Doug Lambert Band
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Doug Lambert Band

Chicago, Illinois, United States

Chicago, Illinois, United States
Band Rock Folk

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Live at Earhole

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Bio

Hey friend.

How can you not like a guy whose first words on his first album are “Hey friend?”

Friend. That’s the word that resonates the most after you give Doug Lambert’s first album, LIVE at earhole, a few listens.

An old friend, a good friend. The kind of guy who tells you the truth; gives it to you straight. No pretensions, no clichés. Fortunately for the rest of us, Doug accompanies all those unadorned truths with a confident voice and stick-in-your-craw melodies that catch up with you when you’re walking down the street, or thinking about why you fell in love in the first place. The lyrics are lived in and heartfelt, and the riffs are earned the old fashioned way: from years of playing.

Doug’s progression from a guy playing around Ball State University to performing in Austin, Texas and around Chicago, begins the way a lot of these stories do: A gift from mom: an electric guitar and a small amp. A 14-year-old kid holed up in his room, playing for hours. Next thing you know, Doug is forming bands with friends. It’s not long before he is penning his own thoughtful lyrics, writing songs and performing them live.

Once he went off to college, Doug hooked up with other like-minded players like Nate Rowe and began collaborating with them, creating and fine-tuning songs like “Tremble” and “Unjustifiable Love.”

After college, Doug had the opportunity to live next door to his 90-year-old grandfather. Here he was able to play music with the old man, hear his stories and write more songs. When Doug’s grandfather passed away, the line between love and loss was clarified.

You’re gonna live forever in my heart…your pain is my pain. You hurt and I feel it. Can’t you see these words have meaning?

When Doug moved to Chicago, the writing continued, and the live performances started up again, as Doug tried out his new compositions at small local venues. In 1996, Doug began collaborating with friend and artist Erik Fagrelius who has been writing and playing bass with Doug since. After getting married in 2005 (to the lovely Cyndi McVicker) a shift in opportunity and overall writing had taken place and songs such as “Wish I Had One More Day” came to be.

I loved you from the start
You loved me from the heart

If Doug has a niche it’s this: He writes from the heart about the things that matter. These songs are about family and friendship and connections. Hope. Living without regrets. Embracing the possibilities. All the important stuff. And, yes, he writes and sings about love. Sweet, glorious, unjustifiable and unconditional love.

It’s no coincidence that a third of the songs have love in the title. Or that they offer sentiments like “Do What You Love” or “Wish I Had One More Day.” Or that the first song is called “Friend.”

So what does he sound like?

Doug Lambert is cast from the classic singer/songwriter mold. He has the ability to tell you a story you can not only feel and relate to, but sing along with and tap your toes to. The funky acoustic picking gives off hints of Dave Mathews or John Mayer; the gonzo drumming of Adam Wiebe may remind you of some long lost Zeppelin acoustic stomper. A little shuffle. A little country. By the end of the album you will be convinced: These guys can rock too. Matt Harting contributed the bass on the LIVE from earhole album and now performing live is upright bass artist Erik Fagrelius. Erik has been collaborating with Doug for over a decade and the next album in the works will embrace his contagious positive energy and full boom-room filling sound. The open approach to writing is what makes the DLB a welcoming yet familiar sound to stop by and visit from time to time.
And then there’s that voice. Confident, authentic, versatile. It veers from the weary and reflective narrator of “Found,” to the insistent pleas of “Do What You Love.”

You can hear Chicago in the songs. Straight forward, Midwestern values, honest lyrics delivered in that sturdy, confident voice. There might be a few detours to Nashville and Seattle along the way, but these tunes always come back home. Think of it as Midwestern soul. If you like the songs of John Prine, but wish he had the heft and urgency of an Eddie Vedder, that’s kind of Doug.

Love, simple but true.
It’s all the same until it happens to you.

Simple and true…that’s Doug, and his first album: An old friend sitting in your living room, better yet around a campfire, or your favorite club, strumming a guitar, wrapping simple truths around assured melodies. The kind that pop into your head three days later and you find yourself walking down the street singing along to them.

Today, Doug has the good fortune of collaborating with the fine folks at earhole studios in Chicago, who captured this album in a single night of playing and singing.

Midway through the album, on “Do What You Love,” a song about missed opportunities and not taking risks, Doug asks over and over:

What makes you happy? What mak