Paulius Musteikis
Taking risks, rocking out.
A tweet involving Madison-area bands Dolores and PHOX has sparked a chain reaction.
"There's a new band in town called Dolores, and my heart is so happy," PHOX singer Monica Martin posted on Facebook last month. "Someone just tweeted their EP at us."
The tweeter in question was Rick Panneck of local music blog Rock of the Arts. He noticed a similarity between the two bands immediately.
"Listening to Dolores gave me the same feeling I had when I first heard PHOX," he says. "You just knew this was going to be something special, and I needed to tell someone about it."
Panneck's enthusiasm has led Dolores down a road that includes a gig at Milwaukee's Pabst Theater less than a year after forming. PHOX's management recently approached Dolores about opening for the Baraboo band at January appearances in Cedar Rapids, Iowa; Green Bay; and Milwaukee.
"We couldn't have been more thrilled to jump at that opportunity," says Adam Thein, Dolores' keyboardist.
Named after memories of a children's book titled Annie, Bea, and Chi Chi Dolores, the band formed last summer. They boast an eclectic range of influences, from psychedelic rock bands like Tame Impala to R&B stars D'Angelo and Erykah Badu.
It's been a year of national and global breakthroughs for PHOX, too. They recently made their television debut on Conan and completed their first European tour. Thein says this is proof that artists don't have to live in New York City or Los Angeles to have a big impact.
"You are really only limited by your imagination and your willingness to take a risk and make something," he says.
Thein studied music at Grinnell College in Iowa before moving to Madison with his girlfriend. Vocalist and guitarist Javi Reyes met him at a Minneapolis music shop called Twin Town Guitars.
"I was playing a banjo," Reyes says. "He was playing right along with me on a bass across the store. I noticed how quick he was, and I had to get his number."
Reyes and bass guitarist Willie Christianson both hail from Minneapolis but met through a mutual friend in Madison. Reyes is currently attending UW-Madison, and Christianson is pursuing a degree at Madison College.
Last February Thein brought a four-track cassette recorder to the apartment Reyes and Christianson share. Initially the group recorded some loose ideas, but they soon began recording more structured songs.
Thein mixed and mastered everything, and the results became the six-song EP Nectar Fields, which Dolores released online in August.
The first song they recorded, "Pleased to Meet You," began as an acoustic guitar piece Reyes wrote at a friend's house.
"We had been listening to a lot of Erykah Badu that night," Reyes says, "so there was definitely a warm feeling in the air, which I think comes across in the music."
The full band fleshed out Reyes' idea and jammed out a longer breakdown for the track's conclusion, which includes overdubbed keyboards.
"I think I was subconsciously trying to evoke that sensual vibe that contemporary R&B sometimes has," Reyes says. "At the same time, I was super into Pond and other psych-rock outfits, so I was kind of caught in genre crossfire."
Dolores opened for Pond last month at the High Noon Saloon. If anything, it made the local group even more enthusiastic about psychedelic sounds.
"Psychedelic music can transport the listener to a different headspace," Thein says. "Not to get too cheeseball here, but it really reminds me that I'm a minuscule part of an unfathomably huge universe."
After finishing "Pleased to Meet You," Dolores recorded "Hustle," a dreamy pop tune.
"It came together very quickly, without any deliberation," Reyes says. "We had been listening to a lot of D'Angelo's Voodoo, so we were feeling a good slow burner."
Another gem from Nectar Fields is "Fight Fire with Fire," a groove that finds Dolores at their dance-friendliest.
"We're all suckers for slinky funk, and there's a lot of humor in there," Reyes says. "This song was us getting a lot of hyper energy out."
Dolores expanded this fall when Madison native Teddy Mathews approached them on Facebook after learning they were looking for a new drummer.
"It wasn't until Teddy joined that we felt like a real band," Reyes says.
Thein initially split his duties between bass guitar and keyboards, but he is now on keyboards exclusively. Christianson has moved from drums to bass. According to Thein, this shuffle led to a shift in bass technique and heavier drumming from Mathews.
"You add that all up and you get something really fresh," Thein says. "We've had to adapt a lot of what we recorded for Nectar Fields to accommodate that style, but I think the core of the sound has remained."
