Emma Baum, Staff Writer–
For the members of Doghouse, singing six part harmonies in the men’s bathroom of the Bandersnatch is just another Tuesday night. The band has two new songs to prepare for their show on Saturday night and they’re taking advantage of the room’s acoustics to work out the minor details. Armed with a three-piece horn section, a shared Google Doc song catalog, and genuine friendship, the band is ready to make music, despite the late hour.
“It’s a good distraction,” said John Brown ‘27, a music performance major from Atlanta, Georgia. He plays guitar and sings vocals for the band. “Literally right now, I’m worried about this essay, but I come in here and I’m not really worried about anything except music and what I’m creating at the time.”
Brown has been playing guitar for six years and he is one of the only members of Doghouse with previous experience in a band. A crowd favorite among his bandmates, the original song “John’s Reception” which heavily features Brown in a twist on the Paul McCartney and the Wings song “Reception,” is named after him.
“We made that song and we were like, damn, we’re cooking with this one,” said Andrew McCutchan ‘26 about the process of writing “John’s Reception.” McCutchan, a computer science major from Granville, Ohio, plays tenor saxophone. “And John in that song is just beautiful. He’s an animal of that guitar.”
While the members of the band only knew each other in passing, if at all, before last August, they have become close friends. During practices, they are quick to praise each other’s playing or jump in on a riff someone is mindlessly playing. When Doghouse is all together, silence can turn into a fully instrumented song between one second and the next.
“It was just me and John and Eli, after rehearsal,” said Erica Elefson ‘26, a pre-med biochemistry major and music performance minor from Kansas City, Missouri who plays drums and sings vocals for the band. “Everyone else has gone to do homework and they’re singing in each other’s faces. And I was just sitting like, I’m so glad I’m doing this. Like, when else am I going to be in a band?”
Although they’ve been playing for less than a year, since their first show at Chichella in September, Doghouse has managed to set themselves apart from the rest of the bands that call Denison home. The members of Cat Eat Cat, the newest band on campus, describe themselves as big fans of the group, both personally and musically.
“All the bands have been very welcoming to us but I think Doghouse especially is really trying to get us into the scene,” said Noah Holland ‘27, a PPA and environmental studies double major, and a guitarist and vocalist in Cat Eat Cat. “In terms of sound, I think Doghouse has some of the greatest vocals on campus. You can tell they’re having fun on stage.”
The energy the band brings to their music, whether in the Bandersnatch bathroom or at a weekend frat party, might have something to do with how its members spend the rest of their day. The musicians come from a wide variety of majors, hometowns and class years, and for many of them, the band is the only way they are able to fit music into their daily lives.
“I took my freshman year without music because I did music for such a long time in school, and then decided it would be fun to get back into it,” said Cole Tatro ‘26, a pre-med biology major and chemistry minor from Coshocton, Ohio. Tatro plays trumpet and keyboard in the band. “I feel like my day is so STEM filled and I’m always like writing a lab report. It’s kind of nice to get the creative side a little bit.”
For Will Lang ‘27, an applied mathematics major from Cleveland, Ohio, playing in the band is also an opportunity to try something new. Before joining Doghouse, he had only ever played in concert bands during high school.
“I think it’s very important to be outside your comfort zone and do something you never really thought about going into college,” said Lang, who plays alto saxophone in the band. “It gets you a little bit of exposure, but it’s really just about making memories and trying to hone a skill.”
While Doghouse has developed a substantial repertoire of classics from a variety of genres, they are looking to branch further into original music this semester. The band has nine originals currently, which they hope to record for an album and release on Spotify in the near future. During shows, the band usually sticks to covers of recognizable songs that they know will get the crowd excited, but they have been encouraged to play more originals by the audience response.
“What was so powerful about ‘John’s Reception’ was that we realized, okay, we can bring this kind of funky sounding weird thing and people like that a lot, which was just very interesting to understand,” said Eli Lishack ‘26, an anthropology and music performance double major from Freedom, Pennsylvania.
In addition to playing bass and singing vocals in the band, Lishack is also the original coordinator of Doghouse. Through a series of conversations in the dining hall, on the Eisner stairs, and after various ensemble rehearsals, he invited fellow musicians to play, and the group quickly grew from the core instrumentation of Brown, Elefson, Lishack and Elliot Atcheson ‘25, who is abroad for the semester, to the full fledged band that it is today.
While Doghouse has plans to continue playing for the Denison community, they hope to make their off-campus debut in the coming months. For now, though, they’ll be in whatever practice space they can find, whether it’s a band member’s dorm or a too-small Eisner practice room, doing what they love best: making music. They might even make some memories along the way.