With three studio releases including their latest Distroid, combined with a triple digit yearly nationwide touring schedule, Dogs In A Pile have made it. The only question at this point is how far the quintet of Jimmy Law, Brian Murray, Jeremy Kaplan, Sam Lucid, and Joey Babbick are going to go? How far can they ride the self-sustaining wave of momentum they’ve labored for years to create?
If the answer to these questions is found in Distroid, the sky is the limit. With a barrage of fresh, wide ranging, genre shifting songs, the album easily meets the goal of DIAP piano/keyboardist and producer Kaplan. “Capture the band as accurately and tastefully as we could.”
Kaplan continues part two with the skeleton key to “accurately” translate a Dogs live show into a studio album as they did with Distroid. “The hardest part is getting the performances. When you’re in front of a crowd, you play differently. There are certain things to latch onto at a live gig that help you through the improv process. In the studio, you have overdubs and stuff which can remove focus from the band playing together. It’s about textures and layers. We used a lot of scratch tracks. We recorded everything live together in a room. Extra guitar, keyboard and vocal parts were overdubbed on top of that. When possible, we kept all the scratch tracks. That helped add to the feeling and pace.”
According to Kaplan, the expanded palate of musical flavors throughout Distroid and an unwavering focus to keep expanding their sound is foremost going forward. “The band is capable of many styles, and we can play a lot of styles authentically. We find joy in playing these styles. That’s what we want to do. Obviously, we have our lynch pins. Funky backbeats and all that stuff anyone can latch on to. What we want to do is take ourselves and everybody for the ride. There’s so much music out there. Let’s hear something else.”
“We’re generally open to whatever. We’ll bang our heads against the wall as long as it takes to make something work. We rarely give up on tunes.” Kaplan adds. “There’s plenty more stuff to be recorded. Too much as a matter of fact. If we continue at this rate, I don’t know if we’ll be able to have these tunes in a studio format. We want to start putting out albums of stuff people haven’t heard. It’s been fine to put out these records where everyone knows the tunes. We do want to put out records of new, unheard music.”
With a bright future ahead, but still early in their journey, Kaplan’s ability to produce the band’s music is an advantage most of their peers don’t have. Kaplan’s behind the scenes abilities were honed at Berklee School of Music where he joined forces with bandmates Murray and Lucid. “My major was contemporary writing and production. It was a good blend of recording techniques but also writing arrangements and of course composing tunes. It did give me different perspectives on several aspects of how recorded music works. I’ve always loved albums. Live shows are great and something I enjoy as well. I love to play, so a live show is really it for me. From the recording side, it’s almost like a time capsule. With us, things are changing so often. Distroid is a good representation of how things are right now. Having the writing and recording practice through school is how I want to approach this. Let’s get a good capture of the band and spruce it up compared to what you get at a live show.”
With several shows still on their ‘25 schedule, including a New Year’s run at Bearsville Theater, Kaplan takes a second to look back to a year full of new accomplishments. “Collectively we’ve been bad about looking back at periods of time or looking forward. We’re always in the middle of something. When you’re down in the trenches, it’s tough to look around and reflect. This year has been really good. There’s a couple of stand out hits we’ve had. Landmark events. We accomplished one of our biggest goals. That was playing the Stone Pony Summer Stage. We came up through the inside room at the Stone Pony. We’ve always looked outside and wondered when we’re going to get there. We finally did it a couple of months ago. That was a high-water mark for the band.”
Kaplan concludes, “We had a great set at Bonnaroo. Playing before it got washed out was a lucky thing. I look back and see some unlucky things. Our trailer lost an axle on the way to California. That wasn’t ideal. We always persevere. That’s the golden ticket for us. We push through and make it happen. As far as our next big goal, I don’t know. We’ll have to realign and figure it out.”
Dogs In A Pile Distroid 2025