Crazy Doberman are an Indiana free-improvisation and jazz collective created in 2016 as an offshoot of the group Doberman. Core members, including Tim Gick and Doberman cofounder Drew Davis, appear on many recordings, but Crazy Doberman’s lineup is loose—it varies on each of the band’s 40-plus albums and has featured dozens of musicians, among them Wolf Eyes’ John Olson and percussionist Tyler Damon.
"It goes without saying that their sound has evolved, shifted, changed as any good collective/group should over time. We were blown away when they handed over what was to become Illusory Expansion (Astral Spirits, 2020) and ran through two cassette pressings in a little over a month (also in the midst of a goddamn pandemic). So of course we asked Crazy Doberman if they would want to do a vinyl release to follow that up.
After moving from the midwest to Richmond, VA, the Doberman crew set up a new studio space and christened it with the recording of their latest missive Everyone is Rolling Down a Hill a collection of studio experiments that goes beyond what this crew has done in the past and into new territory.
The playing on Everyone is Rolling Down a Hill is less hurried with more space and atmosphere. There is still a dark midwestern basement vibe in the best way possible—serious kudos to the group for an album that sounds like a lost relic from another era, while still somehow being completely modern and inventive.
There's less cacophony and more focus, sure there are the free jazz workouts like "Strange New Life Forms Emerge" that wouldn't sound out of place on Miles Davis' Dark Magus, but the Doberman crew also digs into the electronic meets musique concrete of "While the World Dries Out Around the Fire," the lo-fi basement rock of the opener "Five Ghosts Share a Chair on an Autumn Day in Siberia," and even into the John Carpenter meets Umberto closer "Cold Comfort In Memoriam."
Easily some of the collective's strongest work to date, especially coming from the Crazy Doberman crew that never seems to stop creating.”
Astral Spirits
