Steve Swallow Quintet Releases “Into the Woodwork”
Steve Swallow has released Into the Woodwork, a new, multi-textured collection of twelve of the bassist’s original tunes. The album features a revised lineup of Swallow’s quintet with longtime collaborator Carla Bley on organ, Chris Cheek on saxophone, Steve Cardenas on guitar, and Jorge Rossy on drums.
“This album is very much about what this cast of characters provoked in me as I was writing the music,” Swallow explains. “I had in mind a small band but one with interesting textural possibilities, a diversity and variety of sound. The knee-jerk reaction to a band with electric bass, electric guitar and organ is that it’s going to have a jazz-rock fusion kind of sound. But I wanted to show that you can go beyond those sonic models, that electric instruments can yield a more varied textural palette.”
The songs weave in and out of different moods, starting with the mysterious “Sad Old Candle,” then seamlessly into the upbeat, swinging title track. In fact, many of the songs morph from one to another while keeping their own identity.
“The album is made up of 12 discrete songs, but many of them are linked so that they flow together and cross-reference each other, almost as medleys,” Swallow adds. “That sort of thing keeps you into a record more, where you can just put your head down and not raise it for 15 minutes at a stretch – I like that as a listener and wanted to imbue the album with an element of that.”
Into the Woodwork is available now on CD and digital formats (iTunes and Amazon MP3).
Into the Woodwork Track List:
- Sad Old Candle
- Into The Woodwork
- From Whom It May Concern (for Paul Haines)
- Back In Action
- Grisly Business
- Unnatural Causes
- The Butler Did It
- Suitable For Framing
- Small Comfort
- Still There
- Never Know
- Exit Stage Left
