Live Wire: Holyoke’s Donut Kings making tasty music for 40 years

When one of the founders of the Holyoke-based band Donut Kings was asked what his favorite kind of donut is, he had a surprising answer.

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“I don’t eat donuts,” Rikk Desgres said.

But the story behind the name is almost as unusual. Apparently, the band’s first guitarist loved donuts, and they called him “The Donut King.” But oddly, he never actually played out with the band. Desgres and drummer and co-founder Nate Crowell were setting up the band’s first-ever gig at Lemon’s in Chicopee.

“And all of a sudden, I was like, ‘Wait, did he just leave? ’So we went outside, only to see his car speeding out of the parking lot. He got so scared that he just left,” Desgres said.

Despite that shaky start, the group carried on and will now celebrate its 40th anniversary show on May 23 at Two Weeks Notice Brewing Company in West Springfield.

The band tried to get the original guitarist to come back to play for the 40th anniversary, but unfortunately, he’ll be out of town. Desgres said they were thinking it would be funny if it was the first time he was ever on stage with the band — even though he was the original guitarist 40 years ago.

Desgres said that the band has had to persevere through other ever-changing band lineups and musical styles. The group is now Desgres (who originally played bass but now plays tenor guitar), joined by Crowell on drums and Aaron Brennan on bass and Chapman Stick.

Desgres and Crowell formed the band in 1986 and leaned into influences such as a fellow Western Massachusetts band The Pajama Slave Dancers (from which Donut Kings took their humorous sensibilities). Other early influences include the Violent Femmes, where they got their minimalist approach, and hard rock bands like Deep Purple, which the Donut Kings tried to emulate to get a bigger, harder sound.

Over the band’s 11 albums, you can hear even more threads woven into the group’s sound: punk, progressive, heavy metal, pop, alternative, goth, funk, experimental, folk, novelty and “just about any style that made us smile,” Desgres said.

As to what has held the two founding members together for so long, the answer is two-pronged, Desgres said.

“One, we’re friends and respect each other. We’re very different, but we’re almost like brothers. And second, no one ever told us to quit, so we kept on going,” he said with a laugh.

While the group started out as a trio, it has since expanded to four and even five members at different junctures. Desgres prefers the trio setup, although admits there are advantages to having extra hands on deck.

“With fewer people in the band, it’s easier is to manage. It’s like herding cats. With five people you got to get five people to agree on when you’re going to rehearse, and agree on playing a gig, and these days everybody’s in at least another band or two,” he said. “It might sound better with a couple of extra people, but with three people it’s easier to manage.”

For the 40th anniversary gig, Desgres said there will be a slideshow accompanying the band onstage. And, in between sets, they will share older videos of the group with the audience.

He added that all the various members of the band over the four decades have added to the sound and shaped it.

“All the other members have influenced things. Because it’s not my band, and it’s not Nate‘s band; it’s truly a band,” he said. “How we got to where we are now is because of every member that has passed through. It’s like weaving a tapestry.”