Arthur Dodge is a man of many songs — many songs. So many that one night in 2000, he played 100 of his songs during a single show. Dodge first granted public access to his tunes with a cassette release in 1993. His longtime collaborator, Matt Mozier (ex-Truckstop Love) added impeccable lead guitar to Dodge’s melodies. A more formal album release, Arthur Dodge and the Horsefeathers, followed in 1997. The Horsefeathers consisted of Mozier with Guy Stephens on drums and Brock Ginther (ex-Homestead Grays) on bass. The band had been wowing audiences in and around their home base of Lawrence, Kansas and the album’s regional hit, “True Romance,” solidified Dodge’s status as the town’s resident songwriting genius. Some reviewers lumped the album in with alt-country acts but that did not account for the pop sensibility of Dodge’s writing — as much Alex Chilton as Townes Van Zandt. The next album, Cadillacs, Pony Tails & Dirty Dreams kicked off with “Birmingham,” Dodge’s wry observation about the Nashville singer/songwriter scene, around the edges of which he resided before deciding that the industry could not contain his muse. The arrangements branched out to encompass piano and even tuba, demonstrating the breadth of Dodge’s vision. The departure of Stephens for the grayer pastures of Chicago precipitated a change in the rhythm section with Jeremy Sidener (ex-Zoom) on bass and Ken Pingleton on drums joining the Horsefeathers. This lineup generated Nervous Habit with the Midwest feminist anthem, “The Trouble with a Woman.” It also featured “Stripper in a Cab,” one of several tales inspired by Dodge’s fares from his one-time straight job as a cab driver. For the next album, Room 4, the Horsefeathers added Dave Swenson on piano to provide counterpoint to Mozier’s melodic accents and Dodge’s accomplished rhythm guitar. All of this comes together on “Let My Reach Exceed My Grasp,” as catchy a rocker as Dodge has ever written but the album also features the sentimental, string-laden short story, “Her Sister Played Piano,” establishing again how firmly Dodge grasps all the song forms within his reach. 2006 saw the first Arthur Dodge solo album, The Perfect Face. While various Horsefeathers contributed, the stripped down arrangements highlighted Dodge’s melodic sense and his voice mellowed like fine bourbon. This is on display in the country weeper, “Last Night’s You and Me,” that also marks the recorded debut of Dodge’s duets with Adrianne (Dri) Verhoeven, formerly of Lawrence indie stalwarts, The Anniversary. The two had sung together around Lawrence before this release with near pornographically beautiful harmonic results. This collaboration continues on a nearly finished album of 12 duets recorded in an all-analog studio that Mozier built south of Lawrence. You can also hear Dodge and Dri “Checkout Line,” featured in the online trailer for the film Lovely Still, starring Ellen Burstyn and Martin Landau. Soon, Dodge and the Horsefeathers will repair to Mozier’s studio to begin recording. For the new album, they will draw from a copious batch of first-rate songs that they have battle-tested in live shows. But the existence of so much stellar tunage should come as no surprise because Arthur Dodge is a man of many songs.
