Yellow Brick Road
Since 1997, Yellow Brick Road has been reshaping the Las Vegas entertainment culture by bringing rock music to the forefront of what was once known as “the lounge scene”. At the time YBR presented itself, it seemed all you could find in the Vegas showrooms were bands playing either Motown or Top 40. There was a huge void of anything catering to the Generation X rock crowd, and YBR was determined to fill it.
Brody Dolyniuk had just wrapped up a short and unfulfilling career playing piano bars and was looking to do something bigger and better. Borrowing from the Elton John catalog he had developed, he formed a tribute band which performed the vintage EJ songs as a four piece band. They barged their way into audition after audition, when suddenly the phone rang and YBR had its first few gigs. At the time, often required to play four 1-hour sets, the band filled their later sets with songs from various classic rock artists.
It wouldn’t take long to realize the other songs were gaining more attention, and eventually the EJ theme was dropped altogether. The same attention to detail that went into recreating EJ’s music was applied to the entire classic rock spectrum, from Kansas to Pink Floyd, to Led Zeppelin and so on.
After some lineup changes, Brody found Mark Cole on the internet (then still relatively a new concept). Mark’s astonishing accuracy and tones were the perfect match for Brody’s ability to mimic different singers. After some persuading, Mark made the move to Las Vegas, and YBR was reformed in late 2000. In the following years, James Sloan, David St. John and Jonathan Gilcrest would join the virtuoso group.
Then in 2011, Brody shocked everyone by resigning from the band he started years before. Luckily, an amazing vocalist and friend named Kelly Christian was within reach, and Brody asked him to step onboard as a permanent member. Passing the torch before a crowd of 3600, Brody said his final farewell and both he and YBR began a new chapter.
Since then, Yellow Brick Road is still going strong, cranking out weekly shows to adoring fans, both new and old, or performing for corporate events. YBR continues to present the greatest generation of arena rock with an unmatched level of accuracy and enthusiasm.
