Biography

Introduction

Greg Dulli (born May 11, 1965) is an American rock composer, singer and instrumentalist.

Dulli was born and brought up in the working-class Cincinnati suburb of Hamilton, Ohio. Although he was raised a Catholic, he denounced the religion in 1978 and has been an agnostic since. Dulli first came to public attention in the late 1980s with The Afghan Whigs when he joined D.C. transplant bassist John Curley and Louisville, Kentucky, guitarist Rick McCollum. The band fused a unique blend of punk rock and R&B all while placing the spotlight on Dulli's on-stage lothario persona, between-song banter and extensive knowledge of pop culture, music and sports.

Dulli's budding career in the rock and roll production business was halted as The Afghan Whigs began playing more and better gigs, drawing bigger and bigger crowds. The band was soon brought to the attention of Sub Pop Records in Seattle. Sub Pop's signing of The Afghan Whigs created quite a stir; they were the first non-Northwestern U.S. band to record for the label. The Whigs amicably split in 2001.

In 1994, Dulli was a lead vocalist in the Backbeat Band, an alternative-rock supergroup that recorded the soundtrack to The Beatles biopic, Backbeat. Other members of the Backbeat Band were Thurston Moore (Sonic Youth), Don Fleming (Gumball), Mike Mills (R.E.M.), Dave Grohl (Nirvana, later Foo Fighters), and Dave Pirner (Soul Asylum). Dulli was the only musician that appeared on the Foo Fighters first record aside from Dave Grohl. He added a guitar part to the song "X-Static".

In 1997, Dulli (with Ted Demme and director Mark Pellington) bought the movie rights to a book by Ann Imbrie called Spoken in Darkness but the film was never made.

In December 1998, Dulli was hospitalized suffering a skull fracture at the hands of a bouncer following an altercation at the Liberty Lunch Club in Austin, TX.

Dulli provides vocals for the song "Somebody Needs You" off of The Lo-Fidelity Allstars 2002 album "Don't Be Afraid of Love"

In 2006, Dulli produced Ballads for Little Hyenas by the Italian rock band, Afterhours.

Dulli is now the lead singer and main songwriter of the band The Twilight Singers who released their fourth album titled Powder Burns in May 2006. He is also working with Mark Lanegan (Screaming Trees, Queens of the Stone Age, Mark Lanegan Band) on their side project, The Gutter Twins. Lanegan also appears on The Twilight Singers EP, A Stitch In Time.

Dulli always marks the booklets to his records with sentences in nicely-clumsy Italian.

October 2007 saw Dulli, along with Jeff Klein, Shawn Smith, Petra Haden and Barb Antonio, play two acoustic shows at the Triple Door in Seattle, for the A Drink for the Kids fundraising effort by The Vera Project. The shows were recorded and released in October 2008 as a digital download on Greg's own label, Infernal Recordings.

In addition to his recording career, Dulli has also appeared in a number of films including the independent short Salt Shaker, Ted Demme's Monument Avenue and 2009's Passenger Side.