Industrial Jazz Group

A Brief History of the Industrial Jazz Group

Formed by composer / pianist Andrew Durkin in the spring of 2000, the Industrial Jazz Group has frequently been accused of confounding innocent listeners. And no wonder: in addition to its perplexing name (the group could never be confused with, say, Nine Inch Nails), the IJG seems to change shape?”aesthetically and physically?”every year or so. Sure the music is always fun (and it should here be noted that many of the group�s fans aren�t exactly jazz fans per se). But can�t these guys keep a consistent stylistic vibe together for more than one record?

A Brief History of the Industrial Jazz Group

Formed by composer / pianist Andrew Durkin in the spring of 2000, the Industrial Jazz Group has frequently been accused of confounding innocent listeners. And no wonder: in addition to its perplexing name (the group could never be confused with, say, Nine Inch Nails), the IJG seems to change shape?”aesthetically and physically?”every year or so. Sure the music is always fun (and it should here be noted that many of the group�s fans aren�t exactly jazz fans per se). But can�t these guys keep a consistent stylistic vibe together for more than one record?

In the old days, the group produced �edgy melodic jazz,� clearly (though somewhat irreverently) situated in the bop / postbop tradition. �Thelonious Monk goes to the circus drunk� is how one listener (who at the time was probably drunk himself) described the group�s debut album, Hardcore (2001).

Then came the septet era, and the critical success of City of Angles (2002), an aural homage to the group�s hometown, Los Angeles. Clearly indebted to the ghosts of Mingus, Ellington, and especially Zappa, Angles featured substantially more, er, involved charts (�Eleven beats to a bar, the eighth note gets the beat? Are you kidding me?�), with nods not only to bop and free jazz, but baroque counterpoint, musique concrete, and minimalism.

The Star Chamber (2004) followed Angles with a more-or-less �live� (in-studio) document of what was by that time a nonet. Starker than its predecessors, Chamber was, in Durkin�s words, �our attempt to make an ECM record that we knew ECM would never release.� But it also marked a transition into a sound that had become orchestral and cinematic.

Outtakes from the first three records were collected in the limited fanclub-only release, Industrialjazzwerke, Vol. I, also released in 2004. (With a little tweaking this could have been the fourth �official� IJG album. Maybe someday.)

Of course, anyone who has heard the group lately (circa 2005) knows that it has significantly added to this early fascination with jazz and �high art� genres. Though the music still riffs on free improvisation, minimalism, Bach, and bop, it is not so much Monk who is going to the circus drunk these days, but Ray Charles, Elmore James, Celia Cruz, and other illustrious denizens of the variegated worlds of classic soul, R&B, blues, reggae, salsa, mariachi, gospel, doo wop, and rock n� roll. Sound eclectic? You bet. In fact, the stylistic shifts are so abrupt in this latest (eleven piece) version of the group, that while listening to rough mixes of the forthcoming album (tentatively titled Industrial-Jazz-a-Go-Go) one listener exclaimed of the music that �it never lets you relax!�

Amen to that, brother.

A Lot With a Little: The Industrial Jazz Group, Quintet Edition

Most who know the Industrial Jazz Group at all know it as an eleven piece monstrosity that performs the music of Andrew Durkin: a kind of raucous jazz tinged with classic R&B, soul, gospel, mariachi, doo wop, salsa, reggae, and rock �n roll. But there is another, quieter (though no less wacky) version of the group: the Industrial Jazz Group, Quintet Edition. This �splinter group� is, in part, a response to the economic challenges of the music business. After all, an eleven-piece jazz group sometimes has a hard time finding places to play, and a few hundred bucks of door money split eleven ways is not really enough to subsidize extended forays out of the ensemble�s native California. The quintet, on the other hand, is, by virtue of its smaller size, more portable, supple, and �road-ready.�

Though obviously related to its larger cousin?”consisting entirely of regular IJG members, and performing at least a few tunes that are staples in the big group�s set?”the quintet�s repertoire is mostly drawn from a separate book of tightly-structured, quirky, deceptively simple Durkin compositions characterized in part by the absence of a chordal instrument. (Durkin, the IJG�s pianist, does not actually perform with the smaller group). Whereas the large group is joyously bombastic, the quintet marks a return to Durkin�s early compositional philosophy of doing a lot with a little. In other words: if the eleventet is a sprawling cinematic experience, the quintet aspires to be the musical equivalent of a sonnet.

The IJGQE (so to speak) is planning on recording an album, Grupus Interruptus, which will be released in late 2005 (or early 2006).

About Andrew Durkin

Andrew Durkin is a self-described �hack composer and pseudo-intellectual� living in Los Angeles. His main project is the Industrial Jazz Group. He has scored several films and videos, including the award winning shorts Fish and Lunch by Sarah Jane Shute. He was once a member of the (now-defunct) vocal ensemble, the Evelyn Situation. Some folks also claim that he has written a rock opera, a screenplay, and an innovative arrangement of Stephen Sondheim�s score for A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum. He studied composition with his CD player, and before that, with his turntable.

Durkin's doctoral dissertation, Decomposition: A Critique of Musical Authorship and Authenticity, may be published someday. He moonlights as a project specialist at the University of Southern California�s Institute for Multimedia Literacy, where he is working on a DVD production entitled The Untimely Death of Frank Zappa, as well as a collection of essays (on jazz, culture, and aesthetics) entitled The Revolution Will Not Be Linear. In his spare time (huh?), he reviews jazz CDs for the very popular All About Jazz website. He is also currently transcribing Arnold Schoenberg�s Verklarte Nacht for Project Gutenberg.

Miscellany

The IJG has been a persistent force on the Los Angeles jazz scene for five years now (hey, that�s an eternity in jazz time). In addition to its amazing regular lineup, the group frequently attracts kick-ass guest players like Bruce Fowler (Frank Zappa, and, well, just about everybody else) and Daniel Glass (Royal Crown Revue). And in addition to its native Los Angeles, the group has performed in San Diego, Bakersfield, San Francisco, Berkeley, Oakland, Truckee, and Petaluma (CA); Austin (TX); Rochester and Manhattan (NY); Bloomfield and Bound Brook (NJ); and Wilmington (DE). It has received numerous grants from the American Composers� Forum, and its music has been heard on NPR and hundreds of radio stations around the world. It has been written up in The LA Weekly, The SF Weekly, The Wire, The North Bay Bohemian, The San Diego Star-Tribune, and The Boston Herald. It is currently on the artist roster at Innova records.