ReverbNation provides over 2.75 million music industry professionals — artists, managers, labels, venues, festivals/events — with powerful, easy-to-use technology to promote and prosper online. ReverbNation offers a wide array of high quality opportunities for artists in the form of licensing deals, lucrative brand sponsorship programs, and high-profile concert bookings. ReverbNation operates worldwide with customers on every continent. Over 30 million visitors come to ReverbNation.com every month.

Recently the Editors at Bozeman Magazine were contacted by the ReverbNation Live Group about Bozeman Magazine being rated highly among area Musicians as a good place to recieve a review of their music. Bozeman Magazine has been asked to choose one ReverbNation artist per month from March through May, and to incorporate them as a featured artist with a bio and interview. With over 3,900 musicians applying in the first three weeks, March’s pick for Bozeman Magazine / ReverbNation artist of the month comes from Missoula…

THE SUBMISSION INSTRUCTIONS:
Bozeman Magazine is looking for one ReverbNation artist per month from March through May to incorporate as a feature story and interview. Features will run one to two pages each. Artists must be based in or around, or have future tour dates in Bozeman.

THE SELECTION CRITERIA:
Talent, Musicianship, Song production value

DESIRED GENRE(S): All

As a young band playing old music, Three-Eared Dog is on a mission is to ensure that the power of the music they grew up listening to survives and flourishes into the next generation. They believe that this is best accomplished not by note-for-note covers, but by capturing the spirit of the golden age of live music and distilling it into an all-night blend of tasteful originals and standards, liberally flavored with three-part harmonies, rocking guitar solos, and a rhythm section that keeps the good people dancing until closing time.

The band is made up of Aaron “Trickshot” Johnson on drums, Jordan “Junior” Smith on bass guitar, and Sam Ore on electric guitar. Johnson earned his nick-name in a dice game in his native Butte, Montana and cut his teeth playing blues and punk while still a teenager. He pursued a professional music career in Portland before moving back to Missoula to join Three-Eared Dog. He brings an arsenal of producing and songwriting chops, coupled with his obvious drumming talents. His songs lend themselves towards Muddy Waters style blues grooves and he often throws out Latin and Hip Hop influenced flavors into his beats. Trickshot is also the style guru in the band, and the main reason that Three-Eared Dog always looks so damned fly.

Born with “a million dollar voice”, Jordan Smith has been singing since he was a very young child, and switched from guitar to bass for Three-Eared Dog. An accomplished songwriter, Jordan brings a strong R&B influence to the band, and some seriously funky dance moves to the stage. At only 22, Jordan’s musical career is just beginning, but his poise and maturity as a performer ensure that he’ll be on stage where he belongs for years to come.

Sam Ore has put in thousands of stage hours as a sideman for numerous Montana bands, with genre’s ranging from funk, to heavy-metal, to folk, to honky-tonk country. With unique guitar playing style reminiscent of Stevie Ray Vaughn and a gritty, bluesy voice, Sam takes care of the business end of things; coordinating shows, recording time, and cutting off the band’s drinks when necessary. He’s also been known to write a song or two.

Three Eared Dog considers themselves to be upholding the tradition of ‘The Montana Circuit’, where bands play a different town or city every weekend. They look at this as crucial to building a fan base and making new connections for expanding their territory. While on the road they find themselves turning heads and people taking notice of their chops and composure.

When asked about their proclaimed genre of the Blues, they told me that the Blues is pretty much all Rock and Roll.

“The Rolling Stones are an English Blues Band, and so you can pretty much get away with going from that all the way into contemporary R&B and it is still the Blues.”

The band realizes that most people their age would rather turn some knobs on a computer and say they are a DJ than pick up a traditional instrument and put in the time to learn how to play it. When asked about it, they all also agreed that the internet can be a two edged sword for musicians these days. There are a lot of ways to promote yourself online, and share your music with a vast audience, sell goods or even become famous like Justin Beiber. They also realize the internet can keep people occupied and away from the bar scene. People used to go to the bar to find a date, now days they can stay home and find a date at match.com.

Please do yourself a favor and go to hear Three Eared Dog, Bozeman Magazine’s ReverbNation artist of March at Stacey’s Old Faithful Saloon in Gateway on Friday April 26 and Saturday April 27.