This year we are featuring a series called “2020 Hindsight” that showcases bands and musicians that have made it to the top of the Luxuryville radar. The list is quite diverse, although it’s all related to jazz for the most part. Each band is unique in its own right and we are trying to give the listening audience a better feel for these performers so that they can get acquainted with them on their own time. As always, we are looking to promote better than good music and hopefully educate folks with respect to some of the most talented (not always hotter or more popular) bands that are in the various live circuits today. This month features none other than Snarky Puppy.

Snarky Puppy is the brainchild of Michael League, bassist and creative mind extraordinaire, who assembled the players while attending University of North Texas in 2004. According to League, at the time he was “so bad that he didn’t place into any of the school ensembles, so Snarky Puppy was his opportunity to play.” Really hard to believe that Michael, but we’ll take your word for it. Today, Snarky Puppy is an internationally renown jazz ensemble featuring as many as 15-20 people on stage at once and features a collective of about 40-50 members over the last 15 years. They are a regular staple at Jazz festivals all over the world and their talent is unmistakable.

The first thing you have to understand about Snarky Puppy is that these guys are all great musicians. For a lot people, this is a vague category that most just accept as someone who is capable of playing well, or performing complicated pieces. Let me clarify. Beside the music degrees that these guys have (many from University of North Texas), all of the players that perform with the Puppy can read music well, understand their instrument with respect to a particular arrangement, perform at a much higher than average level with respect to errors, and are highly creative in their own right. Where this all comes together is in the ability to virtually track an album entirely live as an ensemble with a small studio audience without having to do overdubs. Now, I’ll be honest, it’s hard to believe there are absolutely no overdubs on their albums (and I would bet they are there in limited amounts) but essentially what you see is what you get. For an example, go to YouTube and search “Snarky Puppy albums” and you will see many a video featuring them in the studio performing/recording tracks for a particular song–and you are hearing the audio from the album! It’s being created right there. It’s impressive and I think speaks to the number one quality that really makes a true “musician” what they are: the insane amount of reps (repetitions, practice, rehearsals, history of performing music, etc.) that naturally occur with high level, professional musicians. They play all the time, even when away from the gig and that makes the error rate go way down and the performance ability go way up.

On his own, Michael League always impresses me with his ability to create music. From what I’m able to tell, this is a lot more than just coming up with a cool riff, or catchy melody–although, this has to happen quite a bit as well. Instead, what you see and hear is Mr. League using specific ideas (rhythmic, harmonic, melodic) to showcase and build his musical creations around. Many of his works are in more than one time signature; very few works are in traditional 4/4 meter. In fact, he is very up front about it in his musings about the various tunes. There is thing on the webs called the “Snarky Puppy Songbook”, which features ~ 5-6 of their tracks with a really nice breakdown of what to look for in the song, the particular rhythm aspects, why they were chosen and an overview from Michael himself. I found this very helpful in understanding his writing process and it even gave me a wealth of ideas myself. And while arranging and writing for a 15-piece ensemble seems easy for him, the listener will likely be amazed when they hear an album like Sylva (with Metropole Orkest) which features songs for an entire (50 piece?) orchestra in addition to the regular Puppy band. At the end of the day, the creativity really speaks for itself–one doesn’t have to be a musician to be captivated by the imagery and vibe that exudes from each Snarky Puppy tune.

For a jazz band at heart, Snarky Puppy really makes the music sound contemporary and it has a catchy, marketable quality as well. Often, Michael will play the Moog for that really electronic, deep bass sound, which gives the band a DJ or electronic feel. Other times, the melodies and instrumentation sound much more traditional, like a Russian folk song or Latin/World standard. The percussionist, Nate Werth, really adds a lot in terms of the base rhythmic elements and I would caution the listener to not completely zone out on that part of the music! There is a lot going on that bears a keen ear and it’s super impressive to hear what might sound like simple rhythm motifs blend into complex and thoughtful poly-rhythms. Frankly, it’s educational for any level listener or musician. For an example, google their latest NPR “Tiny Desk” concert and watch them teach the crowd to clap in a 4 over 3 poly-rhythm. While the arrangement of musicians often changes–sometimes multiple guitarists or keyboardists; other times violin and a different horn section; the music is always consistently good. The band always puts a lot of work into doing different arrangements of their own works, tempo modulating them, changing up the rhythm elements and or key motifs to keep the audience on their toes.

You really can’t talk about the rhythm of Snarky Puppy without addressing the drums. I don’t know how they do it, but they get some of the absolute sickest drummers that I have seen; many are welcome additions to my music world as I hadn’t heard of them before the Puppy. Drummers like Larnell Lewis, Jason Thomas, Robert Searight and Jamison Ross (the newest addition) are more than equipped to handle Mr. League’s complicated time signatures, tempo modulations and specific drum beats. If you take a listen to the “We Like It Here” album notes given by Michael (in between sessions I would guess) it’s amazing to realize that Larnell Lewis was a sub for those sessions because their regular drummer couldn’t make it for whatever reason. As Michael League puts it, Larnell had about 8 hours to ingest the album material before they started tracking. After you listen to the album, you’ll be as amazed as we all are on how in the actual f@#k he was able to do that. However, all of their drummers are equally talented and are just literal drum machines–not boring or pedestrian in any way but so insanely talented and capable that I doubt that Snarky could really handle using anybody who wasn’t that adept! They seem to be able to perform anything and the rhythms/beats they produce are so cool.

As soloists, all of these guys rock. Trumpeter Mike Maher has a great sense of melody and phrasing; Saxophonist Chris Bullock is a real pro; his tone is great and he has a nice ability to restrain himself to playing just the right notes. Of their three guitarists, my favorite is probably Mike Lettieri–he has the most shred capability and his playing (and perhaps the Van Halen t-shirt) resonate the best with me personally. The other two guys, Bob Lanzetti and Chris McQueen are both solid players in their own right. They each have different styles and tones that compliment one another. Often you will only see one or two of these guys at the gig. They rotate consistently, so you really never know who you’re going to get. The violinist Zach Brock is a nice addition here and there. The band doesn’t feature violin on too many of their tracks, but having the fretless violin sound to double a head melody is really a nice effect, in addition to a nice solo instrument sound. The keyboard players are in a category by themselves. Both Justin Stanton and Cory Henry can really play the boards. I’m partial to Cory Henry’s nu-school church organ wizardry, although he is not named in the official roster. Bobby Sparks is also in the line-up from time to time on keys. On piano, veteran Bill Laurence really adds nice texture and color, especially on the more traditional and/or ethnic type of songs. Truthfully, it doesn’t matter who is in the band on any particular night, they all come correct and are adept at making the solo sections sound interesting and fun.

I could probably go on all day and even attempt a headier, more music schooled approach of many of the specific things that Snarky Puppy does in their music, but why bother? One doesn’t have to be a music scholar to recognize the huge amount of talent just oozing from their music. For you, the listener, I would suggest perusing the tubes to watch these guys in action and decide for yourself. There is no question in our minds that Snarky Puppy should be a regular go to band in your musical library. There are so many layers that can be listened to, the audience can choose to focus on the “musicality” or just sit back and enjoy the obvious and musical sounds of creativity. Of course, you will ultimately have to see them live to really appreciate the entire specter. Until then, start your ears off right in 2020!