Dogstar (band)
Encyclopedia
Dogstar was an alternative rock
Alternative rock
Alternative rock is a genre of rock music and a term used to describe a diverse musical movement that emerged from the independent music underground of the 1980s and became widely popular by the 1990s...

 group active from the mid-1990s to the early 2000s. The band performed at the 1996 Zwemdokrock Festival (Lummen
Lummen
Lummen is a municipality located in the Belgian province of Limburg near Hasselt. On January 1, 2006 Lummen had a total population of 13,691. The total area is 53.38 km² which gives a population density of 256 inhabitants per km²....

, Belgium
Belgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...

) and at the 1999 Glastonbury Festival (United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

), and it released an EP and two albums. The band garnered media attention due to the non-musical activities of bassist Keanu Reeves
Keanu Reeves
Keanu Charles Reeves is a Canadian actor. Reeves is perhaps best known for his roles in Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure, Speed, Point Break and the science fiction-action trilogy The Matrix...

, who starred in major Hollywood action films such as Point Break
Point Break
Point Break is a 1991 action film directed by Kathryn Bigelow and starring Patrick Swayze, Keanu Reeves, Lori Petty and Gary Busey. The title refers to the surfing term point break, where a wave breaks as it hits a point of land jutting out from the coastline.The film was a box office success upon...

 and The Matrix
The Matrix
The Matrix is a 1999 science fiction-action film written and directed by Larry and Andy Wachowski, starring Keanu Reeves, Laurence Fishburne, Carrie-Anne Moss, Joe Pantoliano, and Hugo Weaving...

.

Members

  • Bret Domrose - lead vocals
    Lead vocalist
    The lead vocalist is the member of a band who sings the main vocal portions of a song. They may also play one or more instruments. Lead vocalists are sometimes referred to as the frontman or frontwoman, and as such, are usually considered to be the "leader" of the groups they perform in, often the...

    , guitar
    Guitar
    The guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...

  • Keanu Reeves
    Keanu Reeves
    Keanu Charles Reeves is a Canadian actor. Reeves is perhaps best known for his roles in Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure, Speed, Point Break and the science fiction-action trilogy The Matrix...

     - bass guitar
    Bass guitar
    The bass guitar is a stringed instrument played primarily with the fingers or thumb , or by using a pick....

    , backing vocals
    Backing vocalist
    A backing vocalist or backing singer is a singer who provides vocal harmony with the lead vocalist or other backing vocalists...

  • Robert Mailhouse
    Robert Mailhouse
    Robert Kenneth Mailhouse is an American actor and musician. He has also appeared in a TV series including the soap Days of Our Lives and the comedy Seinfeld. He was the drummer for the grunge-alternative rock band Dogstar from the mid-1990s to the early 2000s. Currently he plays in the band...

     - drums, percussion, backing vocals

History

The genesis of Dogstar was a chance encounter between Reeves and Mailhouse in a supermarket in 1991. Rob Mailhouse was wearing a Detroit Red Wings
Detroit Red Wings
The Detroit Red Wings are a professional ice hockey team based in Detroit, Michigan. They are members of the Central Division of the Western Conference of the National Hockey League , and are one of the Original Six teams of the NHL, along with the Toronto Maple Leafs, Montreal Canadiens, New York...

 hockey
Ice hockey
Ice hockey, often referred to as hockey, is a team sport played on ice, in which skaters use wooden or composite sticks to shoot a hard rubber puck into their opponent's net. The game is played between two teams of six players each. Five members of each team skate up and down the ice trying to take...

 sweater, and Reeves (an avid hockey fan and a keen player of the sport) asked if Mailhouse needed a goalie. Like Reeves, Mailhouse is also an actor. Mailhouse is a television actor, and has appeared in the NBC
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...

 soap opera
Soap opera
A soap opera, sometimes called "soap" for short, is an ongoing, episodic work of dramatic fiction presented in serial format on radio or as television programming. The name soap opera stems from the original dramatic serials broadcast on radio that had soap manufacturers, such as Procter & Gamble,...

 Days of our Lives
Days of our Lives
Days of our Lives is a long running daytime soap opera broadcast on the NBC television network. It is one of the longest-running scripted television programs in the world, airing nearly every weekday in the United States since November 8, 1965. It has since been syndicated to many countries around...

, as well as Seinfeld
Seinfeld
Seinfeld is an American television sitcom that originally aired on NBC from July 5, 1989, to May 14, 1998, lasting nine seasons, and is now in syndication. It was created by Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld, the latter starring as a fictionalized version of himself...

. As the two men formed a friendship, they began jamming together. The band went through several lineups before Domrose joined as a vocalist/guitarist in 1994. Eventually they decided to play for a live audience, a decision Reeves would later describe as "a huge mistake". The band originally called themselves Small Fecal Matter, and then BFS (Big Fucking Shit, or Big Fucking Sound), before settling on Dogstar, after Mailhouse found the name in the book Sexus, written by Henry Miller
Henry Miller
Henry Valentine Miller was an American novelist and painter. He was known for breaking with existing literary forms and developing a new sort of 'novel' that is a mixture of novel, autobiography, social criticism, philosophical reflection, surrealist free association, and mysticism, one that is...

.

In 1995 they opened for Bon Jovi
Bon Jovi
Bon Jovi is an American rock band from Sayreville, New Jersey. Formed in 1983, Bon Jovi consists of lead singer and namesake Jon Bon Jovi , guitarist Richie Sambora, keyboardist David Bryan, drummer Tico Torres, as well as current bassist Hugh McDonald...

 in Australia and New Zealand and appeared in concert billings with David Bowie
David Bowie
David Bowie is an English musician, actor, record producer and arranger. A major figure for over four decades in the world of popular music, Bowie is widely regarded as an innovator, particularly for his work in the 1970s...

. Dogstar also appeared in two movies: Ellie Parker
Ellie Parker
Ellie Parker is a 2005 American drama film, written and directed by Scott Coffey. The title character, played by Naomi Watts, is a young woman struggling as an actress in Los Angeles....

 and Me and Will. Dogstar had several opening acts that went on to become notable, such as Rancid
Rancid (band)
Rancid is an American punk rock band formed in Berkeley, California in 1991. Founded by Tim Armstrong and Matt Freeman, both of whom previously played in the ska punk band Operation Ivy, Rancid is credited—along with Green Day and The Offspring—for reviving mainstream interest in punk rock in the...

 and Weezer
Weezer
Weezer is an American alternative rock band. The band currently consists of Rivers Cuomo , Patrick Wilson , Brian Bell , and Scott Shriner . The band has changed lineups three times since its formation in 1992...

 (the latter's first gig was opening for Dogstar). Dogstar released a four-track EP in early 1996, Quattro Formaggi (distributed by Zoo Entertainment) and followed this up with their debut album, Our Little Visionary, which was only distributed in Japan, but their fanbase was worldwide, and they played to audiences in the U.S., England, Australia and India. Whilst in India, they performed at the equivalent of the Academy Awards in India, the Zee Cine Awards
Zee Cine Awards
The Zee Cine Awards or "ZCA" for short is an awards ceremony for the Hindi film industry. It was first held in 1998 in Mumbai. Since then, it has gained substantial popularity as a notable awards ceremony to the Indian population as well as to the viewers of Zee Network.In 2004, the ZCA went...

. They also performed at the 1999 Glastonbury Festival
Glastonbury Festival
The Glastonbury Festival of Contemporary Performing Arts, commonly abbreviated to Glastonbury or even Glasto, is a performing arts festival that takes place near Pilton, Somerset, England, best known for its contemporary music, but also for dance, comedy, theatre, circus, cabaret and other arts.The...

.

Although the band members had other work commitments, a second album, Happy Ending followed in 1999, produced by Michael Vail Blum and Richie Zito
Richie Zito
Richie Zito is a session guitarist and record producer from Los Angeles.He has worked with Poison, Neil Sedaka, Yvonne Elliman, Eric Carmen, Art Garfunkel, Leo Sayer, Diana Ross, Marc Tanner, Elton John, the Motels, as well as The Cult, White Lion, Eddie Money, Heart, and Bad English...

. Domrose called the music on this record more "pop-aggressive" than the band's earlier work. Their last performance was in October 2002 in Japan, and the group folded afterwards. Reeves and Mailhouse later performed together in band Becky. Reeves left the band because of his working schedule, but still plays with the band on occasion.

Notable performances

  • 1996 Zwemdokrock Festival (Lummen
    Lummen
    Lummen is a municipality located in the Belgian province of Limburg near Hasselt. On January 1, 2006 Lummen had a total population of 13,691. The total area is 53.38 km² which gives a population density of 256 inhabitants per km²....

    , Belgium
    Belgium
    Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...

    )
  • 1999 Glastonbury Festival (United Kingdom
    United Kingdom
    The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

    )

Albums

  • 1996: Our Little Visionary
    Our Little Visionary
    Our Little Visionary is the debut album by rock trio Dogstar. It was primarily distributed in Japan. It was recorded and mixed at A&M Studios, Hollywood, CA and mastered at Precision Mastering.-Track listing:# "Forgive" - 1:59...

     (Zoo Entertainment)
  • 2000: Happy Ending (Ultimatum Music)

Other

  • 2004: "Shine" on the Mr. Big
    Mr. Big (band)
    Mr. Big is an American rock supergroup, formed in Los Angeles, California in 1988. The band is a quartet composed of Eric Martin , Paul Gilbert , Billy Sheehan , and Pat Torpey ; Mr. Big also included Richie Kotzen, a reputable blues-based guitarist who replaced Gilbert in 1999...

     tribute album
    Tribute album
    A tribute album is a recorded collection of cover versions of songs or instrumental compositions. Its concept may be either various artists making a tribute to a single artist, a single artist making a tribute to various artists, or a single artist making a tribute to another single artist.There...

     Influences & Connections - Volume One: Mr. Big ("Shine" originally appeared on the Mr. Big album Actual Size
    Actual Size
    Actual Size is the sixth album by the hard rock band Mr. Big released in August 2001. It was their second and last studio album to feature guitarist Richie Kotzen. Actual Size would be Mr. Big's final album for 10 years, until What If.....

    )
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