Joey Spurgeon and Bren Eisman have been acquainted since childhood both of them growing up on the California coast. After being introduced at a basketball camp in sixth grade, playing on the same team in seventh grade, and attending the same high school one text from Joey may have changed each of their lives. A text to led to them being roommates and starting a musical project DWLLRS.
“Once college hit we were we ended up rooming together because he was the only person that I knew. So I texted him was like, ‘Hey, you want to be my roommate?’ And that’s when we just got got really really close. We’d stay up like pretty much every single night till like 3am gaming and talking and playing and that’s when we really figured out that we had a really strong connection with each other and had a lot of similar life experiences and perspectives.” Joey said.
Through a bond of overthinking, Raising Canes, and music the duo went from lifelong acquaintances to best friends and eventually on of alt-pop’s rising stars with their band DWLLRS.
We had the opportunity to interview Joey and Bren on their first tour before they played their first show in New York City and talked about how the duo came together and started playing music. Through high school, Bren’s expressed himself on the stage in theater. “I was a thespian, I was in theater and stuff that was like the extent of my artistic expression,” Eisman explained. Rooming together for college is when Joey taught Bren to express himself through music.
The DWLLRS name comes from the common thread of overthinking they discovered as college roommates and dwelling on topics. As someone who falls victim to chronic overthinking as well, I’m jealous of how the two turn these thoughts into art in their music, visuals, and more.
“A majority of our overthinking is not productive, at least momentarily. But I think I think the catalog in the songs that we’ve created are good examples of when it has turned into something productive and kinda it’s just us trying to make something beautiful from, from all of that existential reality,” Eisman explained.
It was a pleasure to have Bren and Joey in studio for an interview and photo shoot as they closed out their first tour. Check out the full interview and photo gallery with DWLLRS below!
Photos by Pablo Perez/Road Trip Playlists
Hi guys, thanks for coming. Could you both say your name so that listeners can tel you apart as they listen?
Bren Eisman: Hello, my name is Bren Eisman.
Joey Spurgeon: Hello, my name is Joey Spurgeon.
Bren, Joey, I’m glad that you’re here with me. This is the Road Trip Playlists podcast.Your song your latest song dividends. You said and I agree that it sounds like a road trip and it does. And so I like asking I like the first question I started out with is what’s on your road trip playlist? What songs are you listening to? And which one do you play?
JS: Kids by current joys.
BE: Like some Caamp songs.
Caamp is perfect for road trips.
JS: Pink and White Frank Ocean.
BE: Fog Lake. Do you know Fog Lake? Fog Lake is so sick. Super underrated.
You’re about to play. Baby’s All Right here in New York. It’s your first time playing a show outside of California. How’s that feel? How do you feel about this tour? How’s it been?
JS: It’s surreal. It’s It’s amazing. Such an honor to be here…
BE: It’s everything we’ve dreamed of (laughs). The tour is called everything we’ve dreamed of. Because that’s like one of the lines and ‘Dividends’. It’s like “everything I dream of always ends up going bad.” But not this. This is going great. We sold out a couple of our somewhat like local venues. That was crazy. It’s the most like, bewildering thing to see people singing a song that like maybe we released like two years ago that we never got the chance to perform. And then people like singing it back to you as loud as they can with every like, like, piece of that. It’s just It’s crazy. It’s really cool. ‘Flooded the Ceiling’ has been like the most lit song for us live. And the first or actually the second show in San Diego was like a surreal moment for me. Like where I literally almost couldn’t sing because I was smiling so hard because I was like jumping. Yeah, it was crazy. It’s really cool, though.
Well, yeah. What’s that like? I know when you’ve been putting out music a bulk of its been when there weren’t shows and when there weren’t people and that’s also where people found you, which I think is interesting is they were finding your music without shows. And so now you’re able to connect with fans like in live in person, see them move and see like the reactions that your music creates. But how’s it been now taking it outside of California?
BE: Um, well, for for, for me, it’s almost been kind of nice that we had such a long time, like, without feeling the pressure or not necessarily the pressure because we’ve always like, dreamed in like wanting to do live shows. But to be able to kind of be in like a state of hibernation where we’re in like our little like, our little home studios for years, literally without ever performing. Just working on things and kind of like doing a lot of like self discovery and figuring out what we’re expecting out what sounds good figuring out what’s authentically us. Yeah. And then now we’re at this point where we were like, so confident with like the brain and where dwellers is going. So sonically visually and just as, like, as a whole, that to bring that to the live space. We were more confident than ever that it’s going to be something that’s like a, like a lifelong thing you know that like, we want to tour the whole country like, ever you want to the world? Yeah. And that I feel like we’ve achieved that sort of like confidence and that vision in like, unison with that, like time that we spent just like cooped up, you know? And to see the people. Yeah, once again to see the people liking the music. Yeah. Which we’ve never seen with one person. It’s so unbelievable.
Yeah, you see faces instead of like avatars on social media or wherever you’ve seen it in the past. You talked about it being like something that you’ve both dreamed of. And this was dreamt of and come together in your in your college when you were roommates. prior to that did you both see yourself pursuing music like, like the way that you’re doing it now?
JS: Yeah. I mean, I’ve I’ve always wanted to do music my whole life. That’s all I’ve ever wanted to do. So for me, yeah, I would be doing music even if like, like, even if DWLLRS didn’t take up, I think we’d still be doing it and pursuing it as far as we are now. But, yeah, I’ve always just wanted to play music for a living and produce and be creative.
BE: Joey’s my biggest inspiration. Yeah, I remember. I remember when, like one of the first times I heard him singing was at this like thing that he started with our drummer who’s actually drumming with us on this tour, his name’s Tanner was on like this hillside. And I remember I was with my girlfriend at the time. And she was like, sitting in between my legs. We’re listening to you sing, ‘as we’ll burn’. And I was like, I was like, “Dave, oh, this dude can steal my girl right now.” Like with that voice. Like I know my girlfriend probably like swooning over this voice right now. And I just like, I’ve always just had such an appreciation for Joey’s artistry and that I think me like rooming with him became this thing where it’s like I’ve had, I just personally have so many things that, like everybody that I’ve like kind of hauled in, and I needed an outlet and music became my outlet. That’s, that’s where like, some of these songs have come from so many songs have come from us just like bonding together as friends as people as individuals. And it’s been really cool route for us to get to know each other better. But to get to, like understand the world, and it’s been our lens, we see everything through.
Well I love how you said music helped you two get to know each other better. In one of your bios it called you lifelong friends and another was childhood acquaintances. Can you tell me a little bit about what your friendship was like before college and when was it that you decided to start putting the music out?
JS: Well, we’ve known each other since about sixth grade, put it in the same basketball camp. So that’s awesome. It’s like we’re introduced to each other but we didn’t. We weren’t friends then. But then we played on the same basketball team in like seventh grade.
BE: Joey was the star. I was the benchwarmer.
JS: I was not the star.
BE: But we were in different. We’re in different like, it was a level thing. He was a he was up here. I was I was right here. Even though he won’t admit it.
JS: No, we were we were friends though. And seventh in eighth grade. We went to the same high school so we would, we would see each other and we always like always always liked Bren a lot. Yeah, it was like it gets cool. And he was like always, like, kind of mysterious and cool…
BE: I was a thespian, I was in theater and stuff that was like the extent of my artistic expression.
JS: I played sports in high school or yeah, in high school a little bit. And then once college hit we were we ended up rooming together because he was the only person that I knew. So I texted him was like, Hey, you want to get my roommate? And that’s when we just got got really really close. We’d stay up like pretty much every single night till like 3am gaming and talking and playing. Yeah. Nothing’s changed too much. And that’s when we really figured out that we had a really strong connection with each other and had a lot of similar life experiences and perspectives.
That’s awesome. When did it like become a project where it’s like we’re instead of just like, living in your room to then now like millions of people?
BE: I remember Joey taught me the first few chords I ever learned on guitar. And then for the next like, two months, I just played those chords, like super loud, when I’d go home, I’d play them on like this little amp that I got from my other friend. And then that, I don’t know, we would always just kind of like talk like, with with no expectation just about like, Yo, we got to start a band or something. I don’t know. And then, um, I think I sent Joey this like melody that I wrote almost two chords. Yeah. And then that’s what turned into and then won’t be all right, which was our first track released. And it was just super seamless, and kind of crazy. Because I think, when we were working on that song, sorry, excuse me, um, we didn’t really have, we had no expectation, like, we had like dreams and like aspirations. And we like knew that it could go somewhere if we wanted to, but we didn’t necessarily want to like, alright, we got to do all this stuff, make an album, and we’re going to do that, like, that was kind of just like, the way we should make music. Yeah. It’s just like to friends jammin. And it’s kind of just organically progressed into what it is today. And that’s what’s it’s what I love about it. Is that, like, at the end of it all, it’s kind of just two homies.
Well it’s crazy I’m glad you’re here. We just had a photo shoot and it is cool to see your friendship. It’s been cooler to hear about how through living together you have both found creative expression through this project. What has it been like creating this together?
BE: First, like my initial reaction to that is kind of just like, I’m just honored to be able to do it with him. Yeah. And yeah, I mean, for me, like, I know, I know, it is crazy. Like, it hasn’t hit me that so many people like listen to our music. Like, to me it’s like a lot, you know, but at the same time, when I think about Joey, I think of Joey on like the same level as like, some of the greatest, like musicians that I know of like, yeah, so there’s still a there’s still like a part of me that just wants the world to like, see, sea dwellers and to especially see Joey like, just fought like, to the full extent of what I know. Like he’s capable of, you know, yeah. And I feel like we’re getting there. And that’s what’s like, so cool and exciting about it. But I just think the world of Joey’s artistry and I want the world to hear your voice more than I want Joey to sing more.
I loved reading what Joey said “When you listen to us, I want to assure you that you’re not alone in your overthinking andyour struggles,” I overthink as much as anyone and loved that. I think there is a difference in my overthinking compared to yours and even in your newest song ‘Dividend’ and about being imperfect but having the ability to love and cherish someone and also how pain and trials teach valuable lessons. Like that’s better than my overthinking. But can you tell me more about your latest release with dividends?
BE: A majority of our overthinking is not productive, at least momentarily. But I think I think the catalog in the songs that we’ve created are good examples of when it has turned into something productive and kinda it’s just us trying to make something beautiful from, from all of that existential reality. And just like identity crisis, there’s been a lot of periods of dread in, in the process of us trying to get to us off the ground. And that’s all just like self imposed, kind of. But with that being said, Yeah, music for us. I know it’s something that we’ve like talked about a lot with each other. We just want to make the DWLLRS music feel how I felt when I was in high school, driving down pch, crying, listening to Current Joys, feelings that I didn’t understand, but that I could resonate with and in with the music. You know, because we never want to be like one of those bands where it’s like, we make music to like help people. Like, it’s not that because, like, it could be that maybe, but you’re never gonna like be able to force that on someone. It’s just, it’s being authentic with your own subjective experience. And then someone experiencing that world and relating to it and applying it to their own life. Yeah. So if we can even, like achieve a small piece of that with our songs, and with the music that we put out. That means the world does that’s like, that’s just amazing.
I also want to talk about the song that it’s not even released yet, but I listened to it. And it’s incredible. And I think it’s going to be like one of those songs that did exactly what you were describing. It’s called ‘End of it All’ and that song is incredible. That’s one where I’ve like have the like email link in my phone and I keep going back to since since I’ve got it in the last few days and I’m super excited for it. I know it’s early I know there’s not much information about it right now but but what can you say about ‘End of it All’ and how it feels and how it was created because I think there’s some some lyrics there that will really resonate with people?
JS: I remember hearing one of one of the verses for that song like it was one of the first songs that Brad wrote, It was like one of the first demos he sent me was it from like a section of a song.
BE: It was a song called Hola adios.
JS: And I was like, this is this is this is incredible and I I have a great great song, but I feel like the full song wasn’t like, complete so we like to take that part out like one of the first songs that Bren ever like first, like lines he ever wrote, you know, and then put it into this like, song that turned into something else. Yeah, really. It was cool to watch. It was like saying yeah, pieces into the puzzle to create this beautiful, beautiful thing.
BE: Yeah, that the original, like foundation out song was built around this girl that broke up with me. And it was like saying, like, if you don’t love me then like all adios hello, goodbye. And then that kind of got redistributed into this. This song that became an if at all because it it kind of has been serving as like, a big picture song for us, like, at the end of everything, looking back on our lives looking back on the breakups on the fun concerts, on the label deals on the fans on the dread the existential reality. I hope, I hope, I hope it did, it will be lived a life that was worth living, you know, I hope that we rolled with the punches and made something made something worth living for, you know, absolutely. And that’s kind of what that song is for us. So it’s like, it’s a pretty it’s a pretty, like, dense topic, you know, to like, touch on for us, but yeah, it’s been. It’s been we’re still Yeah, it’s a dope song.
I’m excited to see what happens with it. I know we’re we’re close on time so I’m gonna have to leave some questions on the on the cutting room floor here and I hope one day we can talk again and go back to it but put me in the room when Justin Bieber post you guys on his Instagram story and you find that out?
JS: Okay, we’re at this coffee shop near our house. And then I think I just like a bunch of Instagram notifications and I was like ‘what is going on right now?’ And I think I think I was like, dude, Justin Bieber posted us and Bren thought I was joking.
BE: We were with my mom or something.
JS: I think we’re with your dog.
BE: Yeah. Didn’t we like have some like some like, some? What’s the word? What’s the site like psychic connection that I like happened before we even knew or something. So then someone was off that day? I don’t know. Because like when he told me that just to be reposted us. I was like, I knew that. I was like, I was like, I knew that. For some reason. I like felt it. I don’t know what it was so weird. But then it but then it hit me and I like ran around the parking lot or something. It’s pretty funny. It was like right before we had like a meeting with a label to that day. So like, at the end of the meeting, we’re like, yeah, you can see us I’ll just be with the story. But yeah, that was really cool.
Last question that I’ve got to ask is what’s next for dwellers? Where do you guys see like you’re, you’re on your first tour, but like what’s, what’s next?
BE: Yeah. We’re going on a big tour. Okay, we haven’t announced yet. Okay, opening up someone really cool. We’re really excited for that. We’re about to finish our first album. Okay. Wow. And then more tours and more albums as a movie? Movie (laughs) maybe we’ll see.
Thanks. Thank you all for thank you for being here. Thanks for joining this podcast. I really enjoyed it and look forward to sharing this with everyone.
JS:Thank you so much.
BE: It was amazing to talk to you. Great. Thank you so much for having
me.
