With a progressive and heavy sound that meshes together elements of Hard Rock, Punk, AltRock, Post Punk and beyond, Cincinnati-based foursome Go Go Buffalo made waves in 2015 by bringing its dynamic, somewhat psychedelic music to many different audiences. The band presented its wild-eyed live show to a diverse range of local venues, playing house-party basements, smaller clubs and bigger spots (like Madison Theater and Fountain Square) on bills with Punk bands, Electro Pop outfits, Indie Rock groups and others.
Singer Jeremy Moore, who handles most of the group’s bookings, says the band’s initial plan was to saturate the marketplace.
“In the beginning half of (2015), I took the Eddie Van Halen viewpoint of playing shows — play as much as possible,” he says. “So when booking I’d check the Cincy DIY page on Facebook a lot and cruise around different event pages to see if there were any ‘TBAs.’ ”
“I feel like our sound transcends genres, so it’s suitable for us to play with different-sounding bands,” he continues. “I also wanted to play all the different venues, so when we started to get our foot in the ‘scene,’ it was easier to get to play places like MOTR and the (Northside) Tavern and Madison Theater.” “Don’t forget Chipotle,” says Jeremy’s brother and Go Go Buffalo guitarist, Tyler.
“That was our crowning achievement for the year,” Jeremy jokes, “getting to play a private show at Chipotle.”
Go Go Buffalo’s origins go back to Tyler’s high school days, when he was friends with Jason Drennan and Graham Lang, then a singer and guitarist. The three were a part of an Indie Rock band called Merit Badges, which played around town a bit. Jeremy says the real spark that ignited Go Go Buffalo was the drum set his father bought him before his death in 2011.
“I had never been musically inclined, but I think somewhere in his mind, (my dad) wanted Tyler and myself to do something musically together, as Tyler has been proficient playing the guitar since he was in his teens,” Jeremy says. “After he passed, Tyler started teaching me drums and we went from there.”The first edition of Go Go Buffalo came about in 2014 and was an all-instrumental affair, with Jeremy on drums, Tyler and Drennan on guitars and Jeremy Click on bass.
When Click left, the musicians called Lang, who agreed to play bass. “After that Tyler suggested that I move to the mic,” Jeremy says, “because he thought I had the personality for it and I wrote a lot of poetry over the years.”
The Go Go Buffalo sound was forged from the musicians’ varied influences, something that is showcased on the quartet’s first release, the It Ain’t Worth It EP. Tyler’s playing shows some inspiration from Blues Rock exploders like Led Zeppelin and Jack White, while Drennan (whose father was an original member of local Metal favorites Krankenstein) found his groove via influences like Rush and Metallica. Jeremy says he has always been drawn to the “raw and strange stuff,” listening to artists like Daniel Johnston, Dead Kennedys, Nirvana and Ween while growing up.
For the live show, Cincinnati greats Foxy Shazam had a big impact on the Moore brothers’ approach. “Jeremy and I got to enjoy Foxy Shazam a lot while they were rising through the ranks,” Tyler says. “Their energy was really impressive and left that feeling of ‘these guys get it’ to resonate within ourselves.” “We like to live dangerously on stage, just like real life,” Lang adds.
“This is true,” Jeremy says. “Sometimes Graham will park in front of a fire hydrant. I know I have a couple overdue library books and Jason has run a couple yellow lights in his day. Live dangerous, man.”
The Foxy Shazam influence is coming full circle with Go Go Buffalo’s forthcoming full-length debut. The band enlisted Foxy guitarist Loren Turner to help record the album.“Besides him (and Foxy Shazam) in general being so influential to us, we picked him because he understands how the whole Rock sound can be put together into something a little more cohesive than we had on our EP,” Tyler says, noting that the EP had three different producers for just five songs.
The debut is due in late April, and Jeremy says the band is working on releasing the album with an accompanying “graphic novel/comic book type thing” created by graphic designer Abbey Flory. Beyond the new album, the members are looking forward to taking Go Go Buffalo on the road more in the next year.
“Playing out of town is really rewarding to the band itself,” Lang says. “It allows all the bandmates to get to see other cities together and share some life experiences that one would normally not get to experience not being in a band.”
The musicians are keeping their ambitions fairly simple for now, though, focusing mostly on growing as a band and enjoying their time together as Go Go Buffalo.
“You can never be too sure of your future within a band,” Jeremy says, “no matter how good of friends everyone in the band is, so we keep our goals from being too ‘pie in the sky’ and try to take on the other curveballs as they come along.”
Find music and more information on GO GO BUFFALO at go-go-buffalo.bandcamp.com.
For more on the 2016 CINCINNATI ENTERTAINMENT AWARDS, visit citybeat.com’s CEA page.
This article appears in Jan 13-20, 2016.