At 25 years old, Domino Kirke is no younger than your average up-and-coming artist. She’s young, but in comparison to 21 year-old Lily Allen, with whom Domino, her band, recently toured, she’s practically a veteran. It’s not so far from the truth; Kirke, the daughter of Free / Bad Company drummer Simon Kirke, was raised in a musical household, and attended Laguardia Performing Arts School, better known as the Fame school, as a teenager in New York. What’s more, Domino is a band ten years in the making—under unusual circumstances, guitarist Jordan Galland actually met Kirke at the tender age of 16.
“I met Jordan while I was singing karaoke,” Kirke says. “He was in the audience, and I was about 15 years old. I didn’t actually meet him until a year later. It was really strange. He remembered me. He apparently thought I could hold a tune pretty well, while singing drunkenly when I was underage.”
A decade later, with a stronger vision and a few years of playing together under their belts, Domino has recently released their debut EP, Everyone Else is Boring. Taking on effects laden guitar crunch on the title track, laid back reggae bounce on “Tropical Moonlight” and passionate, soaring indie pop on “Green Umbrella,” the band offers a stunningly diverse array of songs on this brief, yet tasty teaser (the band plans on recording a full-length later on in 2007). Its title could be taken as mere sass, but Kirke explains that it represents the band’s own outlook. “We felt like it summed up our attitude when we play. It’s just a direct hit. It could be taken as cocky, but it addresses how we are as a band. It’s risky, though, because people might think it’s silly.”
As for what Kirke considers boring, she has a much more specific answer for that. “Living in Williamsburg, I feel like I meet some very creative people and I feel like a lot of them are kind of over trying to do what they do well,” Kirke says. “Like it’s almost a cliché to try to make a career of it. And I meet so many people that are so talented but they’re not doing anything with it, they’re just working at coffeehouses. And they’ll say if this, that or the other were this way, then things would be different. But it’s just really sad and depressing, and they’re just boring.”
Not one to let their own musical future fizzle, Kirke, Galland, bassist David Muller and drummer Sam Koppelman signed with Allido Records, the imprint of DJ Mark Ronson, offspring of another rock legend, Mick Ronson. This is more than mere coincidence, however. Kirke and Ronson are chums from way back, a fact that makes their business relationship all the more unique.
“I had known (Ronson) since I was really small,” says Kirke. “I got reconnected with him when I was in high school, when he was working with Nikka Costa. He would play me some beats and would encourage me to write songs. And two summers ago he offered us a development deal. There’s no suit-wearing business deal, and we’re all on the same page. I don’t think that sort of thing happens very often. Everything usually gets chopped up and everyone wants a piece. “I think I’ve just been really lucky.”
~ Jeff Terich
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http://www.allidorecords.com
http://www.myspace.com/dominoband
DOMINO's EVERYONE ELSE IS BORING EP is out now on Allido Records.
