Clop is Daniel Di Vita and Mike Dockins. Dan and Mike met in January 1996, in Brockport NY. Mike joined Naked J, a cover band whose members included Dan and Dan’s brother Jonathan. The band performed a mix of classic rock, modern alternative, and originals. Even before the band split up a few months later, Dan and Mike had begun to collaborate as songwriters, and to think about other projects. Thus Clop was born. Over the next few years, Clop played several shows at Java Junction in Brockport. Over Labor Day weekend 1998, they finished their first EP, Road Trip—six original songs including two that Dan and Mike had co-written. They put the EP together by hand, i.e. untold tedious hours of exact-o knife cutting, folding, printing and stamping of CD labels, not to mention recording the songs. Dan moved to Las Vegas soon after, for a few months, but he and Mike continued to write songs. Dan returned to western NY in January 1999, and the duo spent much of the year recording their first full-length album, Small Town Fables. Immediately after the last tracks were recorded, in August, Dan moved to Williamsburg VA. Early in 2000, Dan engineered and mixed STF and the album was officially released in April. Clop returned to Brockport (Mike meantime was living in Amherst MA, taking an MFA degree at UMASS) and the band played a live show at C&S Saloon, featuring Jonathan on drums. Small Town Fables has 17 tracks, including a 10-minute “Intermission” in the middle. Like Road Trip, STF contains mostly mellow acoustic tunes. Fame For Zoe (released May 2005), Clop’s latest album, took five years to complete. While in graduate school, Mike traveled to Williamsburg as often as possible, from Amherst and more recently from Atlanta GA, to work on the album, which has 16 tracks and no intermission. Through lots of trial and error, Dan meantime had learned how to truly professionalize the recording and engineering processes. Fame For Zoe is Clop’s most ambitious work to date, incorporating professional drum samples, layered guitar tracks, piano, and harmony vocals. The chords and melodies exhibit a listener-friendly pop sensibility. Clop is an acoustic duo that hopefully now rises above labels such as “acoustic” or “folk.” The Clop studio is currently based in Longs, South Carolina—not far from Myrtle Beach. Dan has two daughters, and works from home. Mike is completing a PhD in creative writing at Georgia State University, and Sage Hill Press has published his first collection of poems, Slouching in the Path of a Comet. Dan and Mike have begun recording their next album, Burning Isabel, and the band hopes to make Jonathan its official drummer and percussionist. To listen to an incomplete demo of the title track, as well as a selection of songs from Fame For Zoe, check out www.myspace.com/clopmusic.