The Dials

DIALS: Flex Time
Chicago-based lipstick ruffians the Dials make pretty pop-punk like a soundtrack for smokin' in the girls room: gossipy echoed vocals, polished guitar licks and a flirty Farfisa. Stuttering whispers and pumping drum breaks split up taunting snarls backed by finger-heavy bass lines. Singers Rebecca Crawford and Patti Gran tattle on "Rotten" boys and screech like Kathleen Hanna, quipping, "You'll be sitting pretty in your new shitty city with your new girlfriend," as organist Emily Dennison coyly tickles the keys on the Ramones-inspired "Bye Bye Bye Bye Baby." While the Dials are usually a Dee Dee delight, the boy-toy teasing title track borrows B-52's call-and-response vocals and enough surf-slide guitars to make Gidget giggle. Perhaps the Dials' bubblegum punk is plucked straight from the Go-Go's arsenal, but their fired-up feminenergy keeps this pop sticking to, and rattling, the bedposts.
- LISA DONNELLY
- CMJ

Some bands you're supposed to like. They've got an angle -- something unique in their background or composition that either makes them chic enough to avoid serious scrutiny (were the Strokes really ever that good?) or likable enough to make the listener want to root for their success. We're all familiar with these outfits; they seem to come out of nowhere, revealing their presence through a hip friend who knows everything about the music scene and swears they're the next biggest thing. Then the local press throws accolades in the band's direction, a big-time critic or two jumps on board and, well, you'd be completely ignorant to not reference the band the next time you talk music at the bar. You are, after all, the most devout student of rock 'n' roll in your gang.

The Dials are one such band. They're girls. They're cute. They're sassy. They play punk rock. They write lyrics about guys. They sound like the playful gals in the bar who will indulge you just long enough to tell you to go to hell at the end of the night -- after you've picked up the tab. And worse yet, you'd brag to your friends the next day about being used by such goddesses. Yes, the ladies in the Dials not only look killer in dresses, they also know rock history, borrowing freely from it in their songs. With all this going in their favor, it's little wonder this band is the one you should name-check before anybody else you know does. But do the Dials actually deserve the hype?

Upon first listen, the Dials seem like any other punk-influenced band. They rely on a few chords, repetitive riffing, propulsive drumming, and lots of snarling attitude. You can almost hear the disdainful sneers on their faces. Moreover, their particular brand of punk is most easily categorized as pop-punk, that genus of punk rock that garners quite a bit of vitriol, most of it deserved. After all, many of the pop-punk bands are products of the dreadful, deprived streets of suburbia, and lord knows life is rough there.

However, after repeated listens to Flex Time, the Dials' debut LP, something more substantial emerges than just another band whining about their privileged backgrounds as middle-class Anglo-Americans. In fact, the Dials are too busy rocking to whine at all. And while they might play with a limited musical vocabulary, they know how to make the most of their skills. Songs like "Bye Bye Bye Bye Baby" and "Sick Times" display playful phrasing and catchy harmonies, much like the girl groups of the '60s. Indeed, the label pop-punk is too limiting and convenient, for while the Dials are no doubt influenced by the Ramones, they also evoke the geometric structures of Television, the post-modern sensibilities of new wave, and the aforementioned Spectorian groups. In other words, like the best punk bands, the Dials transcend a very limiting genre by referencing others.

Musically, the Dials rely on the two-guitar attack of Rebecca Crawford and Patti Gran. Rather than just furiously riffing through each song, the two take turns playing rhythm and lead. In "Flex Time", the guitar work is angular and symmetrical, possessing a mathematical beauty that somehow sounds both controlled and frenetic. Such inspiration also appears in "Take It to the Man", but the robotic riffs are juxtaposed with distorted rhythm work. Crawford and Gran aren't virtuosos, but they create substantial damage with their modest arsenal.

But where the Dials really succeed is in attitude, which manifests itself in the lyrics of the songs; many of the songs possess a feminist bent that subverts the traditional male-predator/female-prey relationship. "Rotten", for example, features a simple, sexy refrain of "Rotten boy" repeated over and over while the drums and guitars build to an explosive climax. Sure, this is no Dylan lyric, but Dylan can't sing like a goddess in heat, either. In "Do You Want Me", Crawford warns, "Say what you will / Cause I can tell / What you're all about..." The effect is both scary and alluring, much like the Sirens sending out their seductive wail of demise.

Tragically, drummer Doug Meis (the only male member in the band) lost his life in a car accident this summer. Meis' drumming was the glue of the Dials' sound, simultaneously grounding the often acrobatic guitar work of Gran and Crawford while fueling the songs' explosive structures. The rest of the band has vowed to go on, and they should; the Dials sound like much more than the Next Big Thing. They sound like a band that just might make a contribution to the story of rock 'n' roll. It just so happens they're both chic and likable; most of all, however, they're good.

— 9 November 2005
- Popmatters

CD best tribute Dials can pay to bandmate

January 13, 2006

BY JIM DeROGATIS POP MUSIC CRITIC


There is no more powerful force for healing and catharsis than music. It can help us through the most trying times, including almost unimaginable tragedies.
The Dials have been one of the most promising bands on Chicago's thriving garage-rock scene for about four years now, and after releasing a strong six-song EP in 2004, they were gearing up to issue their first full album for the local Latest Flame label when bandleader Rebecca Crawford received a horrible phone call last July.

Crawford's husband, John Glick, the guitarist for the Returnables, had been killed at an intersection in Skokie, near the Shure microphone headquarters where he worked with his friends Doug Meis, drummer for the Dials and Exo, and Michael Dahlquist, the drummer for Silkworm. The Honda Civic they were driving was rammed by another car driven by a 23-year-old woman police say was trying to commit suicide. The woman lived and is facing criminal charges.

"It was the most tragic day of my life," Crawford said. "I found out about my husband, and I deduced from what was told to me that Doug was also in the car. They hadn't informed his family yet, but basically for 24 hours, while I was in shock, [Dials guitarist] Patti [Gran] and [keyboardist] Emily [Dennison] were trying to figure out what happened to Doug and Michael."

THREE FRIENDS MEMORIAL AND BENEFIT


WITH SILKWORM, EXO, THE DIALS, THE RETURNABLES AND THE NEGLIGENTS


6:30 p.m. Saturday

Metro, 3730 N. Clark

Tickets, $11

(312) 559-1212

The Dials had already finished recording the 13 songs on "Flex Time" with Meis on drums, and it wasn't long before Crawford, Gran and Dennison decided that releasing the disc as planned would be the best tribute they could give their friend and bandmate.

"We were all holding on to each other extremely tightly," Crawford said. "Grief is absolutely horrible, and I think that in desperate times, people hold on tight to what they still have. Playing music is what we do, and these guys are like my family. So we determined to honor Doug and keep going."

Six months later, the Dials are celebrating the release of "Flex Time" as part of a special show at Metro tomorrow night dubbed "The Three Friends Benefit and Memorial," featuring the surviving members of all of the slain musicians' bands.

Standing at the center of such a tragedy, it's inevitable that the Dials are being asked about the incident in most of the interviews they're doing to support the new album. "But we don't want to have that mark on our forehead wherever we go," Crawford said. "We want to be known as a good band."

The Dials aren't just a good band; with "Flex Time," they've become a great one, with insanely energetic and infectious tunes such as "Sick Times," "Phone Time" and "Do You Want Me?" hooking you in from the first time you hear them.

A veteran of the puta-pons, Crawford was looking for likeminded music fans when she linked up with Gran, who had been considering moving back to her native Miami. The two guitarists found an instant chemistry, and their dual lead harmony vocals form one of the band's two most striking signatures.

After initially penning songs on their own, it wasn't long before Crawford and Gran started writing as a team, and the harmonies started coming almost effortlessly. "If Becky's doing something, I just immediately do a lower voice under it, and it seems like when I sing lead, Becky comes up to the mike and those harmonies just naturally come out," Gran said.

The quartet's other musical hallmark became part of the mix shortly before the release of its EP, when Dennison joined on Farfisa organ.

"Originally, after Patti and I found each other through the musicians wanted ads, somebody approached us and said, 'Have you ever thought about a keyboard player?' " Crawford said. "I went, 'Oh, that would be a good idea!' So we all got together, and then once we had a keyboard player, it seemed like a necessity. Then she left to do some other project, but Emily had been a friend for a while, and I didn't even know she played keyboards."

Dennison's only other experience playing in bands had been a two-week stint filling in on guitar for the Returnables, but she had taken piano lessons as a kid. She proved to be a natural on Farfisa, bringing the classic trashy garage-rock organ drone to some of the group's tunes, and adding a compelling percussive counterpoint to others.

"I just kind of played off of the sounds that the band already had going, and some songs you play a lot, and some a little," Dennison said. Added Crawford, "When Emily and Doug joined the band, that's when it felt like the Dials really began."

Though Meis will never be forgotten, the group is now completed by drummer Chad Romanski. The band is planning to support "Flex Time" with shows throughout the Midwest (it will also - Chicago Sun-Times