Hellogoodbye at the Raccoon Motel -- March 18.
Tuesday, March 18, 6 p.m.
Raccoon Motel, 315 East Second Street, Davenport IA
Their most recent recording S'only Natural lauded by The Soundboard as a "classy, brandy-sipping funk album" and by It's All Dead as "a romantic blend of current dance beats and crooner swing," the indie-pop talents of Hellogoodbye headline a March 18 concert at Davenport's Raccoon Motel, It's All Dead adding that the group's critically acclaimed release is "soft, restrained, and bursting with energy all at once."
Hellogoodbye started in 2001 as a recording project by Huntington Beach High School students Forrest Kline and Jesse Kurvink. The first Hellogoodbye song ever written was Kurvink's "Bonnie Taylor Shakedown 2K1," which later appeared on their debut self-titled EP. With Kline's interest in web and graphic design, the unofficial group got a working title and a website and posted songs on MP3.com. As interest in the music grew, Kline recruited friends and chanced upon some opening slots at local shows.
In their first two years, Hellogoodbye played local shows in Orange County, California at venues such as the Chain Reaction (Anaheim), The Hub (Fullerton), and Koo's Cafe (Long Beach), made a few trips to play in Arizona, and did one mini-tour through Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas with the band Peachcake. During this time, they also kept busy burning demos, screen printing T-shirts, and promoting via their website before signing to Drive-Thru Records in 2003.
After signing, Hellogoodbye released a self-titled EP in August of 2004 that has sold more than 400,000 copies to date. The band began touring vigorously in support of this release in the United States and abroad, and while participating in the 2005 South by Southwest music festival in Austin, Texas, Hellogoodbye appeared on several episodes of MTV's The Real World: Austin. The cast of the TV series produced a video documentary about three bands on the festival's lineup (the other two were Halifax and Enon), immediately boosting the band's popularity. In November of that year, Hellogoodbye released the DVD OMG HGB DVD ROTFL, which featured two hours of concert and touring footage, as well as music videos to the five songs off their debut EP. Following the release, the group was featured on the third and fourth installments of the Drive-Thru Records DVD series, and in December of 2005, Hellogoodbye won MTV2's Dew Circuit Breakout competition.
Since then, the outfit enjoyed a major smash with 2006's Zombies! Aliens! Vampires! Dinosaurs!, which topped Billboard's U.S. Indie chart and made it to number four on the U.S. Rock chart. Additional hits came with 2010's Would It Kill You? and 2013's Everything Is Debatable, while Hellogoodbye's song “Here (In Your Arms”) was a U.S. platinum-seller that was also a top-five single in Ireland, Scotland, and the United Kingdom.
Hellogoodbye plays their Davenport engagement on March 18, admission to the 6 p.m. concert is $33.06, and more information and tickets are available by visiting TheRaccoonMotel.com.
