Live Review: Snarky Puppy

Proving once again that the appeal of jazz knows no boundaries, Melbourne International Jazz Festival artistic director Michael Tortoni and his team snag a winning act for those who prefer their instrumental jazz served a with a precocious bite.

Snarky Puppy, the large Brooklyn-based jazz-funk collective, is the USA's answer to The Cat Empire and The Public Opinion Afro Orchestra.  Having won a loyal fanbase ever since they debuted in Australia at this same venue and festival in 2013, Snarky Puppy have since picked up a Best R&B Performance Grammy (2014) and are back once again to promote their recently released 11th album, Culcha Vulcha.

Despite arriving at 5.20am this very morning from Singapore, and spending the day running a workshop at a music college, the band are pumped when they walk on stage for the first of their back-to-back performances this evening.

Each track is viscerally vibrant and richly textural.

Snarky Puppy often perform with collaborating musicians nicknamed 'The Fam', which could number from a dozen to 40 members, but tonight they boast a core nine-piece headed by grinning bassist-composer-producer Michael League. Each track is viscerally vibrant and richly textural. Fearlessly mixing funk, groove, R&B, Afrobeat, touches of swing, Latin jazz, rock, soul, and even house music, the band is best experienced live and on your feet.

Many of their tracks feature impressive solo instrumental bridges such as a ceiling-pounding drum and percussion duet/face-off between Larnell Lewis and Nate Werth and extended, metallic riffs from electric guitarist Mark Lettieri. Mike 'Maz' Maher (trumpet/flugelhorn), Justin Stanton (trumpet/keys) and Chris Bullock (tenor saxophone) equally shine, often pulling up ebbs in the compositions and keeping the audience on their toes.

This is instrumental jazz at its most joyful and optimistic.

From the come hither, deep synth grooves of Tarova to the slow-burning, mystical Beep Box and brassy, '80s-rock number GO, the band take us ever further afield in their ephemeral experimentation in memory, time and place. This is instrumental jazz at its most joyful and optimistic, designed to unburden and enliven. It's best not to come with any pre-conceived notion of which parts of their multi-layered sounds are directly influenced by the likes of Herbie Hancock, Bjork, Snoop Dogg, Erykah Badu, David Crosby, James Brown, Radiohead and Salif Keita - among others - but rather just to enjoy the trip as it unfolds.  

Before leaving us with audience favourite Lingus ­- replete with Lettieri's smoking, knee-buckling guitar riffs - League announces that he has a gift for us in the form of a free track download from GroundUP, the independent recording company founded by League himself. The lucky audience already queuing outside for Snarky Pup's second show is in for a treat.