The Maldives
Biography
“Is Seattle a country music town? That’s like asking is whiskey a country drink.”
Jason Dodson, bandleader of the Maldives, is nursing a pint of Guinness on a chilly afternoon in the Great Northwest. “I would say that whisky is a great beverage,” he continues. “Drinking is country. If you drink tequila, it’s country. If you drink whisky, it’s country.
“Seattle is a music town,” Dodson concludes. “So in that way, yeah—it’s a country music town.”
Are the Maldives a country band?
That one’s tougher to answer. Short answer is yes, but. Long answer arrives four beers after midnight, at a Maldives show at the Tractor Tavern in Ballard, alt-country Mecca of the West Coast and the band’s unofficial home base. A stage-spanning nine members strong, they come on hard and strong and loud. The country instrumentation is there: fiddle, pedal steel, banjo, accordion. The look, too: denim, flannel, boots, buckles. Songs are about dead relatives, broken promises, bad choices, and worse hangovers. But even with that high, lonesome sound, dusty like old vinyl and bracing like liquor, there’s something else, something more. Blazing guitar solos, crashing drums, winsome four-part vocal harmonies, tattoos under shirtsleeves, a crazed glint in the eye. This is country, yeah, but it’s equally rock ‘n’ roll, plus a shot each of blues, soul and folk. Hell, it’s just plain music, real and raw, perfectly suited to this music town.
Dodson, son of a chainsaw salesman and a mom who sang him to sleep with Willie Nelson songs, grew up on both coasts. He eventually settled in Seattle and started playing solo acoustic, writing songs and gathering the rogue’s gallery that makes up the Maldives. All nine bring the influences of projects past and current, from old-time folk to baroque pop to Thin Lizzy-lovin’ rock to electro string-band experimentation. They add up to a musical family much in the style of Dylan’s Rolling Thunder Revue or the E Street Band. In their four years together, they’ve logged countless shows around the Northwest and played high-profile slots at the Sasquatch Music Festival and Bumbershoot Music and Arts Festival. In late 2008, they played in front of 10,000 people as headliners for a Joe Biden rally in Tacoma. They never fail to knock out a crowd—or get drunk trying.
After building a die-hard fan base one show at a time and self-releasing an EP in 2006, the Maldives released their official debut on Mt. Fuji Records on September 15, 2009. Listen to the Thunder loses none of the shit-kicking, gut-punching, heart-rending swagger of the band’s live performances. They take it on the road in late summer.
Call it what you want—the Maldives are the new sound of Seattle, music town, and now they’re coming to a town near you
– Jonathan Zwickel (Seattle Times)
Band Lineup:
Jason Dodson – Guitar, Lead Vocal
Jesse Bonn – Guitar, Piano
Tim Gadbois – Guitar, Piano
Ryan McMackin – Drums, Percussion
Chris Warner – Bass Guitar
Chris Zasche – Pedal Steel Guitar
Seth Warren – Violin
Kevin Barrans – Accordion, Banjo
Tomo Nakayama – Percussion, Piano
