Dim the lights, light a candle and watch Echoes in All Directions start spinning in your CD player. When you close your eyes a nostalgic feeling invades your conscience and, with amicable ambiance, opens a portal to a blissful state where you are completely free, nurtured solely by the sounds and poetry that gracefully meld into art (something more musical). You become a part of the music; and it’s a feeling so great you don’t want the first song to end. But then you discover the next song brings you to the same place. And the next…

For more than three years the Doddridge brothers have been the Ottawa indie scene’s best-kept secret. Now, Rodney (vocals, guitar and keyboard) and Darius (vocals, bass and guitar) are in gear to sever geographical boundaries and enter the psyche of pop fans everywhere as they erupt onto the international scene with a sound so satisfyingly fresh it makes you want to groove again.

Intense melodies, beguiling guitar riffs and dreamy, poetic lyrics are the result of the Doddridge brothers’ tireless three-year effort to create the best record possible for a one-off shot at the music industry. Echoes is heavy with Beatle-esque melodies and could easily be thrown into a category with Brit popsters like Stereophonics, Travis or Oasis, but they’ve remained original in their own means and have permeated invisible barriers which normally prevent small bands from creating big music.

Opening track Lindbergh stylishly sets the tone of the album and with the opening lyrics, “Finally take off and you feel the ground falling from you…” it doesn’t take long to get inside the song and spawn images you might see in a dream. A dual-themed love song inspired by aviator Charles Lindbergh, it is the epitome of the Doddridge brothers’ creative songwriting process. “Darius came up with the chorus and that’s all he had,” says Rod, explaining how he and his brother feed off each other’s ideas to build a song from the ground up. “My weaknesses are his strengths and his weaknesses are where I’m strong.”

With Everybody Loves You When You’re Dead, Skytone reinforces its rock roots and draws comparison to early Coldplay with audaciously high notes and remarkable melodic guitar-work. But with staggering sibling-harmonies on songs like Springtime and It Doesn’t Really Matter Anymore, they emerge primarily as a power pop duo with evident Brit pop qualities.