David Nance

A longtime figure on the Omaha, Nebraska music scene, David Nance has become a cult hero for his passionate recordings that merge psychedelia, blues, hard rock, and inspired noise into a satisfyingly volatile brew all his own. Nance's music is often gritty and full of attitude, while also showing off strong songcraft that reflects his eclectic tastes in vintage rock (he's covered entire albums by Lou Reed, the Beatles, and the Rolling Stones). Beginning in 2012, Nance recorded and self-released a number of homemade albums in which he played all the instruments himself, but he achieved more satisfying results with a band, reaching a wider audience with albums like 2016's More Than Enough and 2017's Negative Boogie. Anyone who missed the rough edges of his earliest work was placated with the lo-fi psych-blues introspection of 2020's Staunch Honey, and he adopted a rootsy, '70s-inspired sound for 2024's David Nance & Mowed Sound. Nance was born and raised in Grand Island, Nebraska, a town roughly 150 miles from Omaha. Grand Island didn't have much of a music scene, and as he developed a strong interest in playing guitar and writing songs, he moved to Omaha in search of a more nurturing environment. Nance became part of the local music community, playing guitar with the likes of the Prairies, Noah Sterba & the Cocktails, Simon Joyner & the Ghosts, and Brimstone Howl. After years of working alongside others, Nance put together a low-budget home-recording studio and began releasing lo-fi albums of his compositions, either on cassette or through digital distribution platforms, often playing all the instruments himself. Some were devoted to original material, while others found him putting his own distinctive spin on classic albums such as Lou Reed's Berlin, Beatles for Sale, and Doug Sahm and Band. In 2013, Nance gained some local attention for his album Actor's Diary, and he and his wife briefly moved to Los Angeles, where he began work on his next project. He was unhappy with the results, and ended up scrapping his sessions three times before returning to Omaha and starting over. The final result, cut fast and loose with a handful of his favorite Omaha musicians, was called More Than Enough. The album caught the attention of the Brooklyn-based indie label Ba Da Bing Records, which gave More Than Enough a nationwide release in 2016. Thanks to positive reviews and a fiery appearance on New Jersey's celebrated free-form radio station WFMU-FM, More Than Enough finally earned Nance an interested audience outside Nebraska. For his second release on Ba Da Bing, Nance took a break from home recording and instead booked time at Omaha's Another Recording Company studios, where he and his studio band knocked out 15 songs in just three days. The tracks formed the album Negative Boogie, released in July 2017. Nance next struck up a partnership with the well-respected indie pop/rock label Trouble in Mind, which released 2018's Peaced and Slightly Pulverized, a moody exercise in guitar-based rock. He returned to his home studio and dialed back on the noisier side of his sound for his second Trouble in Mind release, 2020's Staunch Honey. For his next project, Nance put together a new band, Mowed Sound, that featured guitarist James Schroeder, bassist Derrick Higgins, and drummer Kevin Dohahue. Nance wrote a batch of songs informed by 1970s country-rock, and he and the new band set to recording them during a pair of sessions, the first from October 2021 to February 2022, and the second from December 2022 to January 2023. The finished tracks still had a strong rootsy feel, but with a rock & roll drive that reflected Nance's edgier interests. The album, David Nance & Mowed Sound, was issued in February 2024; it was his first release for Jack White's Third Man Records.
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