ArtistInfo

The Dolly Rockers

GB
Rock
A.k.a. The Dollyrockers

It was 1990, Penguins In Bondage had split and Greg Donnelly had just returned from a stay in the UK where he had fallen for the Jesus & Mary Chain’s mesh of noise and melody. He teamed up with his old Awakening band mate, Aidan Harper, Sonic Youth aficionado, Roy Green, on drums and Janine on bass. The foursome starting gigging around Cape Town after just a few rehearsals, supporting the likes of alternative rock stalwarts like No Friends Of Harry and Not Even The TV. After a few legendary appearances on the fringes of The Grahamstown Art festival, the band went through a couple of reshuffles. They eventually settled on the relatively stable line-up of Greg (vocals & guitar), Stuart Crawford-Browne (guitar), Anthony Bull (bass) and Arnold Vermaak (drums) - all former members of Cape Town band, Attic Muse. This line-up recorded their first E.P. with Pitchie Rommelaere, who later went on to replace Stuart on guitar and became the band’s full time producer on all three of their subsequent album releases. The E.P. “Consume Me” (1992), was the vinyl release to be produced in South Africa (before the current vinyl resurgence). “Ziggy Played Bizarre” and “Heart Hits the Ground” received good radio support on 5FM, thanks to the efforts of Barney Simon and Michelle Constant. “Book I Write” was chosen for a Cape Town CD compilation, Cape Town Vibes, that was heavily promoted by KFM. The Dollyrockers continued to play and build up a following, playing at legendary Cape Town venues like The Playground, The Crowbar and The Stage and various festivals in the Western Cape. They produced a video of “Fragile”, shot by Barry Donnelly, however has been lost. After another break the band regrouped and started recording the first full “Dollyrockers” (1995) album at Pitchie’s studio, The Peak. This album was responsible for exposing the band to a wider audience, yielding tracks like “Suicide Annie” and “Walk Right Through Me”, both play listed on 5FM. It was on the basis of this release that the band toured South Africa. The line-up had been bolstered by the addition of David Ferguson on harmonica. Alan Lloyd took over touring duties for Arnold, who was trying to build up interest in the U.K; dropping off demos wherever he could, but nobody was biting on a band from South Africa with no tour imminent. The band did receive a favorable review in the NME demo section. Exhausted, the band returned to The Peak to record their second full length, Glory Glory (2002). Alan joined the band on drums for the album, which produced tracks like “Sleepy Town”, used on the soundtrack of Going Nowhere Slowly. The difficult second album yielded far darker material and was largely ignored by mainstream radio, but the tracks continued to get exposure through television and movies. The producer of Going Nowhere Slowly, David Moore, used many of The Dollyrockers tracks in his full length feature movie, Once Upon A Road Trip. The band then split, but Greg, Anthony and Pitchie got back together a couple of years later to produce their third full length called The Heat (2004). This album produced tracks like “Lovesong” which was included in SA Rock Digest’s 1001 South African Songs to hear before You Go Deaf and “Like A Stranger”, used in the movie Twist. By this stage, South African music had moved into its grunge phase and The Dollyrockers decided to call it a day, but produced the title tune for David Moore’s latest series, Couch Trip before shutting the door. In early 2017, Greg, Anthony, Arnold, Stuart and David got together to perform two very successful reunion shows in Cape Town. It was here where David Sass [Subterania Music] who had joined One F Music in late 2016, approached the band to release a double CD compilation of songs consisting of studio recordings, songs from the vinyl E.P. that were never previously available on CD and a selection of live recordings that Dave had kept from cassettes, like Live At The Playground. This makes up a 29 track “Dive - A Collection”, which has been superbly re-mastered by Paul Riekert of Battery 9.

Genres

• Rock
• Pop