Don’t dodge the gig by this band of brothers

Film writer and broadcaster Mark Kermode’s roots band is coming to Southsea

Mark Kermode is perhaps the best-known authority on film in the UK since Barry Norman. His regular radio shows, podcasts, columns and TV shows have him a familiar figure to cinephiles.

However, he also has another great passion – old-time music. And since the mid-90s he has also been playing music with Mike Hammond, which eventually morphed into The Dodge Brothers, a vehicle for their ‘foot-stomping hybrid of blues, rockabilly, jug-band and skiffle.’

Now settled on the lineup of Mike (lead guitar, lead vocals, banjo), Mark (bass, harmonica, vocals), Aly Hirji (rhythm guitar, mandolin, vocals) and Alex Hammond (washboard, snare drum, percussion) they are returning to the city to play at The Wedge. It is not, though, part of a tour.

Mark, who lives in The New Forest, says: ‘Just playing a couple of gigs here and there is pretty much what we've done for years now!

‘We've been going 20-something years and we don't ever really tour, we just carry on gigging. The last gig we played was in Tromsø up in the Arctic Circle – we were accompanying a silent film in the Tromsø International Film Festival. We played City Girl up there, and the gig before that was in London, then before that was New Milton. That's basically how it works for us – we play as and when.’

It’s an approach they’ve carried over into their album release schedule – their fourth and most recent album Drive Train came out in 2023.

‘We've never done anything in a hurry! I think there was five years between (second album) Louisa and the Devil, and then (album three) The Sun Set as well.

‘We do everything at our own pace, so it's been three albums across two decades – there's probably another one due at some point,’ he chuckles. ‘We've probably got another album's worth of material, but it's getting to a point where we feel that we've got the songs and we're ready to go into the studio.

‘The way that this works, is that we do it because we love doing it, so we're not under any pressure to do anything – as is evident by the fact I hadn't even realised it was five years! I still introduce songs off Drive Train as something off the new album...’

Playing without the attendant pressures of the business has allowed the four-piece to focus on the music.

‘Mike's American – he's from Alabama via California and when we first started The Dodge Brothers, I think he was in a glam band or something, but he was never really into that, he was interested in was old Americana. We met and we started discussing songs that we liked and we realised we liked the same kind of songs.’

Aly joined and eventually Alex was added on drums. ‘Alex is Mike’s son – I first met him when he was just a kid but he grew up to become a drummer... The band has happened so slowly that we literally grew a drummer from scratch.

‘All of that time, the appeal of the music has been pretty much the same – there's a strong, solid following for it, particularly live.

‘It's old music that anyone can listen to – it's very infectious.’

They play The Wedgewood Rooms on May 21. Tickets £15. Go to wedgewood-rooms.co.uk.