A local band from Buffalo, New York that goes by the name of Dollar Diplomacy is making quite a name for themselves.
Dollar Diplomacy is Brad Martynowicz (lead vocals), Tyler Wright (lead guitar, rhythm guitar), John Harrington (percussions) and their newest member, Zenon Maciejewski (bass and back up vocals).
Dollar Diplomacy self-describes itself as a heavy-blues rock band with vocalist Martynowicz adding that they are “very jamming”. Their biggest influence is the immortal powerhouse band, Led Zeppelin.
The band’s first time performing was in 2011 when theyopened up for Davy Zee And The Renegades in Ellicottville, New York for Oktoberfest. The band had a different identity at the time, playing under the name Cut Short with a different bassist. The post-concert rush ended however and a few months later, Cut Short broke up. Wright and Harrington tried forming a new band and had multiple different members but nothing was working until they asked Martynowicz to help form a band. They had a solid line up for a year with all the remaining original members of Cut Short until the band changed the name to Dollar Diplomacy. Maciejewski later joined the band after their original bassist left the band a few months later.
The band’s unique name actually came from a history lecture when Harrington was sitting in class and his professor mentioned President William Taft’s “Dollar Diplomacy” and the name stuck ever since.
When asked how the band works for song writing and composing, the band described that they start with a rough draft of an idea and keep revising the idea over and over until they are kind of content with the end product, figuring out ways to make new songs work for them rather than them working for the new songs. Collectively, the entire band collaborates on a new works, however, the band is in consensus that Wright and Harrington are the main songwriters. As a band they compose and write lyrics together but they all agreed Wright and Harrington are the main songwriters.
Wright explained how at their last practice they wrote a song that they were definitely eager to perform. Wright said that he had a riff that he has been excited to play, at practice he said he just started the new riff and rest of the band joined in and, spontaneously, they formed a new song. Martynowicz added that he recorded the song on his phone and he started writing corresponding lyrics for it. Afterwards, they performed it as a band to see what works and what doesn’t.
The band finds it boring to play the same old songs over and over again and they often eventually reach a point where change is needed. At this point, they re-enter the song writing process.
The band was set to record an album last December. They have yet to be signed to a record label but they have been putting songs on their Facebook page and have been going to local Hot Topic’s and giving out demo CDs. There is currently no set release date on the album but their album will be available both on CDs and on ITunes.
Dollar Diplomacy performed with, Reloaded at Niagara Falls Hard Rock Café on January 10th.
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