Dave Baxter: Avalanche City on his five-year break and return to music with 'Keep that Love'

Saturday Morning with Jack Tame

Avalanche City burst onto the scene in over a decade ago, their 2011 pop hit ‘Love Love Love’ charming Kiwis.

Behind the music is creative force Dave Baxter, a singer-songwriter, producer, and multi-instrumentalist.

After five years away from the spotlight, Baxter re-emerged with a brand-new single ‘Keep that Love’.

He stepped back from making music to raise his kids, having toured his last album through New Zealand and Europe with a six-month old before Covid hit and shut everything down.

“It’s taken me that long to kind of like, feel like I could come back to music, you know?” Baxter told Newstalk ZB’s Jack Tame.

Music is a creative endeavour, and Baxter felt he needed a bit of a break.

“I don’t want to like, force myself to do music, and I waited until I was like, hungry to come back and like, make something again before I started.”

While he was ready to start creating again, jumping back in after five years isn’t easy.

“I started thinking I want to do something, but I don't know how anymore,” he told Tame.

“I decided that I was just going to just take sort of baby steps back into things.”

Baxter began writing little song ideas, ones he knew he wouldn’t use further, and uploading them on Instagram.

“I got such a good response from them,” Baxter said.

“And then I kept on going and then I was like, maybe I’ll just do one song, I’ll write one song and release it.”

That opened the floodgates, Baxter continuing to write more and more, focusing on finishing songs and building up that slow and steady momentum.

“It was almost like re-exercising an old muscle.”

Avalanche City’s previous album ‘My Babylon’ has a darker tone and energy, Baxter using it as a way to exercise his frustrations. In comparison, ‘Keep that Love’ has a much more upbeat and hopeful tone.

“I really wanted a song, the song I was writing at the time, I wanted it to be like, I don’t know, hopeful and uplifting,” Baxter said.

“It sort of felt like, with everything that’s going on, I wanted something for myself to be like, to make me feel better.”

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