Urn by Mike Dillon

Look up punk jazz in the dictionary and next to it you’ll find a picture of its patron saint Mike Dillon. The vibraphonist/percussionist/vocalist/MC has been in perpetual motion for over 20 years now. From his time spent with the late ’80s MTV buzz band Billy Goat to cult faves Hairy Apes BMX to his current role in the post rock behemoth Garage A Trois, Dillon has amassed a diehard fan base that embraces his freewheeling mash up of sound and style. On one hand he exudes the musical chops absorbed from countless hours spent with Milt Jackson records, on the other he thrashes about with visions of Iggy Pop hard-wired to his frontal cortex. In that spirit, his latest solo album, Urn, pushes the envelope even further. Assembling a new band from his current hometown of New Orleans, Dillon toured the group relentlessly for the first half of 2012 before ducking into a Kansas City recording studio and cutting the album straight to tape. The results are vibrational: “DVS” and “Ding Dong The Party Is Over” radiate with a ska pulse and surf punk abandon; “Leather On” is a definitive post modern freak anthem; “Saturn Returns” shows why Dillon was Les Claypool‘s perfect foil all those years in the Frog Brigade; “Cedar” slowly uncoils in a manic existential bender through India. Mike Dillon has made the rare album that can be both party starter turned up loud in the house and tweaked-out headphone record for the end of the night after everyone’s gone home. In all of its multi-dimensional glory, Urn cements Dillon’s reputation as an ever-intriguing cult music hero fearlessly forging his own path.