DIIV are an American rock band from Brooklyn, New York City, formed in 2011. Zachary Cole Smith (former touring guitarist of Soft Black, Darwin Deez and Beach Fossils) started a solo project in 2011. Smith, who originally named the project Dive after the Nirvana song of the same name, put together a live band that included guitarist and childhood friend Andrew Bailey (like Smith, from Connecticut), bassist Devin Ruben Perez (from New York City), and drummer Colby Hewitt (from California and formerly of Smith Westerns). Smith explained to Pitchfork that “everybody in the band is a water sign, that’s kind of why the name Dive really spoke to us all.” Captured Tracks signed the band and released two singles, “Sometime” and “Human”, which were recorded solely by Smith and had acted as demos. In May 2012, the band changed their name to DIIV, according to Smith, “out of respect for Dirk Ivens and the original Dive,” a 1990s Belgian industrial group. After releasing three singles – “Sometime”, “Human” and “Geist” – on Captured Tracks, DIIV released its debut full-length album Oshin on 2012. In 2016, the band released its second studio album, Is the Is Are, after a lengthy and troubled gestation period. This is an unofficial music video edited by David Dean Burkhart.
