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Sugar & Gold Biography

sugar-and-gold
  • Years Active: 2000s
  • Genre: Dance & Electronic

Sugar & Gold’s dancefloor-friendly approach that mashes together disco, early-'80s R&B, electro, synth pop, and funk is made for a sweaty night out at a club but also works just fine on record. The San Francisco-based group was formed by childhood friends Nicolas Dobbratz and Philipp Minnig, who after performing in the bands Dura-Delinquent and Connexion decided to work as a duo on a more poppy project. Adopting the names PAM (Minnig) and PAINLESS (Dobbratz), they began writing and recording in 2005, releasing their first 12”, "Work Out"/"Do It Well," in late 2006 for the Antenna Farm label. Along the way the duo added members to the band, which became a popular live attraction in its home town, eventually being named Best Local Dance Band in 2007 by SF Magazine and Best Party Band 2008 by SF Weekly. The group’s first LP, Creme, was released in summer of 2007, and along with PAM and PAINLESS featured a lineup of Fati Beloved (Fatima Fleming) on vocals, Robot (Robin MacMillan) on drums, and Jeromeo (Jerome Steegmans) on synth bass and production. Tours in the U.S., U.K., and Europe followed and a string of sold-out shows during 2009’s SXSW boosted Sugar & Gold’s profile. They quickly returned to the studio and recorded the AYA EP, which came out in October of 2009. After a six-week tour of the U.S. that included appearances at the Monolith Festival and CMJ, the band returned to the studio to work on another album. The resulting Get Wet! was their most accomplished work to date and was released by Antenna Farm in April of 2010. ~ Tim Sendra, Rovi

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