By Andrew Drever
The wunderkind D'Addario brothers – Brian, 19 and Michael, 17 – played nearly all of the instruments on their debut album Do Hollywood, a technicolour riot of pop, doo-wop, glam, alt-country, Broadway showtune and rock styles.
The brothers, aka Lemon Twigs, have now assembled a live band to replicate the album's multi-layered studio complexity. They tried to resist micro-managing their new band members, bass player Megan Zeankowski and keyboardist Danny Ayala.
Lemon Twigs, brothers Brian and Michael D'Addario, have a flamboyant fashion sense.Credit: Secret Service
"Megan has pretty much played most of the parts as I wrote them … really accurately," says Michael D'Addario. "That's to her credit. If I played them every night, I'd probably lose interest at some point and mess around a whole lot. And Danny, every once in a while he'll add something new. Me and Michael will either say 'we like that, you should definitely keep doing that', or 'that didn't work so well, you should stop doing that'. He [Ayala]is willing to listen, but also doesn't feel scared to try new things out."
The eccentric Do Hollywood sounds like 50 years of FM-radio, oddball pop has been shoehorned into their music. The siblings' flamboyant fashion sense (Brian favouring '70s op-shop cool and Michael's Ziggy-era Bowie mullet hair and makeup), means they've attracted the "retro" tag, but they aren't imitators.
Growing up in Hicksville, Long Island, New York, their musician/songwriter father (Ronnie D'Addario) raised the brothers on Beach Boys, Beatles and Kinks records. Recording equipment and instruments were common around the home and the brothers took up playing various instruments. They were also child actors, both appearing in Broadway shows, film and TV, Michael landing film roles alongside Ethan Hawke in Sinister and Chris Pine in People Like Us.
Do Hollywood was recorded at Foxygen's Jonathan Rado's home studio in Los Angeles. Across the album, the brothers swap instruments and alternate lead writing and singing.
There are unpredictable arrangements and tempo changes, unexpected switches from simply strummed acoustic guitars to carousel carnival breaks, or from doo-wop vocal drops to marching band stomps.
"I would never have dreamed our album would be on people's radar," Michael says. "I knew we were making a pop record and people could get behind it, but I just didn't think we'd have that opportunity. I'm really happy and grateful for it."
Lemon Twigs have proved difficult to pigeonhole and Michael says musicals could influence their next album. "We grew up around a lot of musicals and did a lot of acting, but we're in no way connoisseurs of musical theatre. We were more always into rock".
Later this year Lemon Twigs will release an EP of leftover songs from the Do Hollywood sessions, recorded at their home studio. More intriguingly, they hope to undertake a mysterious Beatles covers project with their mother, Susan Hall.
"It's reworking Beatles tracks … turning their ballads into upbeat, disco-ey, kind of '70s songs," Michael says. "We're doing a lot of the background vocals. It's just a fun project for us, but we have to find the time to do it."
Lemon Twigs play Splendour in the Grass in Byron Bay on July 21; Oxford Arts Factory, Sydney, on July 22; and Curtin Bandroom, Melbourne, on July 25.