The first show I ever went to in the Coachella Valley was a Fever Dog show—and the fusion of blues and psychedelic rock introduced me to the local music scene with a bang.
That performance cemented Fever Dog’s place in my mind’s Hall of Fame, and the band has received a fair amount of attention beyond my fanboy self. It was a part of a European tour in 2015 with Fatso Jetson, and the band’s music has been well-received across various streaming services.
Fever Dog is Danny Graham and Joshua Adams, joined by Ramses Lopez and Alex Galvan. A listen to the band’s earlier work on Volume One and Second Wind will take any rock listener back to the ’70s—albeit with a unique desert twist. Heavy-hitting tracks like “One Thousand Centuries” and “The Great Tree” are rockingly reminiscent of Sabbath and Zeppelin, if those bands had included stoner rock in their songs. The band’s latest EP, Mainframe (2017), offers three tracks that are pure psychedelic rock jams, with the title track sounding like a Pink Floyd B-side.
This takes us to the present day. The release of “Freewheelin’” earlier this year made stereos everywhere sparkle; the track is four minutes of every glam-rock fan’s dream. A second single release, “Solid Ground,” made it clear that the band was prepping for something big this year–so I decided to check in with my Fever Dog friends.
“Our album is planned for release this year, hopefully not too long from now,” said frontman and guitarist Danny Graham during a recent phone interview. “We’re going to try to book some tours as soon as that’s out; hopefully a European tour an Australian tour, and maybe a small American tour, too.”
The upcoming new album is slated to be called Alpha Waves.
“We are shopping for a label right now,” Graham said. “We really want the next album to be released under a European label. The last time we went to Europe, it would’ve helped to have a vinyl release. It’s the best thing to have on your merch table, and we wanted to make sure that we were able to press it on vinyl this time.”
With a big 2020 ahead, Graham looked back on the band’s humble beginnings.
“I was brought up on almost exclusively KISS, and a lot of ’70s rock music,” Graham said. “Me, Josh and Nathan—our old bass player—went to elementary school together and started playing together in 2006. We all picked up our instruments around the same time.
“When we first started, we were mostly a hard-rock, AC/DC-style band. As soon as we started going, we decided that we needed to do this for real and make a recording, even though we were only in the sixth-grade. We wouldn’t have done that, though, if we didn’t have the resources for it. My dad was in a band, so we had a lot of help to make that happen.”
Fever Dog is known for its epic live performances. Long hair flies all over the place, and the jams keep coming as Graham’s disco-ball guitar shines onto audience members’ faces. I was curious whether all the different sounds that Fever Dog has featured would still be represented live.
“For live shows, we’re doing a mix of everything,” Graham said. “We’re doing about half new songs and half old songs, with some improvisation and changes added in. We’re trying to blend pretty much everything we’ve ever done.”
With the change in sound came the addition of the aforementioned two new members. The group didn’t have to look too hard to find them.
“Josh knew our new bass player, Alex, from one of his old bands, The Active Kissers,” said Graham. “He also met our keyboard player, Ramses, through Twitter. They were just friends and then we realized that he also played music, so we asked him to join.”
It’s been pretty lonely in the local music scene without Fever Dog; the band’s two recent single releases are the first in three years.
“We took a break and didn’t really have a specific goal on how anything was going to sound,” Graham said. Josh and I just started recording whatever we wanted. Instead of deciding what kind of songs we’re going to make, we just kind of went for anything. This upcoming record is pretty much a blend of everything we’re into—all the’70s rock, progressive rock, experimental stuff and a lot of glam rock.”
For more information, visit www.facebook.com/feverdogrocks.