Tins drummer reborn as ‘Davey Harris’

by Benjamin Joe

Dave Mutner was the drummer for The Tins – an indie group based out of Buffalo, New York – for nearly a decade before the group went on hiatus due to the pandemic. 

He told this reporter the story of being in college and Adam Putzer, the guitarist, saying he’d picked a good time to join the group because they were finally getting paid gigs.

Having watched important aspects of the music scene, he is now working on his own project where he continues to push eclectic and powerful grooves albeit without his bandmates.

With The Tins on hiatus due to the pandemic, Mutner has found his own creative identity in a project called Davey Harris which is  being sponsored by industry heavyweight Kelly Fitzsimmons out of Milwaukee based art collective, VUCA.

“She just knows all these people in Milwaukee and it sounded like a cool thing, so I said, ‘OK.’,” Mutner said. “I was in Milwaukee … (to) play my first show as Davey Harris and played two songs, so I did OK.” 

Mutner’s single is called “Glamour,” a frothy, heavy, interspliced melody which feature Mutner’s voice communing with electronic, ambient and acoustic sounds.

Fitzsimmons, who has invested significantly in time and encouragement, is a not only musically connected, she’s penned a few books, one of which is connected to the project has Mutner signed off on as part of the soundtrack to what she is crafting in words and punctuation.

“She was actually a best-selling author, but she was also venture capitalist –  powerhouse – went to Harvard, had a huge tech empire where she worked with cyber security, then at fifty was like, ‘I hate my life, because I’m a closet artist.’ She just views it that ‘creatives’ doing something other than being artists is just selling their souls,” Mutner said. “It’s like diluted creativity, (her life before).”

Mutner talked about working with VUCA while at the Porchfest festival in Buffalo, New York. He said he was being introduced to a whirlwind of contacts including music Fitzsimmons husband, Jeff, who’s worked on music videos featuring Stone Temple Pilots and Alice and Chains.

“In this video, Jeff put all these stapled images of women on these trees, and I was standing in a ring of fire for a very long time,” Mutner said. “They had this drone flying around. I’m trying to sing this an inhaling a lot of smoke.”

“Glamour is a chapter of her book,” Mutner said. “About a sex addict demon murderer who waits in hospitals with women who have just lost their children and preys upon them and seduces them. So that’s the chapter in the book.”

Mutner is also working on another song with Fitzsimmons called, “The Magician.” He said it was a redemption song for his character and showcase the good side of magic.