An interview with Dyane Crutcher of Cult(ure) and Solstice (July 2026)

As well as singing with Solstice Dyane is half of Cult(ure), along with Owen Hughes-Holland. So far we have had four songs released to streaming media by Cult(ure) which whet the appetite for an album. Tour dates are coming too.

Hello Dyane. I wanted to start with your fabulous family background – born in Ecuador and grew up in Glasgow. I was born in Ecuador, but my mom’s Colombian and my dad’s Scottish and we grew up in between Glasgow and Edinburgh, so it’s quite wild.

Does that parentage come through in your music do you think? Do you see any influences? To be fair with my original music, from my parents, not really. Well, maybe like rhythmically from my mom, I think that’s why I’m so obsessed with weird time signatures and all these sort of rhythmic songs and off beats. All that sort of stuff. I grew up with loads of Salsa in the house.

But then again, my dad’s the opposite. my dad’s a storyteller. All he listened to was Bob Dylan & Leonard Cohen – that was it. He likes lyrics. But I think growing up with my cousins I was definitely influenced by Metal because my two big cousins are proper metalheads. They used to go to Download every year. They didn’t show me too much music, but I just knew they were into that sort of music and then it all kind of stemmed from growing up with a few family members, into metal and then mum more into Salsa, She’s always got Salsa on in the background. So a few of the songs are like super rhythmic on the album as well. It’s just like a mix of the two cultures I guess.

Before we get on to your own musical path let’s talk about Solstice. I believe Jen Sanin put you up for the band? Yes. So basically Jen messaged my best friend Sacha (Savory) to do it but Sacha wasn’t free. But she thought oh it’s prog and Dyane is in that sort of world. So she put me forward and that’s how I ended up getting the Solstice gig.

This was about three years ago now? The first gig. Where was it? It was kind of like a Members’ club. A rugby pitch or something. I remember it was me, Ebony and Jess and I did the gig without any rehearsals or anything. We were in this little back room going over the songs and they were like, ‘Oh yeah, amazing, sounds great.’

Anyway, I think it was just before we were about to perform, We were outside, and Andy said, ‘Here’s a set list’, and one of the songs was Morning Light. I was like, ‘I don’t know it, I’ve not been sent that song.’ Andy said, ‘Oh’, but I said, ‘I can learn it.’ So we were outside and I was like, ‘let me just learn it now’, and it’s quite an easy song to learn anyway. It was so funny.

You’ve been singing Plunk since the Clan album came out, haven’t you? But did you get a solo vocal on the first tour? No, I never got a solo song before that. It made sense as Andy had Ebony sing her song so I think he felt, ‘Let’s give Dyane a solo song.

Did he say to you, ‘what do you think about Plunk?’ (laughs) I think he just said to do Plunk, and I was happy with it because it’s a good tune. Funky. Groovy. So yeah, it’s fun.

You handle Plunk really well. But then when you listen to Cult(ure), you swing into being ambient metal girl. Yeah, it’s true. I remember first singing Plunk. Obviously I’ve got a different voice to Jess, so I was kind of like cautious. Because when I do function gigs, I’m like running and riffing and soulful and loud and bold, because it’s big party songs and stuff. It’s that style of singing. Even in Cult(ure) stuff, there’s a few bold bits, but yeah, obviously I didn’t want to go too much, too runny, riffy all over the shop. Andy just said, ‘No go for it’ and Jenny was like, ‘Do it all, do it all.’ So I said, ‘Alright, fine.’ So I just kind of get excited to Plunk. It’s fun.

People call Solstice a prog band, but there’s so much more to them than that isn’t there? Oh yeah, Andy can write whatever he wants, and folk will just like fall at his feet. I love it. But do you know what it is with Solstice? The energy we have as a band, It’s a family, the togetherness, the closeness. Andy’s so warm and so kind. I’ve never met anyone like him, he’s a beautiful, beautiful soul. Obviously along with the whole of the band. I just love every single one of them really deeply.

Like, Pete is an angel, he cracks me up. He’s the funniest guy. He’s a bit of a savage which I love. I love proper ‘to the point’ people. And then Jenny’s kind of the same, him and Jenny have a really close bond. That was the funniest thing when I first met the band, those two have a really funny bond, and they just wind each other up. On tour they’re always sitting next to each other, and if we had a camera, we had someone filming us the whole time, it would just be the best ever to rewatch their moments of winding each other up.

Obviously I love Jenny dearly. I love everyone, and they’re just one big family. I feel like Andy can write whatever he wants, because that energy gets put out, and people receive that frequency. They receive the energy that Solstice gives, and the love that they give as a band. It’s all about having really good stage presence as well as having the amazing songs. But I think when you’ve got that stage presence and personality, your fans are going to be happy with whatever you put out – be that Prog or whatever it is.

Leoni particularly spoke about you to me. She’s so cute. She’s Scottish, I’m Scottish – it’s a Celtic bond. It’s in our roots. I just love how vocal she is, and she’s so sweet, and we get along really well. We went to see Karnival the other week together. We hang out quite a lot outside of Solstice. She’s really close with Sacha as well, my best friend, because they work together. So we’re all very close and Leoni is just super talented, and I love how humble she is. She doesn’t have a clue how talented she is. She’s an absolute top guitarist. I love her and she’s funny as hell.

Getting on to your other musical work. I can see where you’ve come from with your previous band Syre to get to Cult(ure). Is that fair to say? Yeah. It was named Dyana for so long because it was literally just me doing it. I think with Syre it was like six years of not really agreeing with how we’re going to go out. I wanted to go more Southern Rock/ Rival Suns vibe. I think the other guitarist, we were clashing heads a little bit.

Obviously when I met Owen, I was like, ‘we’re into the same sort of music.’ We also love the really mellow soft side of metal, the really emotional side to it. So we wrote quite a few just nice chill songs as well as heavy. Syre got a bit heavier towards the end and then obviously I met Owen and got the heaviness I wanted.

We mentioned Ambient Metal as a genre for Cult(ure) which I think is a very accurate description. Yeah, because I love all that sort of music. I grew up obsessed with Stevie Nicks. She still is my idol and her voice is so haunting. So everything I do, when you hear me and you hear my song you’ll hear Stevie Nicks.

That explains something. I was talking to Owen about what you might play on your first tour. I said, maybe a cover and he said we could do something maybe like Fleetwood Mac. Yeah. That’s it, I’m obsessed. They were the gateway for me into a heavier sort of music, which is funny because they’re not heavy. And then I got obsessed with 70s rock and roll. I was obsessed with Free, Bad Company and all that. I was a proper old soul, I’d say. My dad obviously liked bits of that but my dad wasn’t as obsessed with it because he was more of a storyteller type vibe.

If you’re going to cover one of their songs, which one would you pick? One of my favourite songs is Sara or Storms. Storms is up there and I do love The Chain, which is very obvious. That bass line.

One I really love, which was left off Rumours, is Silver Springs which was the B-side to Go Your Own Way. Yeah, it’s a beautiful song. I remember when I was 16 and I discovered them I was always downloading them from Limewire. I’d been well cheeky because I had no money. But there’s just so many songs. Fleetwood Mac and Radiohead, it’s crazy how many great songs they actually have.