Dragonette

Biography

Canadian new wave revivalists Dragonette are a bouncy electro-pop act with a glammy, polymorphic persona rather like that of the Scissor Sisters, with whom they share management, and a sound often akin to Hot Hot Heat, the first album by the Killers, and other successful revivers of the sound of MTV's first half-decade. Prior to the formation of Dragonette, singer and lyricist Martina Sorbara (the daughter of a member of Ontario's provincial government, Finance Minister Greg Sorbara) had maintained a moderately successful solo career as an adult album alternative solo artist in the style of Sarah McLachlan or other delicate neo-folkies; Sorbara's debut solo album, The Cure for Bad Deeds, was released in 2002. She has since disparaged her former Lilith Fair-style musical efforts with the pungent phrase "tampon music"; just as notoriously, her father dismissed Dragonette in a quote to the Scottish newspaper The Daily Record as a "market-driven" phase that was "part of the raciness of current popular culture."

Sorbara formed Dragonette in 2005 with her husband, bassist Dan Kurtz (formerly of the jazz and electronica-influenced Toronto-based jam band the New Deal), guitarist Simon Craig, and drummer Joel Stouffer. A self-released and self-titled demo that year attracted the attention of the U.K. office of Mercury Records, which offered the group a recording contract the following year. Moving their base of operations from Toronto to London (and losing Craig in the process, replaced by British guitarist Will Stapleton), Dragonette released their first single, "I Get Around," in April 2007. Three more singles followed, "Take It Like a Man," "Competition," and a gender-reversal cover of Calvin Harris' hit "The Girls" called "The Boys." Dragonette's debut album, Galore, was released in late summer 2007. The same year, Martina Sorbara sang the lead vocals on the hit Basement Jaxx single "Take Me Back to Your House." Galore was released in the U.S. in 2008 via I Surrender Records. ~ Stewart Mason, All Music Guide