Catch Gretsch Lyles and the Modern Eldorados on a packed Sunday afternoon — as a big crowd did at the American Legion Post 199 Summer Concert Series on the beach before Labor Day — and you’ll hear something increasingly rare: a band that honors the roots of country music while sounding entirely like itself.
The Baldwin County band has been at it since 1996, and its frontman is as much entertainer as musician — part Roy Orbison, part Johnny Cash, part Elvis, delivered with a showman’s wink. One first-time listener’s compliment stuck: he reminded the audience of John C. Reilly in Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story. “That’s my favorite movie! I watch it all the time,” Lyles said. A friendship was made on the spot.
From a rural musical family to the Modern Eldorados
Lyles grew up in rural Baldwin County in a musical family, singing and playing guitar from age six, steeped in his grandparents’ generation of country greats. He wrote his first song at sixteen. In 1996 he formed the Modern El dorados — the Modern Eldorados — with a repertoire built on classic country, and the band has been a Gulf Coast institution ever since, joined along the way by guitarist Monte Tredway (with the band since the beginning), bassist Dawson Caluger and drummer Brandon Hamilton. Together, as one longtime listener puts it, they are a party.
The comparison that comes most readily to fans is Asleep at the Wheel: a band with a sound all its own that somehow warms the heart with something familiar. Much of that familiarity is deliberate craft. Lyles and his close friend Chris Reid — the band’s original drummer and still his songwriting partner — studied the greats systematically. “We dove deep into the roots and history of the most popular songs to learn how they did it,” Lyles says. “We even listened to the ‘B’ side of their songs!”
Originals among the classics
The band learned early that it needed original music to succeed, and the catalog now includes favorites like “When You Leave” — Lyles’ own pick — and “Tennessee Tonight.” The originals sit comfortably beside the classic country covers that fill out the sets, all delivered with the band’s signature mix of authenticity and fun.
The act has traveled well beyond Alabama: the Modern Eldorados have toured Europe seven times. COVID slowed the concert circuit like it slowed everything, but the band has been rebuilding — with plans taking shape for a European tour starting in Amsterdam. “We are still building back to where we were before Covid,” Lyles says.
A beach venue worth saving
The Labor Day weekend show was part of the American Legion Post 199’s Summer Concert Series, a weekend tradition that packs the beach beside the grand old post building — a venue that took heavy damage from Hurricane Sally and is raising funds to renovate. The Legion’s concert series is open to the public, and membership comes with its own rewards.
The Gulf Coast is lucky in its live music: venues, bands and weekend series stack up across Mobile and Baldwin counties, and the Modern Eldorados are one of the reasons locals keep checking who’s playing where. When the name appears on a marquee, make the mental note. It never disappoints.