By Jason McDowell Creative Director Published Nov 05, 2014 at 2:30 PM

One of my favorite bands to come out of Milwaukee in the past couple of years was The Delphines, which handled dreamy, poppy shoegaze and fuzzed out rock and roll with a youthful, too-cool-to-care attitude, best experienced in a small, dark club.

The band's shows were frequent and album releases were fast and furious, but also quite abbreviated. An EP here, a cassette single there. Even a YouTube-only release (one of my favorites). In my 2013 interview the band admitted it wasn't terribly interested in full-length releases.

"When we started the band we didn't want to do albums," lead singer Harrison Colby had said.

Eventually the band produces a full-length album called "Hush," but shortly afterward the band quietly broke up.

Disappointment followed. How could we allow this to happen? This band felt like it was composed of sun-bleached driftwood, waiting for a match to drop and set fire to the music scene. It was a band that made Milwaukee's music scene vibrate.

So I was surprised this morning when my phone lit up with a message from The Delphines about a new release:

Three fourths of The Delphines (Harrison [Colby], Lucas [Riddle], and Jeremy [Ault]) have made a new band called NO/NO with singer Cat Ries and just released a new EP.  Drag is available for free on their bandcamp

With curiosity I clicked through and hit play. NO/NO is not The Delphines 2.0. The new sound incorporates more synth and pushes the fuzz into more of a New Wave territory, but it still holds the same achingly disaffected vibe.

Within 30 seconds I dropped everything and got in touch with Colby.

Apparently the marriage of former singer Jami Eaton was the driving reason behind the divorce of The Delphines. "We found all this out mid-way through the recording process for Hush so it was kind of a rough album to finish, mainly because we knew we wouldn't be able to continue after it was done." Colby said. "She couldn't commit to the band nearly as much as before."

There was a brief moment when The Delphines could have continued to work under the same moniker, but despite three quarters of the original band remaining in tact, it was more of an authenticity issue.

"Jami was such a huge part of the band that it just felt wrong. She named it and she wrote all of the lyrics. The three of us thought that we should definitely keep playing but under a different capacity with a new name and a new fourth person.

"And Cat is definitely a new driving force. Jami and I were such close collaborators it's nice to have someone step in and bring a whole new energy to what we're doing."

Another reason? New instrumentation moved the band into a different direction.

"After we brought in a synth we kind of felt like we needed to change the drum set up so that the synth wouldn't sound so out of place. Hence, the sample pad. When the two are combined it creates a sort of New Wave feel, so we embraced it."

With a new member, a new sound, and a new name, does this mean the output will change as well? Colby doesn't think so.

"I heard that full-length albums are cursed in Milwaukee. We are heading back down into our studio/practice space to record another EP. We are cranking out songs at the moment. And the way it worked out, some of the first songs we wrote together are making it onto the second one as opposed to our first."

The band will play its second show on Nov. 15 at the Riverwest Public House with Snow White and Period Bomb.

Can we expect to relive some memories from 2013 at the show?

"We won't be playing Delphines songs. This is an entirely different band. Yes, it's three out of the four members but we approach everything entirely differently than when we made those songs. Everything is a little less angry."

While the Delphines may be done for good, its impact can still be recognized at the 88Nine Radio Milwaukee Milwaukee Music Awards. The band has been nominated for Best Album, Band, Music Video and Album Artwork in 2014.

Jason McDowell Creative Director

Jason McDowell grew up in central Iowa and moved to Milwaukee in 2000 to attend the Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design.

In 2006 he began working with OnMilwaukee as an advertising designer, but has since taken on a variety of rolls as the Creative Director, tackling all kinds of design problems, from digital to print, advertising to branding, icons to programming.

In 2016 he picked up the 414 Digital Star of the Year award.

Most other times he can be found racing bicycles, playing board games, or petting dogs.