Crack LA hard rock outfit DOROTHY kicked off their 23-date U.S. tour Wednesday night at Brooklyn Bowl Nashville. Arriving hot on the heels of their latest single “TOMBSTONE TOWN” (featuring none other than Slash taking the guitar solo), Dorothy Martin and her current band of drummer Jake Hayden, guitarist Sam Bam Koltun, and bassist Eliot Lorango, blazed through a 70-minute set to an enthusiastic crowd.
Regarding their 2014 debut — a self-titled EP — Martin quipped to Rolling Stone, “Basically, we want to make songs that we think Beavis and Butthead would like.” Eleven years later, DOROTHY remains true to form, and the ne’er-do-well headbangers from MTV would still be giving them the coveted, “That ROCKS!” approval.
“TOMBSTONE TOWN” is the fourth single off The Way (Roc Nation), released on March 14, 2025. The Slash appearance follows Martin’s vocal contribution on “Key to the Highway” off of the Guns N’ Roses guitarist’s solo project Orgy of the Damned. On The Way, DOROTHY remains loyal to the musical heritage of powerhouse vocals over kick-ass riffs. It’s refreshing to see women continuing to lead the charge in a genre once dominated by men.
But the cool thing about hard rock vocalists like Martin and contemporaries like Lzzy Hale isn’t that they’re leaning into girrrl pwr. Instead, they rock just as hard as the boys do. Give them a mic and they’ll slay you. It’s the same “don’t fuck with me” ethos possessed by her forebears, regardless of gender.
Or, as Martin once told LA Weekly, “I don’t care if you think I’m hot or not, or want me to take my shirt off. I’m not going to. I’m going to grab the microphone and sing. That’s what I came to do.”
All told, if you need a dose of in-your-face, riff-laden hard rock with killer vocals, DOROTHY is the ticket.
