I'll Be Dog Damned

In pop music, for its proportional simplicity and an adoring, overspread media that tracks its every new layer as if it were all soap opera, it is relatively easy to keep up with musical developments. I’m sure many of us don’t even want to know that Norah Jones released her second studio date last week – unless that disc is to be a birthday gift for a loved one – or that Janet Jackson showed her bullied nipple and that she’ll likely sell another couple million as a result. But we can’t avoid it. That is not to argue that all social, cultural, and artistic interests should be so omnipresent. More to the point, for the extreme antipoles to popular culture, there is simply no way to stay positively informed.

Trying to remain abreast of the goings-on in the rapidly multiplying corners of my musical interests is a practice that grows further and further in vain. Luckily we have friends who know our areas of interest to some detail, and who are always good for a solid recommendation or two. Then there are those chance encounters that, if shaken off, might result in the loss of an opportunity for revitalization. In this hobby that I share with many other music lovers, music is opportunity foremost for better getting to know oneself.

When the Sweden-based multi-instrumentalist Alberto Pinton contacted me last month, suggesting that I listen to a new disc from his Dog Out project, I was naturally willing – if a little apprehensive for peripheral reasons – to commit to a review. Learning that Dog Out is a small ensemble built from the Swedish ground up with a taste of the free improv aesthetic increased my interest; I’ve been wild about certain Swedish musicians and their scene in general for some time now, and hearing new voices from that community is something I particularly enjoy. This disc came as no exception, so what follows is the quick and dirty.

Pinton is actually Italian-born, Berklee-educated, and now lives in Stockholm with the rest of the Swedish group. He shares Dog Out’s front line (and writing duties) with reed player Fredrik Nordström, and they are backed by bassist Mattias Welin and drummer Jon Fält. While the quartet’s instrumentation (reeds, reeds, bass, drums) has been done to death in every jazz tributary in history, Dog Out demonstrates that even though there may be a shortage in tools to make acoustic music, the well of sounds and combinations therein is bottomless.

Their self-titled release (Moserobie, 2003) is, quite simply, phenomenal. Unlike many freshman or sophomore recordings from newly recorded groups, Dog Out does not try to cover too much stylistic range in these 11 tracks. Rather than get up and blow for the disc’s entirety – a tactic of which all too many ensembles are guilty – the quartet pieces together a mosaic of non-thematic material, however connected by two crucial elements: sinusoidal energy with melody running perpendicular. That is to say, there is no resolute tempo from track to track and each tune is driven by the writing. These are attractive heads, choruses and codas, rather than ones which simply work as bookends and transition points for showmanship. The sleepy progression of “Cold Talk” opens the disc and without delay impresses the group’s ability to craft a melody. The way Nordström and Pinton harmonize with their horns calls to mind Ornette Coleman’s early writing, and each hypnotic note seems bent on erasing the ones immediately preceding. But visions of Ornette evaporate quickly enough and “Cold Talk” almost completely runs its mournful course before Fält enters to accentuate and purify this already lovely piece. Nordström’s “Piece of Change” and Pinton’s “Four Us Three” are the remaining slow-tempo numbers on the disc, the latter perhaps the ultimate two-minute tease.

The remaining nine tracks are propulsive, higher-energy compositions that are both thoughtful and punchy. It is in tracks like “The Group” and “Wonderland Ballroom” that I felt I best “got to know” these musicians. Nordström’s phrasing is consistently imaginative and he has a serious knack for punctuating the series of strategically placed hooks that frequent the disc. Rather than permeate the music, supposed influences occasionally surface (the “Machine Gun”-like intro from Pinton’s baritone on “The Group”) and discharge (Nordström’s Ayler-tinged tone during his tenor solo in “The Freezer”), but without coming off anecdotal or kitschy. The rhythm section maintains itself in the pocket over Dog Out's course, and Welin proves himself to be an unshakable anchor to this music. His bass goes beyond merely dominating the lower frequencies, and his patterns are equally integral to the progressions here.

In another demonstration of economy, the musicians apparently felt no need in marathon solo lines, recognizing the profit in understatement; “Dog’s Right” clocks in the longest at 7:30 to no expense: Fält’s drumming in “Dog’s Right” is the first delicious indication that Sweden has secret weapons of its own. But what of the conservation in instrumentation? Nordström and Pinton wield six horns between them, and any inclinations to show off their many embouchures are safeguarded in the compositions themselves. Pinton’s contrabass clarinet appears once over the disc, where it parallels Welin’s bass to carve more depth into a powerful sequence.

In all, the Dog Out disc is one of the strongest jazz releases since, well, Exploding Customer’s (another Swede ensemble) Live at the Glenn Miller Café (Ayler, 2001). Each number is its own dog and the disc maintains its downright catchiness throughout.

In a follow-up email I shared with Pinton after he contacted me, he expressed to me the importance in a musician being himself in the music he makes, without pretending to be something external to his or his group’s interests. Listening to the music, I get the sense that this group has nothing but respect for what it is they are trying to do, and in doing so the musicians avoid overkill. The result is an archetypal “working band” sound, and the improv world could use more of those.

I doubt I’d have otherwise had the opportunity to hear Dog Out. Sadly, I’m more likely to hear that there’s a new Tim McGraw video about, rather than the music that could possibly matter to me. I’m not buying much new jazz these days, and most of my magazine subscriptions have lapsed. This group has, for the time being, reinvigorated those interests and has maybe even produced answers to some aesthetic questions. I’ll answer one. Where is all of the good jazz writing in today’s music? I point you to “Numerology”.

~Alan Jones