Modern jazz piano trio GoGo Penguin is known for making music on the edges of the genre.
"We get that quite a lot, really, where people say, 'I don't really like jazz, but I like you guys' and that kind of thing," said GoGo Penguin bassist Nick Blacka, during a 2017 visit to the KNKX studios.
"We get all kinds of people coming along, like older fans and younger people. It's really across the board, which is what we're aiming for. Really don't want to make anything exclusive to anyone. It's just music at the end of the day, and hopefully everyone can enjoy it," Blacka said.
I remember describing them to a friend at a coffee shop as "acoustic piano trio inspired by electronic music." A stranger sitting next to us overheard and piped up, "that sounds cool. Tell me more."
Well, I'd be happy to:
Jazz musicians were some of the first to utilize electronic instruments in the '60s and '70s. By the 1990s, electronica found its way into the mainstream in the U.K. as pop music embraced electronic elements like robotic repetition, sparkling ambience, and alteration of acoustic sounds. The members of GoGo Penguin grew up at the peak of electronica popularity in the late '90s, including Blacka, pianist Chris Illingworth, and in this studio session, drummer Rob Turner who left the group in 2021.
Illingworth said that they didn't talk about what kind of music they would play when they formed in 2012, it just came naturally.
"You know, we've played together a long time. We've tried a lot of other ideas since then, and developed a lot as a band, and as individuals. But I think it's quite weird, and quite lucky, how all three of us have got quite a similar idea of what we've wanted to do, without actually explicitly having to say it. We just got together and made music, and luckily, it worked."
Iconic jazz label Blue Note records signed the band in 2015 where they released three albums and earned credibility as a jazz trio. They've recently moved to the German label XXIM Records (pronounced "21 M Records") with other progressive instrumental groups who aren't easily classified. So are they a jazz trio? I asked Blacka to explain how GoGo Penguin uses improvisation — the heart of jazz expression.
"Maybe it's not like improvisation in the sense that I'm going to take a solo now, and the drums are going to do fours, but it was still sort of improvising around, you know, as a unit, really kind of more fluid," he said.
"Sometimes it's a little more subtle than others. I mean, there are moments, like there's some tracks where there'd be a big bass and drum moment or whatever, but generally, it's just sort of the whole unit."
Pianist Illingworth explained where he sees similarities between electronic music and jazz.
"Electronic music has so many options available to it... it's almost infinite. You've got absolutely no boundaries. You can kind of write within any sort of structure. You've got all the technology to be able to use any sort of sounds, and manipulation of those sounds you want."
In the end, whether you call them jazz or electronica or a mix of genres, this is unmistakably GoGo Penguin music, and that's enough.
Songs heard in this episode:
- "Branches Break"
- "All Res"
- "Transient Statement" (Untitled at the time of the trio's 2017 KNKX Studio Session)
