Top gallery: Photos by Allah-Las and crew taken at Field Day 2015

The brainchild of Zachary ‘Cole’ Smith, New York based four piece DIIV (pronounced ‘dive’) set standards high with their debut record Oshin; a dreamy blend of languorous melodies, nuanced songwriting and fluid motorik rhythms. Since the release of Oshin, Smith, along with bandmates – longtime friend Andrew Bailey (guitar), Devin Ruben Perez (bass), Colby Hewitt III (drums) and latest addition Colin Caulfield (guitar/keyboard), have seen their worlds changed considerably as a cult following gathers behind them.

DIIV have just put the finishing touches on Is the Is Are, their LP follow up to Oshin, and now they’re gracing stages – on tour for the summer.

This week DIIV hit up London’s Field Day festival and we were there to capture their set and have a fast fire natter about their new album (read more in our interview with Cole in HERO 13) – between discussing cheesecake – while they snapped backstage on Polaroid for us.

Alex James Taylor: You guys have just landed in England, right?
Zachary Cole Smith: Yeah we just flew in earlier this morning actually.

AJT: How’re things going with your new record Is the Is Are. Is it finished yet?
ZCS: It’s almost finished, it’s like 99% finished we just need to master half of it.

AJT: Do you know when it’ll be released?
ZCS: Around October or September.

AJT: And you’re back on the road now
ZCS: Yeah we’ve done a few gigs recently, we did Primavera and two gigs in Italy.

AJT: How does it feel to be back on the road after spending so much time in the studio?|
ZCS: It’s so much better, being in the studio is [Diiv’s tour manager Arnaud walks in]… is that a brownie?
Devin Ruben Perez: If it’s cheesecake I don’t want it, if it’s cheesecake I won’t fuck with it.
Arnaud: It’s a chocolate cheesecake.
DRP: Naa, I don’t want cheesecake.
Arnaud: It’s really good.
DRP: Take your cheesecake and hit the bricks pal. I’m not having it.
ZCS: Do you guys remember on the plane when everybody handed Ben their cheesecakes and then Bailey [Andrew, guitar] hands back two more and he’s sat there with all this cheesecake piled up in front of him.
DRP: I would’ve made a pillow with that stuff, cheesecake seems like it would make a good pillow.
Colin Caulfield: I put it in the thing, on the plane, like so it all just sort of slid and got into the corner of the pouch, a pouch of cheesecake, that doesn’t sound good.
DRP: Nobody wants a pouch of cheesecake, can we keep talking more about cheesecake?

AJT: It’s a hot topic, what’s your biggest issue with cheesecake?
DRP: Well… the cheese. Cheese and cake is not a good combination.

AJT: I’m on your side, I think cheesecake is weird. So, will you be playing songs from Is the Is Are today?

ZCS: Yeah definitely, we’re playing like eight or something. We have maybe three old songs in the set.
DRP: No we’re doing four.
ZCS: Are we going to do Wait? Ok cool, yeah we want to play quite a few from the new album so people get to hear the new material.

AJT: What do you guys tend to get up to before a gig?
ZCS: We do interviews [laughing].

AJT: No little warm up rituals?
ZCS: Well we usually try to find our drummer, that’s always useful.

DIIV’s second LP Is the Is Are is slated for release later in 2015.

With thanks to The Impossible Project