Keanu Reeves’ Rock Band Returns With New Album & Performances – Billboard

Keanu Reeves dismisses the concept that taking part in bass in his long-defunct rock trio, Dogstar, was a ardour venture that he hoped to find time for in between a prolific Hollywood profession. “It’s not ‘find time for it,’” he tells Billboard, his hair shagging into his eyes, throughout a Zoom name earlier this week. “It’s one thing that’s a part of my life.”

Though Dogstar hadn’t launched an album in over 20 years — 23 years and 4 John Wick movies in the past — Reeves says {that a} correct reunion along with his friends Bret Domrose and Rob Mailhouse had been on his thoughts for some time. “I missed taking part in collectively, I missed writing collectively, I missed doing exhibits collectively. It’s one thing I’ve at all times missed,” he admits. “We got here to a spot the place we weren’t taking part in anymore, and I missed it … As soon as we began to play, and it felt good, and actually constructive and artistic, that’s when it was like, ‘Okay, let’s make this occur.’”

The reunion of Dogstar — which has been teased since final July, when their Instagram account declared, “We’re again” — lastly comes into focus this weekend, when the trio takes the stage for his or her first public efficiency collectively at BottleRock Napa Valley music competition on Saturday (Might 27). The band will play a mixture of older songs from their earlier studio albums, 1996’s Our Little Visionary and 2000’s Completely happy Ending, in addition to unveil cuts from a forthcoming, as-yet-untitled album — which was at all times a part of the plan when the reunion grew to become official.

“I feel all three of us simply mentioned, ‘Properly, if we’re going to do that, let’s make a report,’” says Reeves. Singer-guitarist Domrose provides, “We simply knew that there was ‘X’ period of time, and we would have liked to take advantage of it. We simply locked on as desirous to make this report, and it occurred fairly shortly.”

Reeves, Domrose and Mailhouse stored in contact through the years after Dogstar performed its last present collectively in 2002. “We’ve type of been sporadically getting collectively, as a result of we’re all buddies,” Mailhouse explains. The three would sometimes meet up within the rehearsal house of drummer Mailhouse’s residence in Silver Lake to jam, however would seldom provide you with new music concepts.

Through the starting of the pandemic in 2020, nonetheless, these jam periods grew to become a bit extra concentrated: home visits changed into shared quarantining, and with journey restricted, quickly the trio have been “caught collectively, like we have been at camp,” as Mailhouse places it, and logging eight-hour rehearsal days collectively. Reeves provides, “We performed the catalog songs, after which we are able to’t assist it — we simply began writing.” Inside two and a half months, the blokes had written extra songs than they wanted for Dogstar’s third studio album.

The timing and launch particulars of the Completely happy Ending follow-up have but to be introduced, though the band members are assured that they and producer Dave Trumfio (Wilco, Constructed To Spill) have situated a sound that can fulfill new listeners in addition to longtime followers who’ve been ready for his or her return. “[Dave] understood the place we have been coming from,” says Mailhouse, “and labored rather well with Bret, layering guitars and doing a lot of completely different sounds and ambient issues — issues that weren’t simply laborious rock, in-your-face music, [but] just a little extra textural.”

Dogstar has performed non-public performances since reuniting, however Saturday’s set at BottleRock marks their years-in-the-making return to the highlight, and the primary of what they hope to be many extra exhibits. The trio says that they’re too excited to really feel jittery. “I’m certain because the hour grows nearer, I’m gonna get far more nervous,” Domrose says with fun.

For Reeves, who joined the band as a rising Hollywood star and returns to it as some of the constant main actors of the century, Dogstar represents a ardour that he’s thrilled to return to in an actual manner in spite of everything these years. “It’s an area that I like,” he says, “and an area that I attempted to guard.”