<p><span><span>- 2010 on a dusty Sunday afternoon in the Meredith Supernatural amphitheatre, an equally dusty music nerd wanders by the stage when his entire body is completely taken over by the intricately executed perfect dynamic, four-part vocal blast of <em>Temecula Sunrise</em> from breakthrough album <em>Bitte Orca</em>. Is there any other group that is more quintessentially NYC art-school music than Dirty Projectors?! That a single from a music-school four-piece (with German poetry in translation for lyrics) ends up remixed by <strong>Little Dragon</strong> and then covered by <strong>Solange</strong> was an early clue. A team up of former member <strong>Amber Coffman</strong> with UK bass music heavyweight <strong>Diplo</strong> was another.</span></span></p>
<p><span><span>Famously promiscuous, casually queer and polyand post-binary, like as if you could hybrid-clone <strong>St Vincent</strong> and the <strong>Hilliard Ensemble</strong> and <strong>Kaki King</strong> and <strong>David Byrne</strong>, the <em>5 EPS</em> project sounds like something they dreamed up while high when they were starting out: like “ hey wouldn’t it be cool to do a monster quintuple album where each contributor makes a quartet of songs and then we finish with a combo mash up?!” Well, strap in, coz they did it.</span></span></p>
<p><span><span><strong>Maia Friedman</strong>’s <em>Windows Open</em> acoustic EP exercises her wide vocal range, honey-coated, near baritone moments blending with chorused-out double-bass and cajon, with adventurous chord choices and undercurrents of golden-era protest music artists like <strong>Joni Mitchell</strong> or <strong>Mama Cass</strong> or <strong>Janis Ian</strong>. It's that special, nostalgic, near-British delivery that mid-century Americans used to sound more mature or serious (alt-folk that gets more interesting with each replay being one of Projectors several distinctive flavours).</span></span></p>
<p><span><span><strong>Felicia’ Douglass</strong>’ <em>Flight Tower</em> EP cranks out the sampler and drum-machine, clear block harmonies and clever counter-melodies ring out over twisty dulcimer and glass bottle percussion, rhodes keyboards and something to make the sub get busy. There are some shades of <strong>Brandt Brauer Frick</strong> there, the classical music kids making funky rhythmic compositions with the unused timpani and triangles in the school orchestra practice room. If the new school R’n’B kids are looking for tunes to cover, this is where they’ll come from.</span></span></p>
<p><span><span><strong>David Longstreth</strong>’s <em>Super Joao</em> kicks off with a slow synthetic bossa beat just like grandma’s organ used to make. It marks a step-change in energy that really drags, although perhaps that’s because it begins with the first of only three out of twenty tracks to pass four minutes’ length. It’s a kinda lacklustre lull in the middle of an ecosystem with some very brightly coloured animals, but this could be the result of his part of the project being a literal tribute to Brazilian bossa nova originator <strong>Joao Gilberto</strong>. So no wild guitar antics, no zippy zeitgeist humour to the lyrics, and some suprisingly muddy tonework.</span></span></p>
<p><span><span><strong>KristinSlipp</strong>’s <em>Earth Crisis</em> EP is easily the most ambitious of the suite, bringing some woodwind ensemble chamber-music sounds to it’s opening track <em>Eyes</em> <em>On The Road</em>, before breaking it apart with a sampler cut-up and subby jagged electronic percussion contrasting pitch-shifted harmoniser vocals. This seems to capture the best of Dirty Projectors formal experimentation: R’n’B vocal chops meets classical instrumentation in an experimental art gallery with <strong>Phillip Glass</strong> writing the arrangements and <strong>Bjork</strong> freaking it all out with sampler and FX. it’s a hyper-literate walking tour of the 20th century with hidden trapdoors that drop you right back in to 2020. Is there anybody else who can do what DP does? Who can sound like a chamber operetta one moment, <strong>Brandy</strong> the next, then chop it up like <strong>Dilla</strong> to bring it home? Kristin Slipp definitely knows how, and it’s some of the most transcendent and fresh material in this whole feast.</span></span></p>
<p><span><span><em>Ring Road</em>, the final EP featuring everyone together feels like it’s here to headline the weird festival we’ve been wandering through. Maybe it’s because <strong>Mike Daniel Johnson</strong> finally appears on the drum kit, suddenly it feels like a gig more than a recital. It’s odd to say, but after ranging over so much territory, there’s an instant familiarity to the full band sound. Fans will recognise it immediately, but will we ever be happy with DP-classic again after trying all the interesting new flavours? Either way, the final five tracks feel like exactly what we were expecting before the massive detour.</span></span></p>
<p><span><span>For me, this daring adventure has shown me which facets of Dirty Projectors I was loving all along, versus the stuff where I was just along-for-the-ride, and maybe it will for other fans too. Personally, I’ll take full-length Felicia Douglass and Kristin Slipp solo records ASAP, then I’ll go enjoy the world’s most strangely satisfying dance floor at the next full band show. One thing is for sure, after eighteen years and eight albums, Dirty Projectors have stamped an outsized impression on the music world.</span></span></p>
<p><span><span>- Kieran Ruffles.</span></span></p>
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