ABOUT
Every musician winds up being the sum of their influences, but the truly great ones find distinctive ways to filter and adapt what they’ve absorbed from their heroes and peers alike into an original soundtrack all their own. Such is the case for Doug Albregts, the one-man band known as Little Falls Trophy.
Like many musicians before him, Albregts looked to The Beatles for guidance, but he found his own path for building upon The Fab Four’s impeccable songwriting template. “They were a trigger point for me because I was not a seasoned songwriter at the time,” Albregts observes. “I was taking notes while watching them as kids, and what struck me was their natural instincts. They took relatively simple things and were able to make them so unique, yet they also remained so complex in their own way.”
Those insightful observations also describe Little Falls Trophy’s second album, Dutch Motel, to a T.
Dutch Motel is set for digital release on July 21, 2023 from Rock Ridge Music, with a limited edition 180-gram vinyl pressing available exclusively on the Little Falls Trophy website and at upcoming shows.
Produced by Albregts, Dutch Motel was recorded and edited at Hapgood Studios in Mountain Lakes, New Jersey. It was mixed by noted engineer Josh Tyrrell (Mark Ronson, The Who, Eric Clapton, Van Morrison, Christine McVie, James Morrison, Mark Knopfler) at Supervox Studios in London, and mastered by Joe Lambert at JLM (Joe Lambert Mastering) in Cortlandt Manor, New York. All guitars and lead vocals are by Albregts, while all the drumming comes courtesy of Aaron Shafer-Haiss in Nashville, with the exception being the drums on “Autumn Audio,” which were played and recorded by Dan Konopka of OK Go in Los Angeles. The first single, “Thursday’s Friday,” is set for release on March 10, 2023, with “Autumn Audio,” the second single, to follow on May 5, 2023.
From the high anxiety of being wrapped up in an endless loop of doomscrolling and day drinking that is “Thursday’s Friday,” to the modern upbeat club lilt meshed with feel-good ’80s vibes in “Project 6636,” to the plaintive widescreen jangle of “Universal,” to the sneering disdain of mutual disrespect in “Irreverent” (replete with a cool fade out at the song’s end to match the dissipation of conflict), to the Replacements-esque lurch of album closer “Janie and Jimmy,” Dutch Motel checks in as the fertile brainchild of a singer/songwriter/guitarist whose artistic maturation is coming to full fruition at the exact right time.
While the band name Little Falls Trophy is a direct homage to a well-loved, family-owned trophy shop located in Albregts’ home state of New Jersey, it’s also meant to encompass the evocative broad-stroke ruminations of a 21st century American songwriter wholly in touch with the life-pulse of the cultural here and now. “Yeah, I’d say the name refers to Anywheretown, USA,” admits Albregts. “At first I was only using it as a placeholder, but the more I lived with it, it just seemed to fit perfectly.”
Albregts traveled quite a long developmental road to get to where Little Falls Trophy is today. “I didn’t think I was much of a songwriter at first, to be honest,” he reveals. “I didn’t feel I had the ability to do it all by myself, but then everything came together. I started out as a bass player in my college band, and I’ve only been playing guitar seriously for the past 10 or 15 years. Everyone I’ve played with since the late-1980s on into the early-2000s scene had a big influence on what I’m doing now, and that’s where a lot of these songs are coming from. I always thought I had great ideas, and I finally had a songwriting breakthrough during Covid when I began writing about all the angst around us and the world we had become. Once that happened, all these new creative avenues opened up for me.”
Albregts is very methodical about how his songs come together. “The riff comes first, and then I have to get all the layers of the music done before I even think of the melody and the lyrics,” he explains. “Then the melody line comes, and the lyrics are typically last. I usually have an idea for what I want a song to be about before I get to that lyric-writing stage. But in terms of just the pure music itself, I don’t know what the song is about until I get to that point.”
A perfect example of Albregts’ songwriting M.O. in action occurs in the aforementioned “Autumn Audio,” a tender track that looks at the inevitable transitions that occur with the changing of the seasons. “I was reflecting upon a personal trauma,” he explains. “It happened in the fall when the leaves were dying, and we were also fighting an insurance company about money. The lines in the song that go, ‘We’re running to take a stand / For the rights of every man,’ turned out to be our mantra. It’s a really emotional song.”
Meanwhile, “My Little Sunshine” is a poppy, peppy Dutch Motel track that has an admittedly timeless feel to it. “It’s almost like I’ve heard that song before,” Albregts says with a chuckle. “When I came up with that opening riff, I felt it was the right fit for a little back-and-forth love-thing groove, the kind of jam you have with somebody else in your life. It’s something you can have with your spouse, your dog, or your best friend.
“My Little Sunshine” also benefits from Christy Lynn’s glowing backing vocals. “I felt like the song had to have female vocals on it,” details Albregts, “and what Christy also did at the end of it was really awesome. I love the hook that’s in there, and how it kind of builds toward the end where my simple little guitar parts bring it back full circle. It was a quickly written song, but I spent probably two months trying to nail that lead vocal because it never really fit the vibe until I finally got it right.”
Albregts is happy to pursue the mysteries of the songwriting muse, and he’s along for wherever the ride takes him. “This is something I always wanted to do, but I don’t know where it all comes from — I really don’t,” he concedes, “and it’s still coming. I’ve already been working on at least three more songs, because I can’t stop doing it. As I get older and wiser and smarter and more creative, I think Little Falls Trophy has taken on a life of its own. It’s my passion, and all I want to do is keep writing music.”
Dutch Motel is the portal pitstop that sets the course for where Doug Albregts the artist will travel next. Every one of this galvanizing album’s 11 songs are no mere dress rehearsals — they are all visceral chronicles of modern life being lived to the fullest. And now, the endless sonic awards of Little Falls Trophy’s Dutch Motel await your ears.