The American Dollar

www.myspace.com/americandollarband
www.theamericandollar.info

With slow undulations of sonic relief and rich textures that are light as snow, The American Dollar paints a breathtaking aural landscape that is unmistakably their own. Having played together for the past seven years, John Emanuele (drum, keyboard, bass, guitar) and Rich Cupolo (guitar, keyboard, bass, percussion) show their seemingly effortless musical talents through their expressive songwriting. The American Dollar started as a side project for the two friends in 2005, but the discovery of emotional cimenatic works – the kinds that range from ambient electronic passages to orchestral, full band climaxes – transformed this into their full-time passion. Their first finished composition as The American Dollar was “Everyone Gets Shot,” and within a day of posting it around on the Internet, MTV immediately picked it up for its Battlegrounds television program.

Since then, the responses from listeners around the world have been very much the same. Their Last FM and MySpace are frequented by an enthusiastic, international fanbase that appreciates a wide variety of music. Even though their homebase is in Queens, NY, their two previous LPs managed to gain huge popularity at the independent Tokyo record store, Linus Records. Freely reverberating like echoes in a chamber, The American Dollar’s music spares no audible gaps in their instrumental parts, leaving only an immaculate, yet malleable slate of sound. The ambling motion and meandering tone of their music is highly reflective of their songwriting process. “We don’t have a set mathematics to our songwriting,” say Rich and John. “We use melodic phrases and then vary them as the song progresses until we’re in a different place altogether. We write parts until we feel good about them, and then move on to the next.”

“The Slow Wait Pt. 1” opens their new album, A Memory Stream, featuring a lucid and clean piano appearing from the swirling haze of synth pads, creating an astonishing wave of resonance. It picks up with the succeeding second Part, and into a vibrant cascade of drums that let the outgoing organ fade out through the next song. Later on, “Trancendence” opens with a leisurely and distant guitar riff, swept in and out of focus by epic drums and electronic ambiance, only to be taken over by a wall of unforgettable synth. From the nitty-gritty songwriting to the meticulous production, A Memory Stream, is a product of nothing but consistent collaboration and exploratory curiosity; Rich and John are determined to show you the unlimited possibilities of the sonic world. “We both strive for something outside of our usual areas,” says John and Rich. “We like to experiment with new ways of getting genuine sounds with common and uncommon instruments.”