It was June of 2010 and I had made my way up to Burlington VT to clear my head and spend some time with an old friend. I walked into his apartment and there was a guy just chillin’ out on his couch. What I didn’t know at the time is that my visit to this amazing city was perfectly timed and that guy on the couch (along with his bandmates) were later going to melt my face. Dopapod was the band the couch-sitter was playing with, and later that evening they played an amazing gig at Nectar’s and concluded with what felt like a fifteen minute Rage Against the Machine medley which really sealed it for me. I fell hard and fast for this band and over the course of the last three years have really enjoyed watching them grow into what they continue to become.
This is the second year that I have caught their 4/20 show @ the Pearl Street Ballroom in Northampton MA. Walking down the street I could hear the beats of The Disco Biscuits drummer Allen Aucoin, aka DrFameus. His electronic music side project is gaining speed during his time off from the band; a true one man band using both the drums and electronic sounds to keep the beat. Pretty funky stuff and it really warmed up the room.
Appropriately between acts, Funk Drummer by James Brown came on as Dopapod tuned up on stage. The boys piped in the sounds of Moby to make a very dramatic entrance. They not only have fans, they have fanatics! The audience was chanting “Dopapod! Dopapod! Dopapod!” From the moment they were visible to the very last beat of the show, the room remained full of energy and we in the crowd were really feeling it.
They opened the show with Freight Train off of their first album. On this “unofficial holiday” (as Rob called it) they shredded through some of my personal favorites, to include Trapper Keeper, Indian Grits and a Flipped > Nuggy Jawson that went back to Flipped and back to Nuggy Jawson and THEN back to Flipped; A Flipped club sandwich if you will! It was a good twenty minute jam. The sound is always on point and the lights by Luke Stratton, like the band, only get bigger and better every time I catch them. The addition of more lyrics into their music is very welcomed and helps ground us after their amazing jams. They are all so individually talented, and I am not afraid to admit that Rob is one of my most favorite guitarists–so so good! They concluded the show with a two-song encore: Weird Charlie > Onionhead. Very humbly, they handed out high fives as they made their grand exit. And of course, stuck around to interact with their friends and fans after the show.
Eli, Neal, Rob and Chuck have a great deal of enthusiasm for what they do for us as fans and have a blast while they are doing it. They have grown from testing the waters in small club rooms to selling out larges stages and sweeping across the land in the festival circuit, Dopapod really knows what’s up. I have said it before, and will say it again but they are most definitely going somewhere and I am very happy to have be able to watch it as it happens!
Check out the full show [here]. And be sure to check them out if they are in your neck of the woods.
SETLIST 4/20/2013
Intro
Freight Train Filled With Dynamite
Give It A Name
Turnin’ Knobs
French Bowling >
Plug
Indian Grits *
Cloud
Trapper Keeper
Flipped >
Nuggy Jawson >
Flipped >
Nuggy Jawson >
Flipped
(encore break)
Encore:
Weird Charlie >
Onionhead
* w/DrFameus
