Falling Doves | Interview with Lyndsey Parker (LPTV)

Parker here for LPTV at Licorice Pizza in the San Fernando Valley from London to Hollywood to I think Ohio to Studio City. I'm here with the continental rock group Falling Dove. Why don't um you guys introduce uh yourselves and then we'll talk about what brings you to our store?

Well, this is uh Christopher Le by myself with the Falling Dove founding member and Mrs. K. Hello. I'm Katie. I'm the bass player

and this is our little all-star group of friends that came in to sit in with us. Hi, I'm Moose. And hi, I'm Donnell.

And I'm Rocky Rose. And I'm sitting here on Keys.

Awesome. So, yeah, it's quite a super group today. What are we celebrating, by the way? It's the 10th anniversary of one of your milestone records.

It's it's the 10th anniversary of the band actually touring and and playing and and and traveling around, right? So, we released a record uh vinyl record. We got to spend a little bit of time with Carrie and he had gone about his company and how we needed to release a record with him and we did and you know it was definitely in true Hollywood fashion we want to invite some of our closest friends to celebrate with us not just from the sidelines but on stage with us and that's I think what music's all about. Right.

Absolutely. So like I said you were saying it's kind of a super group today. So what are all of your uh credentials your Wikipedia pages your resumes your CVs? We'll start here with with chapter one here. Um, when we first started in England, this fella helped us actually uh get to all the other cool venues. We had our a bunch of cool ones, but we become creatures of habit because we just go to the same places and Darnell had already been kind of going all over the place. So, he took us on tour. So, you know, he's been part of our career.

Yeah. U meeting Chris over there in uh in England. officially meeting Chris in England, I should say, cuz we we technically met at uh Southby way long ago. Uh that was that was a crazy time crazy time. But England, meeting in the UK, we had a had a good time taking them all up and down the coast. All these little tiny holes dives where it's just you Dandy Warholes, if you will. And

Dandy Warholes,

that's it. And you know, the thing is is is the the culture over there is so great, you know, very much they're just into music, you know, very much like this space. just everyone in there is just they're about new sounds and and new vibes and just bringing that out there has been really cool. So, and then both of us being guitar players and and frontmen, you know, it was a it was a match made in heaven.

But you guys aren't British. I guess I can't I mean I'm not detecting British accents. What how did Am I wrong? How did you get to England?

Well, it's up to you, love. Like, if you want the British accent, all we got to do is just say like turn it on.

Oh, you can switch it on and off.

Yeah. I'm British for the rest of the day and

Sorry. You sounded So, you are from England.

Yeah. From from Leeds.

Leeds. Okay. Very cool. Very cool. Chris, are you British?

I'm Mexican. 100% Mexican, but

um you know, I've been renting back and forth from LA to Liverpool for the last 10 years as well. So, I mean, it really bought homes. You know, I'm not going to start talking to Scouse Saxon because that' be

I mean, you can we don't know if we'd understand you though.

She says it's not the best. And so, that's how that story kind of went down with us. And and for me, I'm passionate about my friends. I really love uh supporting him and being part of their journey in any regard whatsoever when I'm not on tour. And so we've been friends with Allison here in Keys for a bit. Uh and so when you see her in the big billboard, it's Rocky Rose the rocker. And it's awesome to see people excel and and it's honestly an honor to be able to have her play keys here with us tonight.

What's your Wikipedia page? I play for a lot of fun bands and names, especially here in Los Angeles. But I actually just got off a year-long world tour as a keyboardist and back in vocal.

Oh, I was at the Hollywood Bowl show. Sadly, not the one that Joanie Mitchell was at, but the one the day before, which was still awesome.

So fun. On Sunday, Cindy is airing our Hollywood Bowl show. And

must have been amazing.

Live with all the guests and everything. But

I love Cindy. I mean, what an icon. How did you get to end up playing with her? What was she like?

Uh, she was awesome. Uh, it was it was really powerful to have a lot of women in the band. We had female guitarist and female percussionists and myself and the female back singer. Uh, and then the rest of the band. And they've all known each other, most of them, for a very long time. So, I was kind of new coming in to pick up that tour. But, it was it was really special to be a part of seeing a woman's dream come true. She's my mom's age. So to see her her dream come true at that age of doing that level of production for a world tour was uh

great show.

Really wonderful.

Yeah, it's a great show. We went out and watched it. We were cheering her on.

We also met up in Japan.

Yay.

Party with her.

That's me. I mean, I would love to party anywhere with Cindy Looper. But um what about the other CVS? Who else have you guys played with? Like I said, super group has been all over the planet with a bunch of different people. Well, you guys with Collective Soul on the road, right?

Yes. I got to uh I was in um in a band that was Roma Diaz band. We uh opened for Collective Soul and Our Lady Peace in Canada, which was nothing but a dream. And and it was incredible. I uh did a bunch of session work in the city and as of recently I'm uh the drummer of a band called the Crotches where we uh it's uh it's almost like a circus act punk band and we play mostly in Vegas in

Oh, that sounds fun.

And it's really

Yeah, there's a lot going on here. This is

same players right here. So, it's been lovely.

Very cool.

We we all like to have fun.

You mentioned Liverpool. I've been to Liverpool a couple times. I've had a a really good time there. like, you know, when they have Beetle Week and the Matthew Street Festival. I have been there.

Oh my goodness. You got to say hi next time you're there.

I will. I would love to come back. But that makes sense because when I was just looking up random fun facts about Falling Devs, I saw that you've literally played with Pete Best, which I'm sure if people don't know watching this was the original kind of infamously the original uh drummer for for the Beatles, obviously. So, what how'd that happen? What was that like?

I'm going to tell you the funniest story, right? And I'm going to go real quick in this one. So that same weekend that Pete came over. So we became friends. We were working at this documentary where they grabbed a band and they took us in the same route to Hamburg the way the Beatles would. So we did that. And so part of it we got to spend time with Pete to learn about everything that we needed to do in Hamburg. Um which I'm not going to go into detail because you know I don't know who's watching. But I will say we became good friends and he said you know come play for me on my birthday as my drummer. So he did he kept his word came flew down San Diego. We did a mini tour.

How often does he drum? Does he like drum regular?

He retired at the re at the beginning of this year actually to focus on other things with his family. He still he's never going to stop drumming. He's drums, you know, it's he loves it. And

it's cool cuz um I'm sorry to interrupt, but I'm I would love to hear like,

you know, like when I said infamously, it's like to know you were in the Beatles and then you didn't end up being one of the Fab Four. That's a hard thing to deal with in life. Like, but it seems like he didn't give up his passion for doing music.

To be honest with you, you can learn a lot about a man by drinking with him for weeks, right? That's how he drinks. And and I don't you know this thing you get in these situations, and I'm sure you know what I'm talking about. You can't just go and ask people.

Yeah. Yeah,

but the more time you're with them, they they just themselves start telling you stories and and and so he he he did go

through a really rough period. But I think he had, you know, like you said, you know, he had everything that he wanted to begin with. And as the years progressed, he saw how some of their lives kind of went and moved and, you know, he became a civil servant and all this and all that, but he lived a good moderate life. And he got his due, you know, not too not in the '9s. And

I think he got some money for anthology, right? Some royalties. Yeah. Okay.

I'm not allowed to say how much, but

but like he got a good good amount of money for that. But but you know, he's such an optimistic dude and he's such a powerful drummer. Actually, you wouldn't think that. And so that same weekend that he came to my birthday, Ringo is playing at Humphrey's. So we went over I went over to say hi to Ringo and I felt horrible because it's like cheating on your girlfriend kind of how it felt.

You weren't with Pete P. You didn't walk up to Ringo with Pete.

No, no, no. I tell Pete, okay, and I go. So the whole weekend I was going back and forth between Pete and Ringo, hanging out.

That's crazy.

And then I then I was drinking a little bit too much and I was smoking weed with Ringo and some of his I'm not supposed to say that but

I'm pretty sure it's not scandalous that a

smoking some weed with some of his friends and

Okay. I'm pretty sure

and I will say it's not scandalous. Yeah. But you know people in their image. Um, so I just threw out this wild

idea and I said to Ring, "Why don't you come to I'm shooting this music video and you know, let's pretend that you know, you're playing the drums and then Pete Best kicks you off the drum kit." And he laughed and he said, "That'd be funny." So then I said the same story to Pete and that wasn't that funny.

He he didn't like it.

No, he didn't like that.

So it didn't happen.

So I was like, "I'm with you, man. I'm messing with you."

It didn't happen. But but we we were able to get a Ringo impersonator to do the part.

Yeah. Yeah, that was grand.

I feel like I saw some YouTube video that said that or that showed that you did perform or share a stage with Ringo, though.

Yeah. Well, it's and it's been a while now. There was a period where Carrie had a label with Linda Linda Perry and they were doing some recordings and so we were getting some tracks over there with Bruce Sugar Studio and this other artist that he was managing named Beck was putting out the CD. Not Beck Beck but a Beck Chick and she had some of the tracks and I had some of the tracks. We were able to put him on our album. So

was it Beck Black? Yeah.

Yeah, I know. I know. I know her. We're friends.

So she she had some of the tracks too. So that's kind of how that went went down.

Such a small world.

Yeah. Yeah. Where did you grow up? Because we were talking about England and I mean it's kind of a leap to go

back and forth between San Diego and LA because I'd spent all the summers in LA and then obviously as I became an adult I spent most of my youthood up here I guess you would say partying having a good time and playing the punk bars and did my work here.

Yeah. So, you know, a lot of times when I've read things about Falling Doss, they talk about you guys being inspired by the Sunset Strip and kind of the heyday of glam in LA and Hollywood, like the glory days of Hollywood rock. Can is that something you were growing up with?

Is that you know the thing is that's all that it was when we were hanging out the Sunset Strip. So, you get cats like Nuna Ben & Court and a bunch of those really lovely people like Gilby Clark and so they give us a gig, but they said you need to step it up, you know. So when we were playing these shows, we do give credit to a lot of these cats cuz we had to play that type of guitar work in order to play with open up for these shows. So by default, you know, it's in our DNA from the streets of LA.

But how did you end up in Liverpool? I would think that most time when musicians are going to move to Well, I mean, I'm talking about you specifically. Uh when musicians are going to move to the UK that they would go to London. That would be what I would assume.

We tried. We tried. I think I think the first tour we were headed to Sweden between you and me and they lost our bags in in when we did the layover in Liverpool. So we were stuck in Liverpool for a week and just fell in love with the people there and uh over the years it was just a stopover town. So he'll tell you the same thing.

You know, each of us chooses an area to live and we're in England and we just fly around, do the tours, and come back home. And then before you know it, the two months turn into 6 months and then we were there for almost a year and then going backwards. And I was paying rent for a while both places. It wasn't fun.

But am I wrong in that there's How many members have Falling Dove isn't just a band? It's kind of like a collective. Like how many members have there been?

It's always been It's always been a two-piece with with uh session players. It's always been that way. It's the only way we've been able to rotate. Um cuz when I first signed that was the deal on the deal that I was not I needed the freedom to bring people in and out based on the music because I didn't want to be stuck, you know, creatively.

So, how did um the lovely people we have? You guys are all obviously very chummy because you're like all squished onto this 70s couch. How did you curate this lineup?

So, Katie is the

I'm number two of the two-piece.

How long have you been number two? How long have you been in the band for?

I am I've uh been in the band for about four years now. Um I started as kind of just like a backing vocalist merch person just traveling along playing Coahone when they needed it. And then um I think about a year into that the bass player couldn't travel anymore.

He got gout real bad.

He got he got gout so he had to stop traveling and I was like you know I don't play bass but I would love to. Did you play anything though? Like did you know did you play guitar?

I played ukulele when I was 16. This will be the same thing. And it so is not. But I took on the challenge. So now I've been playing bass for them for about three two three years.

Self taught.

Yeah. Yeah. I should probably take some lessons at some point.

I think by now I think you got it down.

I just That's That's pretty That's pretty awesome actually. You had never played in a band before or anything like that. I I was I was vocally trained for a very long time. I was in a cover band in Portland for like six years, all through my teenhood singing in there. But this is my first band that I've been in where I'm playing an instrument. So thating is nice.

So how did the rest of this uh lineup for tonight come to be?

Darnell sat in with us when our guitars couldn't travel abroad

and just sometimes music requires more guitars than you know what you can do and he just filled in in the dates and I mean like I said we literally met on stage in England. We had been in different stages together, but we hadn't met. So, we met on stage and we been

jamming together between tours ever since. I mean, we have another guitarist obviously, but whenever we have a choice, we bring the best to come in.

You also have a kear. That's important.

Yeah. And and Rocky Rose is is uh definitely when the stars align, we have the honor to be able to share a stage with her. And that's

usually it's not in the US, but we got lucky this time. We get to play two nights in a row, you guys.

Yeah. Yeah.

So, is this part of the uh Mirrors and uh sorry,

Mirrors and Dream Waves?

Mirrors and Dream Waves. The You're doing a 10th anniversary tour for I guess for the whole band. Yeah. Maybe the focus is on that album.

On that album. So, what we did is actually we had talked to Carrie about because he knew they have a studio here. So, I talked to him about recording uh I was visiting him in Maui and we talked to him about recording uh new versions of like the top songs that are being downloaded with, you know, the current lineup. And right as we were talking about that, we got offered a beautiful studio in Sydney. So, we just made the album there. And I go, "But we're still going to print it with you." You know,

colors of vinyl

uh like our pink

the band's color. Yeah.

up there. We can show

uh Do you want to grab that record? We We'll do this edit. Hand me the one that says mirrors and dream waves on it.

Just a little pink one at the bottom of the jack.

Sorry. We'll just edit this part out.

No, there it is.

It's very pretty.

It's raw.

And here. Oh, no. Wait. You ready? And here we just happen to have the record here. Would you like to do the QVC situation?

So, here it is. This was the album. And the cover actually happened. We were on vacation in the Cook Islands and um we couldn't get a photographer because, you know, you're in the middle of nowhere and there's no photographers. It's like 30 people in that island. And um I told her, "Well, let's get uh I think we got what is that? An ironing board."

So the back cover here is us sitting playing chess, drinking champagne on a table in the water,

celebrating 10 years. Actually

celebrating the 10 years. So, this actually was taken by essentially duct taping a phone to an ironing board in the sand and dragging our table like sneaking so that the staff didn't see us dragging our table into the water

and you time.

Yeah.

Like, yeah, I thought that was not AI necessarily, but basically CG whatever like rendering.

We were fully clothed underwater. Um,

and did you get

And that is the color of the water.

And that is the color of the water. Did you do just one shot?

No, we did about 10 or 15 cool things for promo.

Pretty good

because we had shot this album and we didn't have a cover and we weren't going to have time.

That's hilarious.

So I go, well, this is beautiful.

It's a good shot though.

I mean, yeah, I think it's cute. Very impressed by that.

The neighbors were very alarmed with what was going on.

So you're all about doing things yourselves or I mean that's literally DIY right there.

We've all worked in everything in in in the business, you know, from photography to creative,

graphic design, videography. So, it's easy when you have an eye for it. It's just translated into a different art form.

So, what uh is next for Falling Doss?

Taking a break hopefully in February. Maybe just doing bigger gigs, but no big tours for a little bit. I got to write a little bit more. And

yeah, I wanted to know if there was new music,

get there is always new music coming out. Always, always, always. It's usually a couple albums a year. And will any of the people on this couch be part of the

I'm sure I'm sure in remotely we'll probably be able to peg this wonderful.

It's whoever's there when we get a studio to do some stuff.

Honestly, that's how it works out. It's whoever is there and present when we get into a studio and whoever can send files overseas.

Maybe I'll send files from my hotel.

Send files all day, dude.

Send as many files as you need, mate.

Well, it seemed to be a system, an international system that's working for you guys.

Yeah, it's definitely streamlined. Sydney to San Diego to Studio City to

Liverpool. I said London before, but I meant Liverpool. And back and

welloiled machine. Honestly, at this point, it is a welloiled machine.

So, we can take a break. We can actually afford to take a break.

Oh, wow.

But not until you play our store tonight.

Correct.

The welloiled machine's going to be working out there.

Yeah, indeed.

It's going to be good times. Well, thank you so much for coming to Licorice Pizza. You have fascinating stories and maybe Pete Best will change his mind someday.

You know, we we we just got hit up actually a few days ago. So, we recorded this album together uh for the radio station, you know, and

Wait, you and Pete Best?

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, we did we did about six songs together, but we haven't released or done anything with it and we

you know, we just we don't want to we just didn't want to do a bunch of Beatle covers and stuff like this. So, we let him choose the songs and he played on one of our songs and so in the future, one of our original songs called Glass of Wine and we let him pick the song.

They're all originals by you.

Yeah. Yeah. I'll tell you a funny story. First day he walks into the studio because we've never jammed with him. And then I tell the guys, "Hey, let's go a little easier on this old guy." You know, let's and he gets on the drums and wow, he you know, he plays like Marky Ramon hard and like boom. Yeah,

he's like I assume because I know Paul McCartney's 83 so he's got to be around.

It's a different ballgame as Ring. Ringle's a great drummer. Pete's like uh he's really is a punk drummer if you really had to.

That's pretty cool. So when's that what can you tell me about that record coming out?

They're they're negotiating it with him. So the N museum, they're talking to him and they're putting that together and I I sign whatever you guys want to do. I'm happy.

So it's going to be built as a Pete Best record or Falling Dove and Pete Best.

That's what I think it's going to be.

That's so cool. I can't wait. Well, Pete Best can come to Licorice Pizza.

Yeah, we'll bring him over.

I'm sure he can bring as long as he bring him with his wife, he might come out.

Absolutely. He would be absolutely welcome here. That would be iconic. But in the meantime, this has been iconic. So, thank you for sharing the stories and your music with us.

Thank you all the staff.

And uh yeah, we're going to catch you there.

Grant and everybody. Cheers.