Dorothy at Varsity Theater
Dorothy Setlist
Spirit Animal Setlist
Tour Dates 02/05/2019 Record Bar Kansas City, MO
02/06/2019 Delmar Hall St. Louis, MO 02/08/2019 Deluxe Indianapolis, IN 02/09/2019 St. Andrews Hall Detroit, MI 02/10/2019 House of Blues Cleveland, OH 02/12/2019 9:30 Club Washington, DC 02/14/2019 Irving Plaza New York, NY 02/15/2019 Paradise Rock Club Boston, MA 02/16/2019 Theatre of Living Arts Philadelphia, PA 02/19/2019 Terminal West Atlanta, GA 02/20/2019 Cannery Ballroom Nashville, TN 02/22/2019 Trees Dallas, TX 02/23/2019 Scoot Inn Austin, TX 02/25/2019 House of Blues New Orleans, LA 02/26/2019 House of Blues Houston, TX 03/01/2019 Regent Theater Los Angeles, CA 03/02/2019 Tempe Beach Park Tempe, AZ 05/10/2019 Epicenter Festival Rockingham, NC Read More
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“I got my roots deep in California, but the road got into my bones” – Dorothy, ‘Freedom’
After over a year of road traveling by Los Angeles blues rock band Dorothy, The Freedom Tour enters its last leg and their crowded show over the weekend at the Varsity Theater in Minneapolis, proved the show poster right about the band being part of Live Nation’s “Ones to Watch”.
Opening the three-act evening was seasoned local band The Missing Letters, a guitar-driven alt rock (with a tinge of grunge) foursome (Bryan Murphy-guitar, vocals; Shannon Drymalski- drums; Elliott Heerman-bass; Josh Ripley- guitar), still on a musical high from being hand-picked to open for Bon Jovi last year at the Xcel Energy Center, and also having recently supported the likes of Buckcherry, Crash Kings, and Charm City Devils.
The fun sounding group remains musically tight, with a humble spirit and youthful energy, still in support of their five-song EP, Lucille, but also teased new music forthcoming on the immediate horizon.
Next up was Brooklyn’s Spirit Animal, playing a purposely eclectic gumbo blend of rock, pop, psych, trip-hop and funk (whew!), fronted by caffeinated front man Steve Cooper (alongside Ronen Evron,-drums; Paul Michel-bass; Cal Stamp- guitar) in support of 2018’s Born Yesterday (Atlantic Records).
With many in the audience returning to see them after their memorable opening set for The Struts at First Avenue last year, the band (best experienced live) came out immediately energized, determined to turn their eleven-song set into a crowd interactive experience.
"I'll start you off with an easy one..." Cooper said, referring to a catchy song to sing along with, focused on setting the ‘House on Fire’ and ending things with latest single ‘YEAH!’, a hyper song that earns its uppercase spelling and exclamation point.
It wasn’t a Kansas tornado that blew Dorothy in from a much-warmer West Coast locale, rather the last vestiges of the Polar Vortex, a massive mid-winter dip in the jetstream that resulted in historically low temperatures. We were fortunate enough to see the beginnings of The Freedom Tour at a Fine Line stop early last year and lead singer Dorothy Martin and band have just gotten tighter and overall better as the tour has continued.
The group still embraces its left Coast roots - from the songs played in support of the Stones-in-the-desert vibe of 2018’s 28 Days in the Valley (Roc Nation Records), on their stage backdrop, and even with two small potted cacti perched atop guitarist Nick (Underground Kings) Perri’s Marshall amp stack, with one pot cheekily reading “I’ll never desert you”.
The recently sober Budapest-born, San Diego-raised Martin confidently took to the stage like a new empress of rock to start the headlining set with 2017’s ‘Naked Eye’, armed with the vocal power and range of a Little Queen-era Heart and dressed in a flowing black robe, swaying about like a darker Stevie Nicks.
Though the focus was undoubtedly on the lead singer, the steady band (along with Martin and Perri: Owen Barry- Guitar; Jason Ganberg- Drums; Eli Wulfmeier- Guitar; and Eliot Lorango- Bass) was not to be ignored, including on impressive extended jams to end ‘Aint Our Time to Die’ and ‘Medicine Man’, and on a Ganberg solo later in the set.
Though Martin didn’t speak much between songs, she didn’t need to, as the music did more than enough of the talking. The edgy blues rock of ‘Who Do You Love’ with its chorus lyric, “I'm your reason for lying, I'm your reason for dying, I'm your reason to live” was so irresistibly crunchy, it was the type of song Greta Van Fleet (whom they opened for, over the fall) only wishes they could compose.
On ‘Whiskey Fever’, the somewhat mysterious Martin combats her own demons fearlessly, then mentioned her previous bad boy friends in her intro to ‘Flawless’, beginning the song with sketches of unpleasant memories and wronged emotions, but quickly morphing that blackness into an anthem for mending hearts on its chorus, “Coming out of all of my darkness now that I’m flawless!” which the crowd enthusiastically responded in kind with.
The main set ended with perhaps the song closest to Martin’s heart, the still poignant ‘Freedom’ that reflects today’s headlines of the increasing loss of personal liberties, juxtaposed within a laid-back and once less-worried West Coast calmness.
The crowd’s rising applause volume demanded one more though, with the band (perhaps sensing the winter chill outside) returning for one last song- 2016’s somewhat somber and stripped ‘Shelter’, where Martin asks more for refuge from herself than the actual elements outside, and peppered with a blues howl that recalled a mid-70’s Robert Plant.
Roc Nation as a label might be best known for hip-hop, but Jay-Z’s team proves their expertise in other genres with Dorothy on their roster, and for helping recruit Linda (Four Non-Blondes) Perry as her creative collaborator, as the results more than speak for themselves.
Martin equated their relationship in a recent interview as Perry’s “Dr. Evil” to her “Mini Me’, further clarifying things by saying Perry brought out the best in her, with Perry describing Martin as “a younger version of me”. To see Dorothy’s star rise even higher from the beginning to the end of The Freedom Tour and knowing that the best is still yet to come, we can only quote Austin Powers himself by saying “Yeah, baby, yeah!”
(click on any photo below to enlarge and see full image - all photographs by Mark / markramm.com)
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