Gold Motel publicity still. Photographer: Craig Seymour. Summer 2012.
In late 2009 I began playing guitar in Gold Motel, a Chicago based pop outfit. Gold Motel's first show was a sold-out gig at The Beach Kitchen in Chicago, IL. The band quickly began touring and recording. Our first album, Summer House, in June of 2010.
Upon the release of Summer House, SPIN Magazine dubed Gold Motel a “hot new band,” and NYLON Magazine describing their music as “[songs] begging to be blasted out of your car’s rolled-down windows.”
We quickly followed up Summer House with the Talking Fiction 7” in November 2010, which continued to establish the distinct sun-drenched sound.
We quickly followed up Summer House with the Talking Fiction 7” in November 2010, which continued to establish the distinct sun-drenched sound.
A handful of compositions that I wrote while in Gold Motel eventually made their way into commercials, TV shows, and films, including the single, "Safe In LA," which went on to be featured in a McDonald's commerical in 2013.
The decidedly West Coast outlook of Summer House and Talking Fiction took Gold Motel on both national and international tours through 2011, playing alongside acts such as fun., Kate Nash, Hellogoodbye, OK Go, Butch Walker, Cold War Kids, They Might Be Giants and more. 2011 also found GOLD MOTEL making debuts at festivals such as Lollapalooza and SXSW. While the band continued to tour and perform through the end of the year, their music was featured on various television shows and commercials. In addition, Gold Motel was featured on a variety of tastemaker radio stations such as KEXP and WXPN, and earned raves from the likes of Nylon, LA Times, SPIN, The New York Post, Alternative Press, Billboard, Refinery29, and Paste among others.
After two years of touring and supporting Summer House, Gold Motel began pre-production for our new album in Los Angeles, CA, splitting time between rehearsals in a house up in the hills of Laurel Canyon and a pool-house in Glendale. Those early pre-production sessions led to the initial material that would make up their self-titled sophomore album, Gold Motel. The band continued pre-production back in Chicago and began preliminary recording in September of 2011 in guitarist Dan Duzsynski’s home-studio, DandySounds Studios. Like Summer House and Talking Fiction, Gold Motel was self-produced by the band.
Leading up to the release of Gold Motel's sophomore album, I edited together hours worth of "found footage" into a promotional "album teaser." The concept was to publicize the release of an album the same way a "teaser trailer" is used to publicize the release of a film. By employing graphical editing to hours worth of public domain footage rooted in futurism, I combined sight and sound to create an aesthetically based representation of the album. The "teaser" videos went on to garnish national attention from publications such as Alternative Press, as well as circulate through various blogs and fan-sourced media.
