Picture this: it’s just another day in the studio and Dragonette are putting the final touches on their soon to be released album “Galore.”
Next, throw in a prostitute and some drugs.
“Yeah, doing a gram of blow off a hooker’s tits, that was pretty exciting,” drummer Joel Stouffer recollected.
“While recording drums!” front-woman Martina Sorbara added.
Now that’s what I call multi-tasking.
It’s a hot summer’s day on the patio at Ronnie’s in Kensington Market in Toronto and I’m joined by the good looking foursome which also includes guitarist and newest member Will Stapleton and bassist Dan Kurtz, formerly of the New Deal.
They’re kidding about the blow, of course, at least I think. You never know these days, especially with a group that has such an addictive electro-pop sound, and such irresistibly sexy singles as “I Get Around” and “Take it Like a Man.”
On the verge of releasing their debut full-length album, Dragonette haven’t had that hard of a ride attaining the attention many bands in their position struggle for. Their second concert ever saw the band playing a show with New Order, which was followed by a tour in support of Duran Duran, during which they landed a record deal. Oh yeah, and somewhere along the way they were slapped with the label of being “the next big thing.” Their battle may just be proving to the world that they live up to the hype.
In the beginning, some five years ago, Sorbara was a solo artist whose single “Bonnie and Clyde II” was included on one of those Women and Songs compilations.
Then, she met Kurtz and as they say one thing led to another.
“We met at a festival and we hooked up, a lot of alcohol and a late night. So, thank you Smirnoff,” Sorbara summed up, in an interview with andPOP.
Thank you indeed, for if it hadn’t been for that chance romance, Dragonette would never have been born. But, let’s not forget, that Kurtz had a live-in girlfriend at the time. If this had happened to you, I reckon you’d do any number of things from trying to drown your sorrows by consuming copious amounts of alcohol, to cursing their unholy union and hoping it fails miserably, or, at the very least, you may pray to never ever hear from them again.
Well, not so much. Not only are Kurtz and Sorbara now husband and wife, receiving international recognition, the lyrics to the track “Competition,” which is about their relationship, aren’t exactly subtle. “Your girlfriend’s got competition/ Goodness I like this being your mistress.”
As their love affair blossomed, the pair started messing around in the basement – musically that is. It was a joke at first, but eventually the recordings evolved into what is now known as Dragonette. The sound is in stark contrast to Sorbara’s solo material and doesn’t always showcase the full extent of her vocal ability, but who really cares, aside from maybe her father Greg, Ontario’s Minister of Finance, who implied he preferred her old material.
“I think I still write the same kind of songs,” the younger Sorbara said. “I think I write them on a different template and I think my limits are broadened. There’s only so much I knew how to do with a guitar and a piano and voice. Now I write from the same place but I think I can go to places I wasn’t able to before.”
“We’re into beats and dance music, unless it’s shit, and that’s always been the basis for most of our songs anyway,” added Kurtz. “The difference I think [is that] Tina writes songs as opposed to us like writing a house track with Tina diva vocalizing over top of it. Somewhere in there it’s like traditional song writing, with machines and people playing loud, and hard and fast.”
He’s described Sorbara’s old music scene as tampon music, a.k.a. tamponic, a scene that Sorbara was quoted saying, she grew bored of.
“I think that what I was saying by being bored of making that music is more just being bored of what I do by myself. I don’t know how to take myself to a different place. Like I only know what I know how to do and I can only get to a certain spot. Collaborating with someone is a completely different thing and you get to places you never get to by yourself. It just makes you branch out and totally puts your limits to like a thousand miles away from where you’re used to,” Sorbara explained.
Kurtz added, “And I think you got a little bit tired of the sentimentality that you had to dial up all the time.”
“Yeah, I wanted to write songs that weren’t heavy and were more fun,” Sorbara said.
The result is a self described “Toronto/London sex love soundclash” that takes elements of pop, rock, and electronica to effectively create a sound that’s catchy and melodic, yet nothing like the manufactured pop that’s polluting our airwaves.
In the process of writing the album, Sorbara recorded the track “Take Me Back to Your House” with Basement Jaxx, which wound up becoming a hit single and no doubt helped spark interest in her own band. The video was shot in Kiev, Ukraine, one of the last places Kurtz had envisioned he would end up writing a song.
Another first is how he feels about “Galore.”
“This is the first record that I’ve made that I listen to a lot, still, and I guess that’s the measure of making a record for the sake of making something you love and want to hear again and again,” he said.
Dragonette, which according to Sorbara means “tough and beastlike but also effeminate and girly, kind of androgynous,” are three parts Canadian and one-quarter British, currently residing in the UK. Although they are often compared to Gwen Stefani, the band thinks another blonde is more a suitable comparison.
“If we had to be compared, I like the idea of being compared to Blondie. Really great guitar riffs, i.e.: me,” Stapleton said in his British accent. “A really good singer, they’re a really cool band, and they’ve stood the test of time.”
And now, Dragonette are left to contend with the label critics placed upon them.
“I think hype is a dangerous thing,” Kurtz said.
“It’s a double-edged sword,” Stouffer added.
“Our major label-marketing machine started rolling before there was any substance to what we’d actually done,” Sorbara explained. “And so we had all this press saying ‘biggest band, next band of the summer,’ all this shit that actually had no bearing on reality. So we just had all this press that wasn’t substantiated with anything and that’s what hype creates. When you have to go out and try to like catch up with whatever’s been said about you.
“Obviously there’s people in our record company that have the clout and persuasion to say like ‘yeah this band is going to be amazing and big’ and so the journalist is like ‘this band is going to be amazing and huge.’ And it’s like, I don’t know, maybe we will. And I think finally now, in the past couple of weeks, we’re proving ourselves on our own merit, without the hype machine behind us. People are coming to our shows because they’re interested in us, not because they read this article in the Guardian that said, ‘you’re going to like this band.’”
Suddenly I’m informed, to my great astonishment, that my time is up. Naturally, I proceed by asking the most insightful, profound and meaningful question – the one on everyone’s mind.
“Do you really eat Sandwich Sandwiches on tour?”
For those who haven’t seen it, the band has created an entertaining Martha Stewart food network infomercial style video entitled “Road Food: Service Station Delights” which features the band cooking and eating some rather interesting concoctions, that can be made when your source for dinner is the local Mac’s convenience store. Take the Sandwich Sandwich, quite literally a sandwich of sandwiches, and instead of adding salt and pepper, why not add salt and pepper flavoured chips. It’s available for your viewing pleasure at YouTube, but I’m sure you get the point.
“No!” Sorbara answered, laughing. “We came up with that and laughed hysterically when we did and decided to make it.”
“Those were disgusting by the way,” Stapleton added.
“Except the processed cheese and cheezies grilled cheese sandwich…” Sorbara started.
“Was good,” Stouffer exclaimed.
“Was phenomenal,” Sorbara finished.
But Kurtz added, “I’d never eat that again either though.”
And they’re not going to have to. If things keep up, who knows, maybe Wolfgang Puck will be catering their next tour.
Martina Sorbara’s music career has been like one one-night-stand after the next.
