David Dominique plays a flugabone, a large brass instrument that looks like an oversized flugelhorn yet sounds like a trombone. But that’s hardly the most unconventional thing about his music. As a bandleader and composer, Dominique has shown a creative zeal for using traditional jazz as a springboard into the abyss, much as Mingus, Kirk and Lacy did. He brought those values to his first octet project Ritual (2013), and comes back with his octet for another, fresh set of ingenuous compositions for Mask.
Dominique’s eight-piece ensemble remains mostly unchanged from the last go around: Brian Walsh (tenor saxophone, clarinets, co-producer); Joe Santa Maria (alto saxophone, flute); Sam Robles (alto and baritone saxophones); Lauren Baba (viola); Alexander Noice (guitar and electronics); Michael Alvidrez (basses); and Andrew Lessman (drums and drumKAT) – along with Dominique — make up a somewhat eccentric combination of instruments that tips you off that the music they play is a mixture of old and new sonorities.
It’s an eight-piece band alright, but it plays much larger than that. It probably needs to in order to absorb all the ambition Dominique invested into these songs and his arrangements of them. Brash and unpredictable, sure, but it’s the swagger and sheer gumption that makes Dominique’s mission impossible to ignore. Just when you think the music is about to settle too comfortably into a mid-century mindset, hollers or Noice’s guitar squall zaps the music out of any impending lull. That’s especially apparent on “The Yawpee,” a song that packs ninety years of jazz history into four-and-a-half minutes. Whiplash-inducing big band type arrangements are deftly mixed in with Noice’s metal rifts and short hints of other styles as well, then finishes off with a wild Baba viola feature. Dominique leverages the silence between notes on “Invisibles” to tantalize, then suddenly kicks it into overdrive with a balls-out, screaming guitar.
It should be clear by now that Dominique doesn’t just recycle ideas, he’s coming up with a lot of his own. “The Wee Of Us,” which swings hard despite its start-stop motion, sometimes fools the listener that the record is skipping (at least, those of us from the vinyl era, anyways). “Beetle” takes on a film noire aspect, with complexity in the melody that you won’t expect in a tune lasting only about 150 seconds. A taut rhythm section underpins “Grief,” while Maria’s flute leads a gaggle of horns and voices that blend right in with the horns. “Five Locations” is an unusual sax/vocal scat duo and the odd-metered “Gotta Fumble” uses competing harmonic lines to form a persuasive update on Eric Dolphy’s edgy style.
Mask, issued through Orenda Records, is now available for sale.
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