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Dog Trumpet, originally known as Reg & Peter's Dog Trumpet, is an Australian rock band, founded in 1990 by brothers
Reg Mombassa Christopher O'Doherty, also known by the pseudonym Reg Mombassa, is a New Zealand-born Australian artist and musician. He is a founding member of the band Mental As Anything and member of Dog Trumpet (alongside his brother Peter O'Doherty). Ea ...
(aka Chris O'Doherty) and
Peter O'Doherty Peter O'Doherty (born 23 March 1958) is a New Zealand-born Australian musician and visual artist. He is a founder of Australian pop band, Dog Trumpet, in 1991 on guitar and vocals, alongside his older brother, Chris O'Doherty ( Reg Mombassa) on ...
, original members of Australian new wave and
pop rock Pop rock (also typeset as pop/rock) is a fusion genre and form of rock music characterized by a strong commercial appeal, with more emphasis on professional songwriting and recording craft, and less emphasis on attitude than standard rock musi ...
band Band or BAND may refer to: Places *Bánd, a village in Hungary * Band, Iran, a village in Urmia County, West Azerbaijan Province, Iran * Band, Mureș, a commune in Romania * Band-e Majid Khan, a village in Bukan County, West Azerbaijan Province, ...
Mental As Anything Mental As Anything was an Australian new wave and pop rock band that formed in Sydney in 1976. Its most popular line-up (which lasted from 1977 to 1999, and recorded all of its charting singles and albums) was Martin Plaza (birth name Martin ...
. The brothers formed as an outlet for their own material. The Dog Trumpet sound reflects affection for 1960s pop and psychedelia. They have released eight albums and three EPs.


Biography

In 1990, Mental As Anything members had agreed to take a
sabbatical A sabbatical (from the Hebrew: (i.e., Sabbath); in Latin ; Greek: ) is a rest or break from work; "an extended period of time intentionally spent on something that’s not your routine job." The concept of the sabbatical is based on the Bi ...
from their band work and turned to solo or side projects. Mombassa and O'Doherty formed the duo Reg & Peter/Peter & Reg (they alternated names whenever interviewed). Under the name of Reg & Peter, the duo issued the single "Jean"/"Nobody Home" in March 1991 on Regular Records, the song is described by Mombassa as "a fusion of psychedelic and Celtic rock 'n 'roll dealing with metaphysical romance", before assuming the name Reg & Peter's Dog Trumpet for the album ''Two Heads One Brain''. The album made the
Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. The magazine was first known fo ...
's list of top albums for the year. Two further singles were lifted from the album, "Made of Wood"/"Red Brick Home" in June 1991 (the cover art for which is a painting of a howling dog trumpet by Mombassa) and "I'm So Handsome"/"Dream" in October 1991. The name "Dog Trumpet" came from a piece of Mombassa's artwork which featured a creature resembling a cross between a dog, a trumpet and a jet engine. The album was produced by Steve James and helping out in the studio were Mike Gubb (keyboards; ex-
Dynamic Hepnotics The Dynamic Hepnotics were an Australian soul, blues and funk band which formed in 1979 and disbanded in 1986. Mainstay, lead vocalist and front man, "Continental" Robert Susz formed the group in Sydney. They had chart success on the Australian K ...
, Mental as Anything,
The Whitlams The Whitlams are an Australian Indie rock band formed in late 1992. The original line-up was Tim Freedman on keyboards and lead vocals, Andy Lewis on double bass and Stevie Plunder on guitar and lead vocals. Other than mainstay Freedman, the ...
), John Bliss (drums; ex-
The Reels The Reels are an Australian rock music, rock band which formed in Dubbo, New South Wales in 1976. It disbanded in 1991, and reformed in 2007. Its 1981 song "Quasimodo's Dream (song), Quasimodo's Dream" was voted one of the APRA Top 30 Australian ...
) and Mark Honeybrook (bass). The next two years saw the release of two
EPs An extended play (EP) is a Sound recording and reproduction, musical recording that contains more tracks than a Single (music), single but fewer than an album. Contemporary EPs generally contain up to eight tracks and have a playing time of 1 ...
, ''Kiss a Gun Down'' in October 1992 and ''Strange Brew'' in October 1993. Film clips were made for "Beast of Prey" and "Melancholy Way", although they were not released as singles. ''Strange Brew'' was an inspired reworking of the old
Cream Cream is a dairy product composed of the higher-fat layer skimmed from the top of milk before homogenization. In un-homogenized milk, the fat, which is less dense, eventually rises to the top. In the industrial production of cream, this proces ...
song. The artwork for ''Strange Brew'', was painted by
Martin Sharp Martin Ritchie Sharp (21 January 1942 – 1 December 2013) was an Australian artist, cartoonist, songwriter and film-maker. Career Sharp was born in Bellevue Hill, New South Wales in 1942, and educated at Cranbrook private school, where one ...
, who designed several album covers for the real Cream in the late 1960s. Tony Martin had replaced Honeybrook on bass. After that, Mental as Anything re-emerged to tour and record, with Dog Trumpet put on the back-burner. In 1996, Reg and Pete revived Dog Trumpet and issued the album ''Suitcase''. Backing the duo in the studio were Tony Martin, Andy Travers (drums; ex-
the Happening Thang The Happening Thang were an Australian country pop group formed in 1984 by Stuart Crysell on guitar, David Lennon on drums, Rose Pearse on bass guitar, Andrew Travers on acoustic guitar, vocals and harmonica, and Catherine Wearne on lead vocals. ...
) and Amanda Brown (violin, backing vocals; ex-
The Go-Betweens The Go-Betweens were an Australian indie rock band formed in Brisbane, Queensland, in 1977. The band was co-founded and led by singer-songwriters and guitarists Robert Forster (musician), Robert Forster and Grant McLennan, who were its only co ...
). "Suitcase" was released as a single on TWA Records in 1996, with "Into the Bible" released by TWA as a radio single in 1997 (the cover picture of a lecturing monster is by Mombassa). The band's third album, ''Dog Trumpet'', was recorded over a period of years and was engineered and produced by O'Doherty on an old sixteen track reel to reel in the spare room of his flat in Coogee. It was released in February 2002 on
Half A Cow Records Half A Cow is an independent record label from Australia, established in 1990 by Sydney musician and music identity Nic Dalton. History In 1985 - 1989 Dalton ran a bookshop (owned by Dalton's parents) in the Sydney suburb of Glebe called Dal ...
. Aside from regular drummers, they used
Terepai Richmond Terepai Chalmers Richmond (born 21 February 1971) is an Australian drummer. He joined the Sydney-based rock band The Whitlams in September 1999 and formerly played in acid jazz group Directions in Groove (d.i.g.) (1991–1998, 2008). Biograph ...
for some tracks. The cover is a painting by Mombassa of him and his brother Peter when they were small children. Dog Trumpet released their fourth album ''Antisocial Tendencies'' in March 2007 on Half A Cow Records. The album features a cover of "
Lili Marlene "Lili Marleen" (also spelled "Lili Marlen'", "Lilli Marlene", "Lily Marlene", "Lili Marlène" among others; ) is a German love song that became popular during World War II throughout Europe and the Mediterranean among both Axis and Allied troo ...
", a popular World War II song made famous by
Marlene Dietrich Marie Magdalene "Marlene" DietrichBorn as Maria Magdalena, not Marie Magdalene, according to Dietrich's biography by her daughter, Maria Riva ; however, Dietrich's biography by Charlotte Chandler cites "Marie Magdalene" as her birth name . (, ; ...
. In 2008 Mombassa and O'Doherty began recording songs for the next Dog Trumpet album, uploading a demo of "The Great South Road", a new song from the forthcoming album, on their MySpace website in December 2008. The album, ''River of Flowers'', was released on 28 May 2010. Early August 2013, Dog Trumpet released the double album 'Medicated Spirits' through Orange Lounge Recordings. The album has been short-listed for the 'Australian Music Prize' Australian Album of the Year. The band have also been invited to attend SXSW in March 2014. Playing various Festivals all over from "Port Fairy Folk Festival", "Bluesfest", "Blue Mountains Music Festival", "SXSW". Dog Trumpet lost their talented Drummer/Journalist Iain Shedden in 2017. Dog Trumpet's seventh album, ''Great South Road'', was released in May 2020 and featured the singles "Gravity", "Wallpaper", "Lonely Death Cleaning Company", "You've Heard it All Before" and "Overseas and Elsewhere". The album garnered great reviews and because of COVID19 the brothers decided to do various performances live on Facebook to promote the album. In 2021, their back catalogue was released digitally, with vinyl records released on 29 October 2021 via Demon Records. A new single and video, "F**king Idiots", was released 20 May 2022. Dog Trumpet released a further single. "The Ballad of Clayton Looby" on 9 September 2022, from their forthcoming album, ''Shadowland'', which is scheduled to be released on 4 November 2022, on vinyl, CD and digitally worldwide by the Demon Music Group. The video for "The Ballad of Clayton Looby", contains footage from some of Australia’s 1970s surf films, including Alby Falzon’s ''
Morning of the Earth ''Morning of the Earth'' is a 1972 classic surf film by Alby Falzon and David Elfick. The film's soundtrack was produced by G. Wayne Thomas and included music and songs by noted Australian music acts Tamam Shud, John J. Francis, Brian Cadd, ...
'' and Phil and Russell Shepard’s ''A Winter’s Tale'' and Paul Witzig’s ''The Lost Witzig Reels''. "Nina Simone" the third single from ''Shadowland'', was released on 7 October 2022.
“In 1987 I was on tour in London visiting a friend from Sydney who was living there at the time. We spent a few days together looking at the sites, going to galleries, combing second hand shops and markets.  One Sunday she bought shoes and I bought her a book and Nina Simone’s first record Little Girl Blue which we took back to her bedsit.  Little did we know we’d still be together today.”  - Peter O’Doherty
''Shadowland'' is a distinctive blending of psychedelia, folk and blues, the album probes the perils and absurdities of human existence, kicking off with the title track "Shadowland", a nervous musing on digital over-surveillance; followed by "Nina Simone", a song reflecting on romance and memory. "F***ing Idiots points" out the shameful idiocy of our addiction to war and militarism; "The Ballad of Clayton Looby" is an anti-establishment ode to a larrikin surfer. "Space and Time" is the first single from the forthcoming new album, it is a fun song about our universe. It was released on 24 May 2024. Dog Trumpet performed at Vivid Sydney in front of a Reg Mombassa animated artwork "Gumscape with Road and Creatures", which runs for the Vivid Festival. Dog Trumpet released a new single, "Marianne" on 27 September 2024, a song about
Marianne Faithfull Marianne Evelyn Gabriel Faithfull (29 December 1946 – 30 January 2025) was an English singer and actress who achieved popularity in the 1960s with the release of her UK top 10 single " As Tears Go By". She became one of the leading female art ...
. Their latest single, "Live Forever", is an uptempo pop rock song. The lyrics are impressionistic and slightly ambivalent, expressing a fear of good and bad things and questioning any desire to live forever. The song is the title track from their ninth album, ''Live Forever'', which is set to be released in July 2025.


Members

;Current members *
Reg Mombassa Christopher O'Doherty, also known by the pseudonym Reg Mombassa, is a New Zealand-born Australian artist and musician. He is a founding member of the band Mental As Anything and member of Dog Trumpet (alongside his brother Peter O'Doherty). Ea ...
— guitar, vocals (1990-present) *
Peter O'Doherty Peter O'Doherty (born 23 March 1958) is a New Zealand-born Australian musician and visual artist. He is a founder of Australian pop band, Dog Trumpet, in 1991 on guitar and vocals, alongside his older brother, Chris O'Doherty ( Reg Mombassa) on ...
— guitar, mandolin, bass (1990-present) * Bernie Hayes — bass, vocals, (2002-present) * Declan O'Doherty — Drums, (2023-present) ;Former members * Mike Gubb — keyboards (1991–1993) * Mark Honeybrook — bass (1991–1992) * Tony Martin — bass (1992–1993, 1996) * Amanda Brown — violin, vocals (1996, 2002) * Andy Travers — drums (1996, 2002) * Jess Ciampa — drums (2002, 2007) * Hamish Stuart — drums (2002, 2007) *
Jonathan Zwartz Jonathan Peter Zwartz is a New Zealand-born Australian jazz musician. In the 2018 ARIA Music Awards, he won the Best Jazz Album category for his third album, ''Animarum'', released in 2018. Early life Zwartz was born in New Zealand. Career ...
— bass (2002) * Peter Mitchell — harmonica (2007) * Iain Shedden - drums (2012 - 2017) Died 2017 * Jim Elliot - drums, (2017 - 2023) * John Bliss — drums (1991–1993)


Discography


Albums


EPs


References

{{Authority control Australian rock music groups Musical groups established in 1990 New South Wales musical groups