Half Moon Run’s Facebook page states that the band was “born tied to walls of a sweaty room in Montreal’s Mile End district.” When asked about their true origins, the band joked that they found each other through online dating. Whatever the circumstances surrounding their initial union, the members of Half Moon Run – Devon Dunn, Conner Molander, and Dylan Phillips – have been making music together since October 2009, and they’re serious about it.
If you haven’t heard of them yet, it’s not for lack talent or artistic drive. On the topic of their attitudes regarding self-promotion, the band says they “hope to generate interest mostly through performance.”
“Perhaps it’s a romantic notion,” the band confessed, “but we think that music can become successful because of its quality rather than some kind of image.” Granted, using this approach to gain a fan-base may take some time, but it seems to be working. A small tour of Ontario in early September and a recent show in Montreal yielded overwhelmingly positive responses, marked by robust sales of Half Moon Run’s self-titled EP.
The trio characterizes their sound as “fusing restless elements of indie with the honest part of warm electronica.” Each of the multi-instrumentalist members has had a lifelong interest in music, but the group insists that while their diverse musical backgrounds factor heavily into who they are as individuals, when they come together they can transcend their personal histories and create something truly original. In fact, it is this idea – the notion of a unique whole emerging as something greater than its constituent parts – from which the group derives its name: “It refers to a salmon run on Canada’s northwest coast. When they swim upriver to lay eggs they are drawn to that location by the moon…there seemed to be something relevant to us in the way all these pieces mysteriously come together for a common purpose.”