Dari Bay Reflects on a Co-headline Tour with Villagerrr

“IT’S SO BEAUTIFUL TO SEE PEOPLE MAKING THEIR OWN LITTLE CORNER OF THE MUSIC SCENE.”

Written and Photographed by River Epperson

In August, contributor River Epperson covered the Villagerrr x Dari Bay co-headline tour when they came through Chicago at Gman Tavern. After the tour concluded, Epperson sat down with Zack James [drums/guitar/vocals/lyrics] and Nina Cates [bass/vocals] of Dari Bay to reflect on the tour.

SOUND STAGE: Thank you so much for sitting down with me today! I hope the rest of your time on the road treated you well. 

DARI BAY: Thanks for having us! We’re excited to talk to you about it. 

SOUND STAGE: If you had to describe your sound in five words, what would they be?

DARI BAY: Do we get five between the two of us or five total?

SOUND STAGE: You can both have five. 

DARI BAY: [Cates]: It’s still hard… I feel like playful is one of them?

[James]: Yeah, it’s playful

[Cates]: There’s something very precise about it, listening to the recordings… It's almost surgical. Precision? 

[James]: Precision is good. Pop… Rock… I guess I’m thinking about Surprise Wish. Dari Bay has sounded like a lot of things over the years. I would say our music is triumphant. 

[Cates]: I like that… is that five? I think we ended up agreeing on all of them. 

[James]: I think we did. Playful, precise, triumphant, pop-rock.  

SOUND STAGE: I think that sums up the sound of your most recent record pretty well. How long have you been playing as Dari Bay? 

DARI BAY: The project’s been going since I was in high school. The sound has changed quite a bit, so I guess it could’ve been different projects, but I’ve kept the same name… eight years, maybe nine? This version of the band started in 2022; that’s when we started playing with Joey and started playing these songs. 

SOUND STAGE: When did you first cross paths with Villagerrr?

DARI BAY: We first met them in 2022, it was our first tour ever. We played with Lily Seabird, who Zack was also playing for at the time. Lily booked the show for both of us [Dari Bay and Robber Robber], and we just happened to stumble across Villagerrr and Golomb the first time we played in Columbus. Both bands are great and we’re still close with them. We also played with Wishy on the same tour, by chance. We met a lot of cool musicians on that run, and it’s so inspiring to see them continue to grow. It feels really lucky and special.

SOUND STAGE: How did you come up with the idea of a co-headline tour with Villagerrr? 

DARI BAY: We both had records that released around the same time, and felt like playing some shows in cities between our hometowns. We played our first show in Burlington, our home base, and then worked our way to Columbus, where they’re from. 

 SOUND STAGE: Was that on purpose, starting in one hometown and ending in the other? 

DARI BAY: We knew we wanted to hit both of our hometowns and knew we wanted the run to be about a week long… some of it was luck, but it was definitely nice to start the run in Burlington. It gave us more energy for the rest of the journey. We got to give both records a solid send-off in both of our hometowns, which felt good.

SOUND STAGE:  Did touring with a group of people you know so well affect or change the tour experience? 

DARI BAY: Definitely. There was no ice to break in the beginning. We try to go into every tour with the mindset that we’ll be collecting friends along the way; most people we meet on the road feel the same way, and the experience feels more meaningful. We’re certainly not best friends with everyone we’ve ever toured with, but for the most part we’re chill with everyone. 

Villagerrr especially– those guys are so awesome. Running merch with Zayn [Villagerrr drums] every night is awesome. He’s the best and gives you so much energy. Mark [Villagerrr vocals/guitar] is really cool too… he’s a crazy runner. I’ve been following him on Strava for a while… I finally got to go on a run with him and Joey [Dari Bay guitar] and it was so humbling. Mark is always finding such cool musicians to fill out his ensemble, like Collin [ Villagerrr bass]... he was a great addition to the group. We met him for the first time this run, but the cool thing about Villagerrr is, if someone new rolls up with them, they’re going to be awesome. 

SOUND STAGE: The band started as a solo project and eventually grew into a larger ensemble. Has the songwriting process changed as the project evolves?

DARI BAY: The songwriting process is always changing. I [Zack] don’t have a set way of doing anything; I’m always down to try something new. Having the band expand has definitely made the process more collaborative because I know I’m writing for a four-piece rock band. 

SOUND STAGE: Is there a difference in experience when you tour with management or without it?

DARI BAY: We’ve actually never been on the road with tour management. It sounds nice from what we’ve seen with our friends that have it… having a tour manager means having to do less of the unglamorous stuff yourself and can focus on the music. Things probably fall through the cracks less on tour. Being on tour means you’re trying to balance ‘how much fun can I have?’ with ‘how can we make this go smoothly?’, which can be a tricky thing to balance sometimes. 

Tour managers help with both things, maintaining the vibes, efficiency, and technical things. This tour with Villagerrr went super well without one. It was simple; there weren’t a lot of details to keep track of. Three out of the four of us got food poisoning in Pittsburgh… it barely affected the experience, which was a nice surprise. Even when we had to do the seven-hour drive from Pittsburgh to Chicago with food poisoning. Our van’s AC also went out at the end of the run… There ended up being a lot of little things collaborating against us, but we had a great time, physical discomfort aside. It was definitely one of our smoothest tours. 

SOUND STAGE: On the topic of AC outages and food poisoning, were there any other unexpected bumps in the road on tour? 

DARI BAY: Things always come up when you’re on the road, but if anything else went wrong, I think we had so much fun we forgot about it. This tour felt nostalgic because it felt reminiscent of our first couple of tours, where we booked them ourselves and worked our way through the Midwest to Chicago and back. This is a well-traversed route for us. 

We got to play New Jersey for the first time; it was cool. There was something about the town we played in that felt stuck ten years in the past. It felt like a time capsule. We were right next to this manufacturing plant that made tubular alloys. We made a comment about tubular alloys and how much we love them, and the whole room was silent… no one got it. There was a pond next to the tubular alloy plant that had a dead goose next to it. The pond was green and bubbling; it felt like something straight out of The Simpsons… I guess there’s a byproduct from the tubular alloy process that’s deadly to geese. 

SOUND STAGE: The more you know, right? Are there any lessons you learned on the road with Villagerrr that you’ll take with you for future tours?

DARI BAY: I [Zack] learned I would much rather have a cold than a stomach illness on a tour. Touring as a vocalist with a throat problem definitely sucks, but I’d still rather that than food poisoning. There are things you can do to help a sore throat, like cough drops, tea, honey… but for a stomach thing, what can you do? Nothing. If you like going on tour, and it’s something you have fun doing, there are a lot of ways you can get better at it every time. We try to, at least. It makes the process more sustainable and lets you go out for longer and longer each time.

SOUND STAGE: Was there a tour stop that stood out as your favorite? 

DARI BAY: We played this show in Clayton, Ohio, somewhere outside of Dayton, Ohio, that was super awesome. It was a DIY barn show, and people and community members of all ages showed up and were super excited about local music. Those are some of my favorite shows; it’s so beautiful to see people make their own little corner of the music scene. 

We got to play some shows in places we’ve never been before, too. Burlington obviously rocked; it always feels good to have so many family and friends at a tour send-off. Honestly, every show was great. Places like Kingston and Clayton have really awesome communities. We sounded great in Pittsburgh and Chicago; Burlington and Columbus both had so many close friends and family there. It rocked. When we tour in the Northeast, it’s cool because we know so many people all over the place. 

SOUND STAGE: What’s next for Dari Bay? 

DARI BAY: More touring, for sure. We’ve got a handful of dates with Squirrel Flower this fall; we’re friends with Ella too, so it’s very exciting. We’ve also got a handful of dates as Nina’s band, Robber Robber, supporting Modest Mouse, which should be epic. More music, more shows, and more rocking out. We’re pretty excited.

EDITOR’S NOTE:  This is a pre-recorded interview from August 2026. Robber Robber has concluded their run supporting Modest Mouse. Dari Bay hits the road with Squirrel Flower 9/29.

SOUND STAGE: That’s so exciting! Thank you so much for sitting down with me today. I loved hearing about your experience on the road with your friends in Villagerrr. Best of luck on the road with Modest Mouse and Squirrel Flower! 

DARI BAY: Thanks for reaching out! This was one of our favorite stints on the road, and it was nice to have the opportunity to talk about it. See you around!

Dari Bay is composed of Zack James (Drums/Guitar/Vocals), Nina Cates (Bass), and Joey Krause (Guitar). Robber Robber is composed of Nina Cates (vocals/guitar), Zack James (drums), Will Krulack (guitar), and Carney Hemler (bass). Robber Robber recently concluded a tour supporting Modest Mouse on 9/25, and Dari Bay hits the road supporting Squirrel Flower across the Northeast and Midwest on 9/29.

You can read the companion interview with co-headiner Villagerrr HERE!