Bio

(From left to right.  Dustin Kaufman – drums / Greg Hornby – lead guitar / Jared Saltiel – guitar, keyboard and vocals / Dave Koenig – bass)

Catchy melodies meet rapturous lead guitar, country twang and jazz sensibilities in this New York-based quartet. Though rooted in the singer-songwriter tradition, the Dirty Birds are essentially a rock band in the 1960s mold of experimentation, growth and musical freedom—the result is an occasionally retro sound, colored by modern pop and indie-rock. Forever pigeonhole-phobic, the Dirty Birds will peck away at anything until they make it their own, incorporating elements of Brit-pop, soul, folk & country, psychedelia and Brazilian music into their sound.

The band’s self-released debut album, How the Cause Became the Cure, was recorded in Ann Arbor, Michigan and Madison, Wisconsin in the summer of 2009. Produced and arranged by the Dirty Birds, in collaboration with recording engineer Tomek Miernowski, the album is a fully orchestrated production, brought to life with strings, woodwinds, and horns. To celebrate the one-year anniversary of its release, the album is now available for free download at dirtydirtybirds.bandcamp.com.

How the Cause Became the Cure meanders between toe-tapping, high-energy tunes and melodic, crooning orchestral numbers…However strictly midwestern The Dirty Birds’ beginnings may be, their music molds together all sorts of genres — including jazz, pop, folk and rock — into a wonderfully rich sound, deeply layered but simultaneously subtle…the band lures listeners into a state of anticipation and flips the switch at the optimal moment to release a great deal of musical tension…The album not only flourishes in production quality, but also in lyrical and musical terms — by blending so many genres, the album becomes virtually genre-less.

—The Michigan Daily

Orchestral, cinematic, all those grand adjectives apply…

—Jeff Milo, Deep Cutz

The Dirty Birds “have concocted an album…that manages to stay simple enough to digest and enjoy on a surface level. But it’s really served best if you let your ears and your mind delve deeper.

—Greg Brown, G’s Albums