Photo credit: Mike Smolarek
R. Mutt began in the ’80s as a cool cover band. By the ’90s they were described by one writer as a head-on collision of Black Sabbath and James Brown. In the ’00s they drifted toward Americana. Their most recent album, Dash, draws comparisons to Bruce Springsteen. Each of those R. Mutts will be heard at their 30th anniversary show this Saturday at Club Garibaldi.
Four distinct lineups with a total of 11 musicians will take turns on stage and work through the eclectic catalog that has been performed under the R. Mutt moniker. Bassist and songwriter Jim Dier (a founding member) recalls a casual beginning for the band amongst a group of Marquette University, UW-Milwaukee and UW-Madison students.
“Our main concentration was on the music of The Clash, Velvet Underground, Lou Reed—the songs we grew up loving—which would have been considered ’80s alternative.” Drummer Paul Leckie, an art major, suggested the band’s name. “R. Mutt” was how Dadaist Marcel Duchamp signed the urinal he shockingly displayed as a sculpture at a 1917 art exhibition.
“It was the art of reclaimed objects,” Dier says, alluding to R. Mutt’s re-contextualization of familiar songs. “Even as a cover band, we pulled songs together from different genres and put them together with new ideas.”
They were popular on the circuit of bars and house parties in the Marquette neighborhood but soon developed the ambition of becoming an all-original band. They didn’t lose their original following. According to Dier, the fans were impressed by R. Mutt’s release of a CD, Steamin’ Hot Coolie (1991), at a time when local bands were largely confined to cassette tapes.
“Back then, we tried hard to be difficult to classify,” he says. “We liked odd tempo breaks, unexpected key changes and time signatures.” Black Sabbath-James Brown mash-up aside, Dier thought of R. Mutt as working the same field as the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Urban Dance Squad. “We were bending styles.”
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The band has broken up, gone dormant and reformed several times over the past three decades, changing personnel as well as changing their sound along with the personal evolution of longtime members. “Family. Jobs. It was often too tough to commit to being in a band,” Dier recalls. And yet, R. Mutt kept coming back. Their albums Heptane (2007) and Leash on Life (2011) leaned toward Americana. “You can hear it,” Dier says. “Both had a ‘Hey, we’re getting older—let’s play more serious music’ feel.”
The Dash shifts course again. Producing the newest recording was Sassparilla’s Kevin Blackwell, a longtime fan whom Dier ran into on a trip out west. “He said, ‘Yeah, those [recent] albums sound good, but it’s not the R. Mutt I remember. What I used to love was the unexpected, the fun, the fire,’” Dier recalls.
Blackwell recorded The Dash in Milwaukee and mixed it back in Portland, Ore., with Eels guitarist Chet Lyster. Dier likes the results. “It sounds like an improved version of what we used to sound like,” he says. “I softened things too much on Heptane and Leash on Life—took the edge off, I hate to admit. This sounds more like us.”
R. Mutt performs Saturday, May 19, at Club Garibaldi, 2501 S. Superior St.
