By Audrey Wallis, Second Year, English
Nobody’s Dad are a band that combine dreamy, diary-entry-style lyricism with punky indie rock guitars, resulting in songs that are charming in their DIY-ness.
For fans of Beabadoobee, Lowertown, and Pavement, they’re a young, underground, Bristol-based band you can brag about discovering.
Phoebe, Max, Raul and Jules of Nobody’s Dad met with me over a pint to talk about songwriting, the impact of the Bristol creative scene on their work, and their advice for smaller student bands who want to get into music in the city.
So where did the name Nobody’s Dad come from, you might be wondering? Inspired by memories of going to concerts when she was younger, Phoebe explained that the name was initially a joke born from attending “bad band gigs with 15-year-olds where only their parents came.”
After talking to dads who had introduced their kids, she joked, “I’m nobody’s dad”, a name that later re-emerged during university band practice and one that neatly sums up the band’s fun, unserious, and above all genuine style.
When asked about their favourite gigs, those that felt particularly special to them as a band, Raul smiled before describing a Rough Trade gig they played in late 2023, supporting She’s In Parties. It was one of the first gigs that showed them they could make it as a band, and that venues might start taking them seriously.
Raul describes it as “the gig that got us in the door”, the one that made real the dream of “doing it”.
Max added: “[She’s In Parties] were the first band that were doing it, doing what we wanted to do. They were on tour, they were signed. They opened our eyes to the fact that having a career in music might be possible.”
Recounting their first Rough Trade gig seemed to bring forth memories of feeling like outsiders in venues where “you don’t get taken seriously with the promoters and the sound guys”, and yet Rough Trade treated them like “artists”.
Though they started out as a Bath band, Nobody’s Dad have since become a Bristol band after playing so many gigs in the city. Phoebe describes audiences here as uniquely “so open-minded. The amount of people that come to our gigs as a small band and barely know who we are, but do it for the love of music and because they want to show up for small artists.” She emphasised, “I don’t think you would get that in many places.
This spirit of showing up for small artists defines the Bristol music scene, an ethos of lifting up creativity and talent that allows for diversity and independent voices. As Max puts it, “Everyone is doing everything all the time. It’s very freeing to have that”, describing how the sheer variety of musicians and creatives centred here has influenced their own creative processes.
The proliferation of venues held in prestige, like Rough Trade, that still give space to smaller acts is indicative of Bristol’s “love of music”, summed up in the audiences for bands like Nobody’s Dad.
Digging into their songwriting and early university music days, the band joked that, for an assignment, they once made a punk cover of ‘Material Girl’. This was met with a loud, mixed response from the group, equal parts cringe and nostalgia.
But after Phoebe showed them her diary-entry versions of ‘Angel’ and ‘Margo’, the band “completed the songs”, revealing the strength of their bond from the very start.
The latter, ‘Margo’, is a song that on the surface is about dead pet fish, disappointingly not originally named Margo, while more broadly exploring the vulnerability of missing someone and losing people. ‘Angel’, one of the band’s most popular songs, speaks to feeling out of place with yourself.
As Phoebe puts it, it’s about “not liking [herself] and wanting to change [her] hair.” Yet despite the depressing lyricism, the indie rock guitars add an undertone of unseriousness. The music, as Max suggested, plays with “ironic teen angst.”
Talking about their latest release, ‘Glued to Your Couch’, a grungy shoegaze track whose chorus becomes an instant earworm, the band described the more collaborative process behind both the song and its cover art.
Phoebe describes her lyric writing style as having a “diary-entry feel”, a quality that comes through clearly in ‘Glued to Your Couch’, with its intimate, vulnerable lyrics about fearful isolation.
The cover art was, as Jules tells me, a result of taking “creative liberties with the visual side” of their music and being in control of the art that accompanies their sound. The cake on the cover, despite being “really sweet and horrible”, represented for Phoebe ideas of “fitting in, going out, and parties”. These are concepts the song remains fearful of, in the sense of “not liking who you are so not wanting to go outside.”
The cake represents a “worst nightmare” for a teenage outsider, while Jules jokes, “My cake! Her worst nightmare!” However, the band’s grungy outsider musical style is precisely what makes their songs so charming. It reflects the fears and anxieties of our generation’s desire for community and connection.
To end our conversation, I asked the band for their advice to younger student bands, now that they’re able to reflect on what it was like to leave the bubble of being a university band.
They all instantly chimed in, saying to “gig lots, get out there, play lots”, with Jules highlighting the importance of being able to “release your music” rather than waiting for it to be perfect. “It will never be perfect in your eyes. Just do it.” They add that “you’ll never be ready; you’ll be ready ten gigs in.”
Nobody’s Dad are a band that reflect the spirit of Bristol’s indie music scene, one of independence, creativity, and community. And no, as the band joked, they are not paid by Phoebe’s mum to be in the band with her.
Featured Image: Nobody's Dad | @nobodysdadband
Have you listened to their latest single yet?
