If you’re trying to make it in the indie / jam band scene, you’ve got to stay at full throttle. That’s just to keep pace with the throngs of musicians vying for the same opening gig, festival spot, album deal and countless variables crucial to avoid the potholes happy to derail your journey.
Amazingly, playing 100 plus concerts a year while continually releasing new music is the bare minimum to give you a chance to break from the pack and keep the wheels in constant motion.
Dogs In A Pile (DIAP), the New Jersey based quintet, have been able to handle this furious pace with ease. Check out the hundreds of their live shows on all the streaming services. Most of their hundred plus yearly concerts are broadcast live or available soon thereafter. They have excelled at getting their music to a growing fan base. DIAP is also keeping pace on the album side with Distroid. The band’s third studio release since 2021.
The album is a fantastic capture of what DIAP brings to the table in 2025. Clocking in at just under an hour and technically a studio album, Distroid plays like a live album with each extended song perfectly placed to showcase what to expect at a live Dogs show.
DIAP’s piano/keyboardist Jeremy Kaplan, produced the album with the wide range of funk, country, rock and more found on the first two releases, Not Your Average Beagle (‘21) and Bloom (‘23). This time around Kaplan and the rest of the band Jimmy Law (guitar), Brian Murray (guitar), Sam Lucid (bass), and Joey Babbick (drums) turn into a bunch of mad scientists experimenting with a ridiculous range of flavors. From Reggae to 80’s punk garage bands, adding stops at Spanish love songs before finding the Beatles, Distroid is packed throughout.
Songs like Shenanigans, Thomas Duncan pt. 3, Samba for Sam, and Por Que, Pedro? offer a unique sound and set a new standard for the band. The ability to pull off going from the Butthole Surfers to Julio Iglesias in an instant should leave the listener with a grin and growing curiosity. The band’s unexplainably seamless cut and paste genre shifts set a broad foundation of what Dogs In A Pile has become and will be in the future.
When Slide&Banjo caught up with Murray in early 2025, the band was wrapping up the recording of the album, and he offered insight on what to expect. “We were supposed to take the month of March off, but we have our album to finish. Jeremy and Brian Masella, our sound guy have been in the studio working 12-hour days editing things. We go in and have our own days in the studio. This album is done completely by us. We had an engineer and went to a house in California to track the basics. Other than that, everything has been done in house. It feels really good.”
Slide&Banjo’s Marty Halpern caught up with Kaplan for a deep dive into the creation of their break free release. With the added pressure of producing the album on his shoulders, Kaplan begins with his early visions of what he wanted Distroid to be. “It was to capture the band as accurately and tastefully as we could. Like the first album with more of a band playing in the room, kind of vibe. We’ve continued playing and touring and doing our thing. We knew it was time for a new album but didn’t have much in the way of preproduction mapped out. We decided to just go for it, and it turned out to be like the first album. Trying to record and capture the band.”
With a long list of originals they’ve played live but not recorded, narrowing the roster of songs for Distroid became a team effort. “I think we were in Dallas and we rented a rehearsal room. We jammed some songs and worked out some stuff. We needed to come up with a track listing. It was somewhat by committee. I often say, just like the government, everything dies in committee. I think 90% of what we decided that day is on the album. There were a couple that got cut or replaced by another. It was decided collectively by us for sure.”
The album kicks off with Go Set, a longtime staple played over 150 times about going to a Dogs show. Kaplan’s decision on how to translate the longstanding live versions into studio recordings is a major factor in the success of the album. “For this album we recorded demos. It’s funny because there are tons of live versions of these songs from our live shows. We worked up demos that added things or took them away from how we’ve been playing them live. That tightened the arrangements when appropriate but allowed space for improv. The album sounds pretty close to the demos.”
Lucid’s contribution Lucia’s Secret is a complete shift from the funky Go Set. One of many unique genre and pace changes on a well thought out track listing. The nuance of making two songs that shouldn’t go together, flow perfectly is the beginning of what’s to come. “The first two tunes together are interesting for two reasons.” Kaplan notes. “First, it shows what you’ll be getting the rest of the album. It will be the full spectrum. Second, Go Set ends on a big E chord and Lucia starts on a small E chord so your ear is drawn there even though it’s sort of out of left field.”
Kaplan’s tune My Disguise picks the funk vibe back up. Bringing in the Ocean Avenue Stompers to add horns to the mix is an extra bit of polish showing off the maturity the band has found in a short time.
While Murray and Law take the vocals on most of the DIAP repertoire, Lucid and Kaplan play a major role in the creation of the songs. Kaplan explains the band’s songwriting process. “It’s generally preordained. Typically, the person who pens the tune is going to sing it. That’s not always the case. There are some revisions. Whoever wrote the tune will teach it to everyone. If it’s not working with whoever wrote it, we’ll try someone else on vocals. Sam writes the most songs he doesn’t sing. It’s piecemealed. There’s no strict order we stick to.”
Kaplan dates the origin of Nicolette to his college days with Murray and Lucid at Berklee College of Music. “I first heard Nicolette when we were in college. I think Brian introduced it to me as a stupid love song. It was pretty much in place from then and not much has changed about it. We tightened up the arrangement for the studio. It’s always been a straightforward tune.”
This will be the last time straightforward should be used to describe Distroid as things shift dramatically with Shenanigans. Starting with a vintage Murray/Law light Nashville country vibe about a relationship gone sour, the song slams the brakes midway through and makes a hard reggae right turn out of nowhere for an instrumental break to end the song. Kaplan points the finger directly at himself for the abrupt change of direction. “It’s Joe’s fault and mine. He and I are really into Frank Zappa. There was a period in the 80’s where he would give a hand signal, and his live band would immediately turn whatever song they were playing into a reggae tune. At the time of the recording, we were in a phase where everything is reggae. There’s a lot of that coming through.”
He continues, “Shenanigans is the big reggae moment on the album. If you look at the lyrical text, it’s shenanigans. People doing silly things. At the end, things get silly and it turns full on reggae which you would not expect, but it kind of works amazingly.”
Thomas Duncan pt. 3 is another highlight of Distroid. The 14 minute, well composed excursion covers multiple musical movements. It flows from the serene to a Who rock opera vibe and ends with a nod to the Beatles. This is a bookmark for what sets Dogs In A Pile apart from their bountiful competition. Kaplan arranges the pieces that are the Thomas Duncan puzzle. “This is a big number. It’s the epilogue of the whole story. It’s transcendent compared to part two. I was really looking forward to getting it into the studio. There’s a big textural section in the middle that was so much fun to put together. Piece and mold this nebulous, amorphous, swirling thing.”
“While there are no plans for one, there could be a part four.” Kaplan continues. “Musically there are a lot of Thomas Duncan themes that appear in our improv. We took some of those themes and chords and the basic structure of part two and extracted and glued them together for part three. There’s some stuff from part one which does exist that made its way into part three.”
Once again, The Bag is a showcase of the old school Dogs funk that perfectly merges into dark, spacy themes despite being on a completely different path. “We thought Jimmy would sound nice on it. And he does. It’s simple sometimes. People get hung up on you sing this one but not that one. That doesn’t really matter. It’s about the tune and we’re trying to make it the best it can be. Tone wise, this is the darkest song on the album. I wanted to lean into some of those sound effect-y kind of things without going off the deep end. Trying to find that dark feeling. It grooves and rocks but there’s something about it that’s dank.”
It’s not often some of the best material is relegated towards the end of the album. Such is the case with the Samba for Sam – Por Que, Pedro? – Samba for Sam closing pairing. This is the true showcase of Kaplan’s efforts as producer. He and Murray curate an eclectic amusement park soundtrack that starts at samba and slices its way back and forth through the tastiest chunks of fusion, country, funk, and more. Again, the album impossibly shifts to the thrasher garage band opening to Lucid’s Por Que, Pedro? In typical fashion, the song somehow shifts to a Spanish love ballad perfectly bouncing between an impossible swirl of musical genres going forward. It’s a clear statement piece of the unique sound Dogs In A Pile are bringing to a crowded table.
Kaplan shares his Frankenstein like story about how he pieced the ending together. “A tune like Samba is all about the composition. Brian and I put that tune together over the course of a couple of months. It started with some music notation software sessions we had. We glued things together and it took a while.”
“As the album goes through time, it challenges you more and more. It’s prepping you for this challenge you get at the end. It’s also a test on how far can it go? How much can you take? It’s kind of funny. I also think it’s some of the most engaging music on the album. The Samba for Sam stuff is the greatest glue job Brian and I have ever done. It’s really all stapled and mushed together.”
As far as Por Que, Pedro? “That was all Sam.” Kaplan offers. “He’s a wild beast. Nobody ever thought this was an acceptable thing to do. But he made it that way. The arrangement definitely helps it. It came together quickly. We’ve been playing it for many years. It kind of just happened.”
Coming up in part two, Kaplan takes the rare opportunity to ease off the throttle to stop and reflect on the path Dogs In A Pile have taken. Sharing his and the band’s high points while looking ahead to a busy future. Stay tuned.
Dogs In A Pile- Distroid 2025
This is a great review. Marty is spot on in describing the diversity and subtle musical nuances each song presents quite succinctly. Jeremy’s production skills are nothing short of amazing; a gift to look forward to in the years to come. Distroid masterfully exemplifies it is possible for jam band artists to present their long form-based tunes in fresh, exciting and compact form. No brainer-an A for the Dogs for their accomplishments with Distroid.