Listening Room Blog

I saw the Dough Rollers play Brooklyn Bowl, in Williamsburg, Monday night. If you like crisp blues done right and tight, you’ll like these young guys. From what I’ve read about them, the core of the band is singer/guitarist Malcolm Ford (Han Solo’s son, for real) and lead guitarist Jack Byrne (son of Ellen Barkin and Gabriel Byrne, also for real), though at Monday’s show they had a bassist and drummer in tow as well (no idea who their parents are).

Nothing revolutionary here, only really solid blues played with just the right amount of swing and no effect pedals to get in the way. Ford sings with an effective rasp and growl that borrows a bit from Tom Waits, and he seems completely plugged into the emotional core of the band’s songs. That’s important. The problem with The Blues, and this is no fault of the genre, is if the singer misses, even slightly, that emotional core, the songs flop. With so many people playing the same three chords over the same 12 bars, the ability to find that emotional truth matters. Lots of people don’t or can’t, which is why there’s so much cheesy blues out there.

As for Byrne, he can play. Nothing flashy, no light-speed flourishes. Just the kind of touch that would make the late Hubert Sumlin smile. All in all, fine stuff.

Here’s a recent story about them that ran in Interview. It’s a good, quick read.