Road-grooved and fully unleashed, power trio DeeOhGee are leaning in and letting it rip. Their self-titled full-length LP lands November 13 via Midtopia (vinyl is available now), and the first single, Truthin’, is out now for your listening pleasure.
Matthew Paige (guitar, vocals, harmonica), Zack Murphy (drums, vocals) and Dylan Whitlow (bass, vocals, guitar) have cooked up a batch of porch stompers that mash together the raw swagger of the British invasion, fuzzed-out woozy psych and early ’00s alt-rock atmospherics. The result is a sound that feels instantly familiar and totally of the moment. Or, as Paige puts it, “it’s catchy as shit.”
Listen to the new single Truthin’
Purchase the vinyl
Real People, Real Music, One Room
‘DeeOhGee’ plays like a cohesive artistic statement. Every song holds its own, but together they add up to something deeply charming and cathartic, a record that is human to its core. For Murphy, that’s the whole point: “Because AI is the state of the world,” he says, “real art and music is coming back. We’re actually playing the music; there’s no click track. It’s just real people playing real music in a room. We were just tripping mushrooms at a hippie festival out in the middle of Wisconsin. And then we drove to Kansas, got in the studio, and did it.”
And what a wonderful thing they did. It’s a cliché to say it out loud, but there is no filler here. This is a melodic snapshot of a brief burst of unfettered creativity that also feels timeless, ready to take its place in the canon of western music. Or, as Whitlow puts it, “this a killer fucking rock and roll record.”
From Blackfoot Gypsies to DeeOhGee
You might know these guys from their earlier life as Blackfoot Gypsies, a band that earned national attention the hard way, by touring nonstop with a live show that split the difference between a roadhouse and a revival tent. Along the way they shared stages with Tyler Childers, Buddy Guy and Dwight Yoakam.
When the pandemic slammed the brakes on their momentum, they regrouped with a new name and a renewed sense of purpose. DeeOhGee (a nod to a Waylon Jennings lyric) became a home for exploring their many influences without apology. Their self-produced 2022 debut, ‘New Way of Life’, was a triumphant reintroduction, tapping the band’s deep roots in American folk poetry and wide-eyed wordplay. That same searching spirit carried into their following singles project, a run of collaborations with producers across the country, from Oak Munson in Upstate New York to Greg Lattimer in Nashville.
Cabin Songs and a Steel Drum Surprise
The songs that became ‘DeeOhGee’ were written on the road, then workshopped in a cabin in the woods in Monticello, Kentucky. A new relationship with independent music hub Midtopia opened the door to a fresh studio experience, and the band headed to the non-profit artist support company’s Somewhere Works studio in Wichita, KS to track the record.
The unexpected star of the session? The gentleman affectionately known as “steel drums guy.” The studio had a list of available instruments, and Murphy asked the team, half in jest, about some steel drums. And then…“This dude shows up with a full drum kit of steel drums!” relates Paige.
The trio cut the bones of the tracks live and overdubbed as needed. Even with a wide swath of sonic tools at their fingertips, they stayed deliberate about every production choice. In the band’s words: “You have all this time, but does that mean you need 17 guitar tracks layered on? I’m proud of these songs, I’m proud of each other’s songs, and how we served them. This is a song-focused record.”
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