Dr Tree was New Zealand’s first jazz-rock fusion group and album. It was formed by drummer Frank Gibson Jr. in 1973 with Murray McNabb after hearing the Mahavishnu Orchestra and wanting to try and do something that had a rock and funk feel to it, but was still inherently jazz. The oft-told story (by both Frank and Murray) was that when Frank first heard the record he thought it was being played at 45rpm, not 33 1/3 because it just seemed too fast.
The line up originally was Gibson on drums and McNabb on keyboards, wth Kim Paterson (trumpet), Bob Jackson (bass), Martin Winch (guitar), and John Banks on percussion, with guest Colin Hemmingsen on soprano saxophone. They gigged around Auckland for a few years, confusing both the jazz and rock scenes as they didn’t quite seem to fit in either genre: too much in the way of electronics for the jazz scene, and they had improvised solos and swing rhythms, so a no-go for the rock scene.
The funny thing about Dr Tree is that I only discovered them long after I’d been through my ‘formal’ jazz education, and yet I have so many connections to the group. Murray’s ex-wife, Edwina Thorne was one of my first jazz teachers (and I also knew Murray through some friends who had played with or learned from him). Frank taught me at university and is 50% of the reason I’m a jazz historian (he was not only my ensemble tutor, but also my jazz history lecturer), Martin was also one of my ensemble tutors at uni, and I’ve had met Colin and Kim a few of times. Despite all of those connections the first time I had heard of Dr Tree was with the rerelease in 2007 of their 1976 self-titled album Dr Tree. Even then, I didn’t actually really listen to it until several years later.
Recorded and mixed over three Sunday mornings at the Radio New Zealand studios in Auckland the first last and only album of Dr Tree is what we would now describe as an EP- it’s actually quite short, only 37 minutes and six tracks long; the longest track is ‘Transition’ at just over 8 minutes. In other words, it’s quite short by jazz standards (in both track and album length), even in 1976. This is not a group that demarcates ‘melody line’ and ‘rhythm section’ instruments- they are a true ensemble: the bass and drums play an equal melody role with the trumpet, keyboards and guitar, who all play roles in supporting each other in the background of solos.
It’s tempting to say that this is a local version of an album like Miles Davis’s Bitches Brew, or Mahavishnu Orchestra’s Birds of Fire, but while it’s certainly innovative (particularly by New Zealand jazz standards of the time), it’s not quite that ground breaking. Dr Tree definitely takes musical cues from the well known fusion groups of the period. Also, despite its short length there is a musical debt owed to prog-rock and epic-rock groups of the period, in that there is that indefinable feel that groups like Led Zeppelin, ELP, and Pink Floyd all have, despite not being remotely similar.
What Dr Tree does do quite well (that is something that it still fairly rare in jazz) is that it has a something of a musical narrative that runs through the entire album, despite there being no obvious overarching narrative structure. Loosely speaking there is a quality (to break out my classical music training for a moment) leitmotif running through the album. Not so much in terms of musically describing specific characters, but rather to characterise a feeling of alienness and that of going on a journey. It almost feels like a jazz-fusion take on War of the Worlds– in particular the pieces ‘Vulcan Worlds’ and ‘Transition’, the latter a space waltz if ever I heard one.
The best way to describe Dr Tree is ‘space jazz’. It fits well into that slightly out there 1970s experimentalist jazz fusion: the first tracks on the album are called ‘The Twilight Zone’ and the second is ‘Vulcan Worlds’ after all. The timbres and the shape of the melodies also enhance the otherworldly feel of the album. While the structures of each piece are different, there are some commonalities throughout that give it this space feel: ostinatos from the synths, and repeated rising arpeggio lines in the guitar and bass, while Gibson breaks out some of the less heard percussion (various bells and shakers) to add to his drum kit lines.
Dr Tree is a very easy and fun album to listen to. It’s deceptively simple on the surface, with easily followed melodies and riffs, driving rhythms and killer grooves; but repeated listening makes you aware of the subtleness and the complexities involved- for example the way McNabb and Paterson blend their shared lines in ‘Transition’ so well that on first listen it seems as if it is a particularly brassy sounding synth sound. No matter how many times I listen to it it always takes me by surprise at how well its done, and how effective their supporting melody line is in driving the piece along. There are subtleties like this all over the album- simple (or seemingly so) but so incredibly effective at building on motives.
Although McNabb wondered at the point of a 30th anniversary reissue of the album in 2007 (as he said in interviews, it’s not like he ever saw any money from it), its availability digitally and on CD meant that it was now available to a new generation of listeners. Reissues are also vitally important for the preservation of New Zealand music because so much from the 1950s through to the 1980s had a small and finite pressing, which means it is very easy for it to completely disappear as people throw out LPs on an alarmingly regular basis. Albums like Dr Tree are important but fragile and ephemeral documents of New Zealand jazz history, which are easily lost. So much of my work dealing with the pre-recording era (pre-1947) is trying to work out how jazz sounded from written reports, but this piecing together also happens in the recording era where recordings have been essentially lost (as in you can’t beg, borrow, steal, or buy them), so from my point of view as a both a jazz fan and historian reissues are important to introduce people to music (how else would I find such cool stuff), and to preserve valuable, but ephemeral art.
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