On their second album, Thank God It’s Almost Monday, the California trio turn the uncertainty of releasing new music into a reason to get back onstage.
For Dawson Daugherty, finishing an album doesn’t mean the hard part is over. It means handing something deeply personal to people he may never meet. Almost Monday’s sophomore album, Thank God It’s Almost Monday, arrived September 9 with 13 songs; now the singer gets to find out what happens when those songs belong to an audience, too. Apple Music
“You make this thing that’s obviously really personal and you spent so much time on it,” Daugherty tells Skratch N’ Sniff. “And then it’s like this strange feeling of like releasing it to the wild, to everybody else.” He calls the experience “really odd and scary, but also beautiful.” The nervousness is real: after months spent making the record, all he can do is put it out and wait for a response.
Touring offers a more immediate answer. Almost Monday are preparing for 37 shows in just under two months, including a longer stretch in Canada than they’ve done before. The schedule sounds daunting even to Daugherty, but it also promises his favourite part of releasing an album: hearing people sing the new songs back. Onstage, the streaming numbers become faces in a room.
That connection has been on his mind since childhood. Daugherty credits his dad with introducing him to U2, the Psychedelic Furs, Echo & the Bunnymen, and Oasis through concert videos they watched together. What stays with him most isn’t a particular stage move; it’s the sense that a performer can disappear into a song while bringing the crowd along. “I think all really great performers have this really beautiful gift to be super present and fully there on stage with you,” he says.
Almost Monday began less grandly. Daugherty and bassist Luke had been friends and played music together for years. He met guitarist Cole while surfing in high school; Cole said he played guitar, they got together to jam, and the band took shape. Their tastes overlapped without matching completely, leaving room for the different sounds Daugherty hears across the new record.
That openness remains a guiding instinct in the studio. “I think sometimes trying to be cool or chasing coolness is the least cool thing,” he says. Instead, the band follows what feels good and fun. With Thank God It’s Almost Monday out in the world, the next test comes under the lights: whether songs made among three friends can feel just as alive when a roomful of people sings them back.
Watch the full interview with Almost Monday:
