Rocket Surgery consists of singer and songwriter Rueben deGroot and his supremely talented backing band, guitarist Dan Curtis, bassist Elijah Abrams, keyboardist Josh Lyon, vocalist Christina Foster, saxophonist Jon Stewart, and drummers Rob Radford, Daniel Chalmers, and Mark Fraser.
Since 2012, Rocket Surgery's unique melding of jazz, roots rock, alternative, and prog has kept audiences dancing and smiling every Monday night at The Toucan in Kingston, Ontario. Rueben has recently shared the stage with Corb Lund, Sarah Harmer, NQ Arbuckle Band, Coco Love Alcorn, and Oh Susanna (who covered one of his songs on her 2014 album Name Dropper).
In the tradition of Steely Dan, Randy Newman, and John Prine, Rueben populates his songs with an unforgettable cast of hard-luck heroes. Whether he’s writing about a forlorn road worker, a rogue Wall Street trader, or a beleaguered con man, Rueben balances the poignant with the whimsical, the profound with the quirky. He sets his tragi-comic tales to infectious melodies and scintillating arrangements that call to mind classic seventies pop-rock. In the words of Luther Wright, Rueben “...has a vast arsenal of themes and ideas for a seemingly endless amount of excellent songs. His phrasing and melodic ideas are as strong and flawless as his clever lyrical choices.”
"Rueben has a vast arsenal of themes and ideas for a seemingly endless amount of excellent songs. His phrasing and melodic ideas are as strong and flawless as his clever lyrical choices."
~ Luther Wright
Over the past few years, Rueben has performed at the Dakota Tavern in Toronto, the Two Rivers Music Fest in Gananoque, Music Westport, and the Wolfe Island Music Festival in Kingston. In 2015, Rocket Surgery teamed with Greg Ball for their cross-Canada RocketBall tour.
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