feature photo: Peregrine Honig
Mike Dillon has a reputation as a gonzo musician but that also belies the fact that he’s also a hard-working musician. Until Covid hit, he was performing north of 200 shows a year for decades and it seemed like every time I turned around, he had a new record out, one that revealed a new permutation of his unique blend of jazz, funk, fusion, psych and anything else that qualifies as misfit music. And when it comes to the vibraphone and marimbas, he’s as ferocious on those instruments as Rahsaan Roland Kirk was with reeds.
So when that nasty virus shut down his relentless touring regimen, he doubled-down on the music creation. Dillon settled into his new Kansas City digs by holing up and heaving out not one but three full albums: Shoot The Moon, Suitcase Man and the one we’re discussing here, 1918.
Those albums were rushed out into Bandcamp at the end of 2020, but will be available in vinyl and all the requisite streaming services on March 12, 2021.
Each album addresses topics we can assume were foremost on his mind in 2020. Shoot The Moon took aim at the toxic political climate in the U.S., while on Suitcase Man Dillon looks inward at his own life, the good, the bad and the ugly. 1918 is perhaps the most instrumental of the three but still manages to carry out his message of grappling with the pandemic, with a healthy dose of wit to provide some levity. In case you slept through your high school history class, 1918 was the year of the last global pandemic and Mike Dillon reminds us, we hadn’t learned a lot since then about how to handle them.
There’s scant but crucial help from others in making this album; Earl Harvin plays some drums and Shane Theriot plays some guitar. Dillon is handling everything else but keeps it lean, mean and unconventional.
“Pinocchio” is played with vibes, table, an analog Moog and nothing more. That’s already enough to tell you that this is an unheard-of combination of instruments, as well as styles, eras and cultures. But Dillon uses this tactic to the service of a song that’s very much put-together.
The sounds of early synth pop can be heard on “Pelagic” but soon sports a rougher edge, thanks to Theriot’s psychedelic guitar and Dillon’s marimbas. “Super Spreader” is super funky, with the funk coming from drums, tabla and a squelchy Moog bass. The jungle rhythm of “1918” is reason enough to experience this track, but Dillon’s amped up, distorted vibes bellowing at the end provides another reason. Dillon’s brand of purple haze vibes continues on “Grandfather Clock.”
Dillon’s slightly psycho growl and a lo-fi charm steers “Mad Hatter” toward Captain Beefheart-land and The Residents, while the instrumental “March Of The Coviditos” also has that Residents vibe.
Primal screaming greets us at the start of “A Word To The Virus,” where Dillon employs Arthur Brown theatrics to rail against the virus. When I first heard the hilarious “Quarantine Booty Call” I thought this was Marc Ribot’s Atomic Dog. “Covid Kumbia” does have that Colombian cumbia dance rhythm but it’s set to a somewhat dreary melody that matches that sense of dread setting in as the virus takes hold of the narrator’s body.
1918 is vibes/percussion outlaw Mike Dillon’s unfiltered, homegrown manifesto about living in a pandemic world. If you’ve felt rage, frustration, fear and even a little humor from this viral madness, Dillon is speaking to you.
Dillon’s trio of new albums — 1918 as well as Shoot The Moon and Suitcase Man — will be available through the Royal Potato Family.
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