Lakeview Farms Barn Welcomes Night Three of Daytrotter’s Barnstormer
by Amanda Slater

What do Chris Bathgate, Sondre Lerche, Best Coast, Two Door Cinema Club, Tennis, The Futureheads, Fleet Foxes, Andrew Bird and the Avett Brothers have in common?

Not only are they all talented musicians, but all of these artists have been featured on Daytrotter.com.

Daytrotter.com is one of the best places on the internet to read about and listen to cool new artists.

“We have a recording studio, and we invite bands that are touring across the country for a quick four song session,” says Daytrotter creator Sean Moeller. “We put it up on the internet for people to look at and listen to.”

Moeller says that, at the time he got the idea for Daytrotter, he had been doing a lot of freelance music writing for a local newspaper.

“It was just one of those spur of the moment types of things. I was out running one night and thought, ‘What if we tried this?’ I had a friend who owned a recording studio that he wasn’t using that much, and he was a great engineer. I think I called him up the following morning and said that I had a crazy idea, and he said that he’d be willing to embark on a crazy idea with me.”

Since, then, Daytrotter has exploded and now, for many, is the go-to place to find new music. In addition to featuring articles about and recordings of artists, the site also includes a sketch of each featured artist, which has become a trademark of sorts.

“There’s most definitely a look to Daytrotter that is very hard to mistake,” says Moeller.

Of the artists that Daytrotter has profiled, Moeller says it’s impossible to pick favorites, although he says that it was really cool to work with people like Kris Kristofferson. He says that Daytrotter has gotten some incredible opportunities as well.

“We did the first thing that Fleet Foxes ever did [as a band] outside of their home city. We did a session with them prior to their first show outside of Seattle,” says Moeller. “Things like that kind of stand out.”

Moeller says that one of the things that he has enjoyed the most about Daytrotter is being able to develop relationships with so many different artists.

“We’ve made a lot of friends over the years—bands that, maybe at the time they were here, no one knew who they were, and they’ve gone on to be good friends of ours and have come back a number of times.”

Moeller pauses, then says, “Those are sort of my favorites—the people with whom the working relationship kind of spilled into a personal relationship.”

And this spring, Daytrotter is taking some of its artists on the road, where they will play what is called “Barnstormers,” a series of concerts held in barns in select cities, including Dexter, Mich.

“We started doing these things years ago,” says Moeller. “We just tried to find small towns or small towns outside of big towns. It’s really just to create an atmosphere of getting people to appreciate music in the live setting, which is the core of what Daytrotter the website tried to do: present a band in a raw environment where, if they’re good, they sound amazing, and, if they’re average, they still probably sound pretty good.”

“The shows are in these kind of unorthodox settings and structures that are really meant for theatre,” Moeller says, explaining, “[Barns are] constructed with higher vaulted ceilings and all wood and are typically in very beautiful settings. These shows allow you to escape a little bit. I think people are sort of glazed over a little bit these days. They don’t venture out of their houses too often to see a band play at a bar or at a club, and it’s really a bloody shame because it’s a beautiful thing. I can’t even begin to count how many times I’ve gone to a live show and come away that night inspired.”

This April will mark Daytrotter’s first barnstormer in Michigan, which will feature Sondre Lerche, Guards, The Romany Rye, Hellogoodbye and Keegan DeWitt.

Moeller says that audiences and bands alike who have never attended a Daytrotter Barnstormer before can expect the night to be “powerful.”

“I get chills every time I watch the videos from previous years,” he says. “I’m certainly not naive enough to think that we’re the only people arranging for these sorts of moments, but there’s something special about these settings and the bands that agree to come out.”

The third night of Daytrotter’s Barnstormers will be held on April 28 at Lakeview Farms Barn in Dexter. Doors open at 5 p.m. For more information, visit www.daytrotter.com.