saxophone, interesting percussion and hypnotic circular guitar rhythms makes “Satisfied” the kind of track listeners will come back to time and time again. I’ve already listened to it 8 times in one sitting.




Stay tuned for more from My Darling Fury as they’ll be releasing a new record titled, A/O/K, this winter. You can find their debut record, Licking Wounds, on iTunes and keep up with them on their website. - Music for Lunch

Why do we like this?
I've got a vague bit of attachment to Virginia -- the state that My Darling Fury hail from. I worked there for two years (while living in DC), and actually voted for Obama while on the State registry.

Mumbling aside, "Satisfied" stood out to me for its quality vocals, quality instrumentation and quality production. All-in-all, the single represents a fantastic foray into the indie rock zone, reminding me just a touch of Wilco and Fleet Foxes.

If you dig what you hear, be sure to check out more from the band here. - Indie Shuffle

While outsiders may not recognize it yet, Richmond, Va is the home of an emerging rock scene. A promising band that's poised to and themselves to this list is My Darling Fury. Their blend of indie rock and pop is as melodic as it is haunting and mysterious. The group's video for "Satisifed," which we're premiering today, captures the band at their rawest while in the studio. This rare glimpse behind the scenes will give fans a different perspective of My Darling Fury on what's become one of their most challenging songs.

"The song isn’t about being satisfied, it’s about what it’s going to feel like when you finally get to be satisfied," the band says. "In the social media age, it’s something we’re all familiar with: that feeling that people are happy, being awesome and you don't measure up. When you see people you know doing bigger and better things and you feel like you’re left behind, looking out.

"People having kids, landing big gigs, big jobs, going on exotic vacations, getting engaged, so on and so on. So you’re staring at a screen, and the grass is not just greener, it’s color-boosted and it’s in HD and Zac Efron is doing pushups on it. Then you look at yourself, and you feel inadequate. So in 'Satisfied,' we try to imagine ourselves on the other side and we’re happy as hell, but there’s a bitterness beneath it. In this scenario, we’re not reaching Zen. It’s not about contentment. We’re there because we’ve taken it. So it’s that blood in your mouth kind of satisfaction. "

My Darling Fury's ACHES EP is out now. - Pure Volume

My Darling Fury are sharing their heartfelt single, "50 Hearts," a stunning tribute to the Orlando victims. The gorgeous piece calls for action and displays a haunting, subtle tone throughout, as singer Danny Reye's voice is a bit of heaven. My Darling Fury helps to show the true meaning of community coming together, and the emotions felt within the community and the world of the tragic shootings.

For My Darling Fury's Danny Reyes, the track comes from an extremely personal place. As a gay-Cuban American from Florida, Reyes heart-wrenching tearful vocals calls for strength, healing and peace within the world.

Singer Danny Reyes says of the piece:

"When my brothers and sisters lost their lives, it’s as if I did too. I thought of them having a good time, dancing, and getting tipsy, and I imagined myself at that club. Then suddenly to hear gun shots and bullets raining down on them, how confusing and horrifying it must have been. I thought any one of them could have been a friend. Any one of them could have been me. To understand why the setting of this tragedy is doubly horrific, you’d have to understand that nightclubs are some of the few safe spaces for the queer community. And to understand what a safe space really means, you’d have to come to grips with the reality that queer people are constantly aware of the possibility of violence towards us. That we are never quite fully free. That we think twice about the degree of our expression, because we’ve experienced that violence."

With a glimpse of hopefulness for the future, My Darling Fury pleads for a change in the world, while bringing to the table an insightful and fitting tribute, that will not only make you shed a tear, but have a better understanding of the violence that still exists in this world towards the LBGT community. - Paste Magazine