Woah indeed! Keanu Reeves’ rock band, Dogstar, reunited for the first time in over 20 years, playing BottleRock Napa Valley over the weekend. Even though the music festival attracted headliners like Post Malone, The Smashing Pumpkins and the Red Hot Chili Peppers, nabbing one of the biggest stars in Hollywood (and, you know, his band) was a major get. So take that, Bacon Brothers!
On the Dogstar reunion, Keanu Reeves told Billboard, “I missed playing together, I missed writing together, I missed doing shows together. It’s something I’ve always missed…We came to a spot where we weren’t playing anymore, and I missed it…Once we started to play, and it felt good, and really positive and creative, that’s when it was like, ‘Okay, let’s make this happen.’” It’s sort of funny to think of Keanu Reeves in a garage band that formed well enough into his career, but it all feels so genuinely Reeves, who is generally considered one of the most authentic guys in the business.
Even though Dogstar has rarely played, Keanu Reeves (who plays bass in the trio) insists the band is a sincere love of his (along with whisky, evidently), telling Billboard, “It’s not ‘make time for it’…It’s something that’s part of my life.” That’s a categorically humble statement, as Reeves not only has starred in movies that have grossed over $6.5 billion worldwide (including John Wick: Chapter 4, which, as one of the highest-grossing movies of the year so far, helped the franchise cross the $1 billion mark) but has insisted on devoting proper time to a passion project.
As far as how Dogstar progressed after their break, Keanu Reeves said much of it came about due to the pandemic. While drummer/co-founder Roger Mailhouse said that travel restrictions kept them close together, Reeves pointed to this time giving them a proper opportunity to dust off their instruments and develop new music. “We played the catalog songs, and then we can’t help it — we just started writing.” As such, a new album is in the works. No details on this release have been announced, but it will be their third since forming in 1991.
On the trivia front, Dogstar was originally called Small Fecal Matter before BFS for Big Fucking Shit or Big Fucking Sound, eventually landing on their best-known name, derived from a Henry Miller novel.
What did you think of Keanu Reeves’ band Dogstar reuniting after such a long hiatus? Would you ever catch them live? Let us know in the comments section below!