Gil Mantera's Party Dream

Gil Mantera's Party Dream is an electronic synthpop party band hailing originally from Youngstown, Ohio, with Gil Mantera living in Columbus, Ohio as well as Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Donny has always lived in Youngstown. Consisting of self-proclaimed brothers Gil Mantera and Ultimate Donny, the Party Dream are known for their over-the-top live shows and updated channeling of 1980s synthpop à la Tears for Fears. Their music blends synth-heavy electronic dance music with heavy basslines, distorted guitar, and even a few progressive rock influences. They toured several times with successful artists as varied as Grand Buffet, An Albatross, GWAR, and Art Brut, and most notably were invited several times to play New York City with The Rapture. In 2008 they toured across the country with the Van's Warped Tour. Originally a regional phenomenon, the Party Dream signed to Fat Possum Records, a primarily blues label that is also the home of The Black Keys and The Fiery Furnaces, and have begun extensive national touring. In mid-2006, they were invited to play the SXSW concert series in Austin, Texas, garnering enough attention at their three garish live shows to warrant a "Best Show [SXSW]" award from the Village Voice. They were also featured by Spin magazine as a Spin.com band of the day and warranted a recommendation on Timothy McSweeney's publishing house website. The Party Dream is well known among their fans for their pseudo-performance art approach to playing live, with sets that include not only musical performance, but also improvised stage banter, dance, and at times even elements of striptease. Driven by Gil's synthesizer arrangements and Donny's wildly over-emotive vocal stylings, the Party Dream produces danceable, electronic music with recognizable hooks that are often performed by Gil, who sings exclusively through a vocoder. After originally focusing on improvised performance, the Party Dream has now matured into a dance band with recorded musical offerings that while not directly comparable with their frenetic live shows, has placed them in a position to expand on their regional success and join the indie/post-punk revival from a decidedly different angle than their peers.