WEEKEND

RICKY DOVER JR ROLLS INTO ROCKNPOD 2019

Ricky Dover Jr

We’re excited to announce that Ricky Dover Jr will be a returning guest at ROCKNPOD!

Ricky Dover Jr is a rock musician from Nashville TN. RD was born in Houston TX, but spent his formative years growing up in the eclectic college town of Knoxville TN. A happenstance of piano lessons at an early age sparked a lifelong interest in music. By age 14, after pilfering his father’s record collection, RD began being mentored by several local guitar gurus and started gigging locally with several bands. Following graduating from MTSU in spring 2010 with a degree in Music Production, RD was recruited by Atlanta’s The Booze, and helped the band finish their final album, “At Maximum Volume.” Returning to Nashville in 2011, RD worked at United Record Pressing, while getting himself fully immersed in the Nashville music scene. After playing guitar with numerous Nashville bands including The Birdwings, The Tip, and sharing stages with the likes of The Darkness, Buckcherry, Sebastian Bach, RD joined Atlanta’s Biters (Earache Revords U.K.) on bass duties in April of 2017.  

After completing nation and international tours with Biters, the band called an “indefinite hiatus” in summer of 2018, which allowed RD to tour on guitar with Nashville’s Blackfoot Gyspies in the subsequent downtime. By October of 2018, singer and songwriter of Biters, Tuk Smith, contacted RD to come to Los Angeles and play guitar on a new album he was about to begin with Grammy Award winning producer and engineer combo Rob Cavallo and Doug McKean (Green Day, Goo Goo Dolls, My Chemical Romance,more).  After several intense weeks of recording alongside A-list session musicians in one of the finest studios in LA, the album is now complete. A major distributed indie label has decided to pick up the record, and a release date for the first single has scheduled for Summer 2018. To fill out the live band for the new album, RD and Tuk have turned to Nigel Dupree on drums (formerly of Wayland, and son of Jackyl’s Jesse James Dupree), and recent Nashville via San Francisco transplant, Shane Rickerson on bass – thus, Tuk Smith & The Restless Hearts is born! 

With several warm up shows already completed opening for the likes of Ace Frehley (Kiss) and Jackyl, the band is eagerly finishing up the artwork and putting the final touches on the new album. Many more exciting details and huge announcements to unfold soon!! 

 RD is sponsored by HiTone Amplification, Zemaitis Guitars, Solo Dallas, Daredevil Pedals, Jaykco Straps, Amprx Solutions, Bolt Electric.

Meet Ricky Dover Jr at the Nasvhille Rocknpod Expo along with members of Megadeth, Stryper, TNT, Danzig, Saigon Kick, Tora Tora, Roxy Blue, and many more!

Tickets available now at www.nashvillerocknpodexpo.com/ticketing