Movie spills a little sunshine on Denver band

Behind the scenes of this season’s most lovable family flick is a tale of two indies.

The first is the movie itself, “Little Miss Sunshine.” It bounced around for years before producer Marc Turtletaub created this season’s must-see situation comedy, which opened at Kimball’s Twin Peak Theatres on Friday.

The second is the Denver band DeVotchKa.

Along the way, the indie film met the indie band. “It was pretty organic,” says DeVotchKa violin-, accordion- and piano-player Tom Hagerman.

A Los Angeles radio station was playing De-VotchKa songs and directors Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris heard the music and contacted the band. DeVotchKa ended up with 10 songs on the soundtrack.

Hagerman, who grew up in Colorado Springs, hopes the film sparks interest in DeVotch-Ka, but he’s not betting on it.

“I think a lot of people just watch the movie and see it as a whole and forget about it,” he said, shrugging.

For nearly a decade, De-VotchKa has been playing indie rock with a circus-polkacabaret-Eastern-European spin. The band’s name, which bears a phonetic resemblance to the Russian word for “girl,” is made-up slang used in the Anthony Burgess novel “A Clockwork Orange.” DeVotch-Ka’s music has struck a chord with the cool kids in Denver, but wide acclaim has been out of reach.

Theremin-, guitar-, pianoand trumpet-player and singer Nick Urata formed the band in the mid-’90s in Chicago after giving up on his rock band, The Reejers. He moved De-VotchKa to Colorado, and Hagerman, then a college kid, joined soon after.

DeVotchKa became a career as it grew in popularity. At one point, the band even came excruciatingly close to a deal with Sire Records. The label failed to make an offer.

“It’s such a ridiculous business, I think — the rock ’n’ roll industry,” Hagerman says. “We’ve been not so romanced by the dangling carrot, the ‘living the dream.’”

Hagerman grew up the black sheep in his Colorado Springs military family. The rest of his family sought practical careers, but Hagerman concentrated on learning the violin and skateboarding. Later, he earned a degree in music from the University of Colorado at Boulder, much to his sensible father’s dismay.

“I always felt like the band could be successful, and that Nick’s cooler songs were really good, and that if everyone could keep it together it could be really good,” Hagerman said.

Yet, he notes, “At some point all bands flail, and I think you have to be prepared for that.”

The band just finished a European tour and has earned a following in many of America’s larger cities. Hagerman says the band sold out New York’s 575-seat Bowery Ballroom.

“It was weird,” he says. “I didn’t expect that to happen.”

Maybe “Little Miss Sunshine” will brighten DeVotch-Ka’s future.

“I think it just builds after a while,” Hagerman says. “Ultimately, I just can’t imagine that there’s this time that we’re like Dave Matthews.”

DETAILS

- To learn more about DeVotchKa to to www.devotchka.net.

- For “Little Miss Sunshine” showtimes, go to www.kimballstwinpeak. com or call 447-1945. The movie got an A- rating in Friday’s GO! Read the

full review at gazette.com.