Dan King & Friends

KBMG are an energetic, thought provoking, Folk Rock Band.  The musicians in KBMG have recorded and performed with some of the most successful (critical and chart topping), names in Pop, Rock, Folk, and Country music, including Paul McCartney, Fairport Convention, Simon and Garfunkel, George Harrison, Roseanne Cash, Jethro Tull, Billy Joel, Elton John, Richard Thompson, Jimmy Page, Nick Drake, and many more. With Dan King writing the songs, KBMG create a musical soundscape that can scream and purr with a full dynamic range of song, rhythm, and lyric, soft moments and energetic highs, all wrapped in the rustic folk rock tradition. 

KBMG are 

Dan King - Vocals and Acoustic Guitar 

David Brown - Steel Guitar and Backing Vocals 

Dave Mattacks - Drums 

Wolf Ginandes - Bass and Backing Vocals

  David Brown's work in the studio and on tour with Billy Joel starting with the 1978's 52nd Street to 1989's Storm Front   brought him round the globe many times over, a wall of gold and platinum and the experience of being in the top Billboard recording group for the 80s decade, as well as being a favorite call for Producer Phil Ramone which led to performing with Simon and Garfunkel for The Concert in Central Park, along with many other credits.  In KBMG he plays lots of Slide Guitar on electric and resonator matched along with  his pure finger picking style and strong rhythm hand, bringing him back to his roots in the folk and country blues tradition. 

  Dave Mattacks has a discography that reads like a who's who of folk, rock and pop. DM continues to enjoy accolades with folk rock innovators and icons Fairport Convention.   Fairport's Liege and Lief  has been voted greatest folk rock album ever and sold out it's 50th Anniversary Cropredy Festival in 2017 with DM headlining Friday and Saturday night with Richard Thompson and the Fairport family.  DM will be headlining again for the anniversary of Full House  this summer of 2021.  He's one of the most recorded folk rock drummers or maybe he is the most recorded but who's counting!  When you've had Paul McCartney, George Harrison,  Jimmy Page, and Elton John calling you're in good company.  We're just glad to have him in the band as his cheerful knowledgeable self.  

  Bassist Wolf Ginandes comes with a deep knowledge of blues and soul music plus an extensive 78 record collection.   Ginandes is also an expert guitar and bass maker/ restorer with over 30 years experience with the Musical Instruments service center at Berklee College of Music in Boston.  We love to check out what vintage classic instrument he happens to bring on each gig!  The favorite choice on bass for many in New England his other current gigs are with the Mohegan Sun All-Stars and The Joe Cocker Band featuring former members and lead singer Elliot Tuffin. 

  The KBMG chemistry works as personified in their releases It's a Beautiful World, Blue Sky Sundown, Western Color, Light City Live, Live at Chianti, and the new Dan King and Friends project. Their recordings and live experiences have grown into a relationship that DM describes as "not just four great musicians playing together but a real band with a strong and moving sound."    Wolf Ginandes likes to describe the group as "folk rock with a Jazz attitude" expressing the freedom inherent in the improvisational side of the music. KBMG, with the chemistry of working 20 years together, can also be simply described as great music. 

Dan King is a songwriter and performer born in Gloucester, Massachusetts.   Gloucester is a fishing city on the rocky shoreline north of Boston called Cape Ann also famous as an inspirational destination for poets, artists, sailors, and musicians.  

His first memories of music were his fathers Chet Atkins and Glen Campbell records recording in the far away land of Nashville. 

Famous original Berklee College of Music  Professor and Jazz Trumpet player Herb Pomeroy encouraged Dan to take music more seriously after hearing Dan play bass and guitar during a high school jazz assembly telling him "you've got something special so don't learn too much".

  Dan performed around Cambridge and Western Massachusetts while attending Harvard University and Umass Amherst.   Traveling cross country, it was in San Francisco, CA where Dan got his first songwriter Showcase and held his own weekly acoustic pub shows in the Lower Haight district.   

    Forming The Prolz in the mid 90s, featuring Nelson Bragg ( Brian Wilson, Beach Boys) filling the drum seat with Vincent Briguglio on bass, the direction turned much more experimental and psychadelic with all the latest production tools at their disposal including early versions of Pro Tools. Guitarist Mark Pelosi and drummer Dom Lentini guested as they  worked with Cove Studio owner Doug Brown and engineer Dave Henshaw.    

 The Prolz added guitarist Brian DeFort and drummer Pete Koeplin and for the next two years and played many shows locally, both electric and acoustic, hosting an open jam every Monday at favorite local pub the Rhumb line.  Highlights included the Nemo music conference where the Prolz played at Mama Kin Music Club in Boston the same night as the owners Aerosmith for the hottest ticket in town.  The single Fell in the Pocket got radio play from Maine to DC but most importantly on Dan's favorite radio station Boston's WBCN.  

  A second Prolz record was Recorded at Breakwater Estate Studio by David Brown  and Produced by Grammy nominee and award winner Tom Hambridge ( Buddy Guy, Susan Tedeschi, Keith Richards, Mick Jagger) in late 96' and finished in 97'. Titled Instinct it was the finest recording project to date with exceptionally produced gems like Beatles in my Room, Whistle Bye, and the title track Instinct recorded on Twin 24 track 2 inch tape machines through a Neve Console and Sony Nashville automated Sound Board all within an impressive estate with tennis court and private beach.  

  The next project would be even more focused on Dan's acoustic roots and turned into his first Solo effort.   Time Move Over was recorded mostly in the summer of 98' at Room 9 From Outer Space in South Boston by Ducky Carlisle with Tom Hambridge  producing again.  It was finished in late 99'. The recordings featured many friends Dan had met and worked with over the years, Nate Richardson (John Brown's Body), Tom West (Peter Wolf),  Mike Tucker (Arturo Sandoval), Ben Zecker (Soundtrack Production), Benny Benson (Los Sugar Kings), Dan Graziani ( The Adicts), with Hambridge on backing vocals and Prolz era veterans Kopelin,  Pelosi,  and Briguglio making appearances.  

  The songs were performed live with L.A musicians Graziani, Doug Forsdick, Bret McConnell, Joe Mora, as Dan King and the Mac.   Grapeshot Records picked up Time Move Over in 2000 and released it nationally in March of 2001. King appeared in New York City and Los Angeles ( the indie music awards at the famous Biltmore Hotel where the Oscars were first held) to support the record.   Another fond memory from a different time was seeing the  CD on the shelves at Tower Records Hollywood, a long way and many bands  later from where it all started.   Boston Radio played "Never Once" on the WXRV the River which became the local home for the burgeoning alt country scene.

  During and after the push for Time Move Over  Dan turned to producing and performing with NYC based artist Luke Temple, playing bass guitar in the live band.    They made a couple dozen demos and self released a few EPs before Luke got signed to Mill Pond Records on the west coast.   They played lot's of great NYC clubs around the upcoming Williamsburg Brooklyn scene including  Arlene's Grocery and the Knitting Factory.   The trips and gigs in New York City were a much needed diversion into indie rock production and influenced Dan's next album Two Kinds Of Mind.   Recorded by indie stalwart Tony Goddess (Papas Fritas, Guster) starting in spring 2001 and released spring 2003 it was the first to feature all of KBMG and friend Russ Lawton(Trey Anastasio).   Two Kinds of Mind got  radio support for "After the Round".  

 Around this time Dan started rehearsing with Whoopi Goldberg for a NBC special through friend Jamie Kehoe and they put on shows at his waterfront club Captain Carlos.    Whoopi, David Brown, Michael Troy, and Craig Tramack, played a few shows over the years before Whoopi went full time on The View.  Highlights include jamming onstage doing Stones and Beatles tunes with Robin Williams and Goldberg for Whoopi's 50th birthday at New York's Cutting Room in 2005.   Another fond memory  being  at Cornell U. in upstate New York at the famous  Barton Hall  field house where the Grateful Dead's Cornell 77 was recorded.   Dan remembers sound checking that day while he listened to that famous room's reverberation coming back at him.  Lastly, a big memory was when Whoopi brought Dan backstage to Keith Richard's dressing Room at Boston's Fenway Park where he met Keith, Ron Wood, Bobby Keys, Blondie Chaplin, who were  many of Dan's childhood musical heroes.   

 Solo Recording projects included drummer James Cohen( Ryan Montbleau) and old friend Burke Sampson (Caleb Stine and the Brakemen) which were done in Boston with Dave Minehan (The Neighborhoods, The Replacements ) at Wooly Mammoth studio, and with Andrew Mazzone at High n Dry studio (Mark Sandman, Morphine) in Cambridge, featuring Lawton, Ginandes, and Dana Colley on saxophone (Morphine).  More recent Solo efforts outside KBMG with Lawton on Drums include In the Sun and Bathed in Dream Light featuring Sampson and Tucker on Sax.  In 2018 Dan recorded his first Solo acoustic collection You're Not Alone featuring KBMG live favorite Closing Time Dear.

 Dan also co-wrote and performed in the original performance art piece "Big Top Road" with co-creators artist Jon Sarkin and director Ian McColl (Gloucester Stage, Blackburn Performing Arts).  Dan continues to perform with Sarkin for his show The Unchained Brain recently featured at Worcester Art Museum and Boston's HUB fest sponsored by Boston Globe, MIT, and Harvard.  Sarkin has provided the artwork for a few releases.  

Other successes were achieved with The Bandit Kings (Renee Dupuis, AnnMarie Clark, Joe Cardoza, Dennis Monagle) as a writer, producer, and performer which put Dan's songs on  Sirius XM with Meg Griffin's special Having Words with Meg and in rotation,  plus a couple fabulous trips for gigs in LA at the famous Mint and Molly Malones.  

  Always keeping busy Dan plays bass locally in the strictly fun Reggae outfit Glostafarians and the 80's retro band Safety 80s.   2019's big personal highlight  was being invited onstage to help sing Meet on the Ledge and conclude Fairport Conventions Cropredy Festival in Oxfordshire, England in front of over 20,000 with many thanks to DM and Caron for making that happen.   

  Concluding, it is certainly  KBMG that has been the main focus for Dan's original material,  see above, but forever thankful to all the other projects that help influence, give respite,  fun diversion, and all in all help the art move forward.