Reviews for Zubot and Dawson

Music critics love to come up with classifications for artists so they can plug them in, make comparisons and feel like they can evaluate a performer based on how he or she stacks up to the others in this genre.

The talented Vancouver duo of Jesse Zubot and Steve Dawson has twice been nominated for a Juno Award in the Best Roots/Traditional album category and won that title at last year's West Coast Music Awards and Canadian Indie Music Awards.

Jesse Zubot and Steve Dawson have become fixtures on the folk festival circuit through their modern take on acoustic music and blazing instrumentation. But do they have any songs?

Strange instrumental music is what they play, leading gifted fiddler-mandolinist Jesse Zubot and virtuoso guitarist Steve Dawson (slide, Hawaiian, Weissenborn) Steve Dawson to dub their style STRANG. Twisted takes on blues, bluegrass and western swing is what it is - tasty too. The Chomp is feverish, fiddle-fueled jazz-funk, while Paloma is delirious, slide-driven gypsy music.

"...their eclectic music manages to be creative without being self-indulgent..."
-The Courier, September 2002

"...on their mostly-instrumental new release Chicken Scratch, they let those horses loose for a jazzy, improvised run..."
-Globe and Mail, November 2002

Our national mythology has it that Canadians are nice people who would never dream of pushing themselves on the world, American-style. By that standard, Steve Dawson and Jesse Zubot may be the most Canadian musicians alive.

In the world of Jazz, the mere mention of the word "fusion" brings to mind a wholly confusing post-Bitches Brew era that many believe should be forgotten. So let us cast aside those images and instead let Strang music re-define the essence of fusion.

This is the third album for Vancouver's Jesse Zubot and Steve Dawson and the first on a big, internationally distributed label. It's impossible to describe what these two suberb players actually do - it's a jazzy, bluesy, folky mix they call "Strang". "The Elf Hunter" for example, is a killer guitar run from Dawson layered with an insistent melody from Zubot.

The Vancouver-based duo Zubot and Dawson waste no time getting down to business on their new record, Chicken Scratch. The opening track, "Ed's Wake", takes us for a rhythmic ride, the acoustic instruments rising and falling like waves upon a shoreline.

You'd think a guy who plays mainly a resonator guitar (one of those big hollow-bodied metal-and-wood contraptions picked ocassionally like a regular axe, but more often thrown across the lap and played with a steel slide) and another who plays rustic fiddle and ocassional mandolin could go only so far, particularly when their chosen musical landscape lies well within established folk and country b

"Jesse Zubot and Steve Dawson's first album was nominated for Canada's Juno Award. And rightly so. On Tractor Parts, the duo's second release, the boyhood friends and string playing sorcerers continue to explore acoustic music and redefine it.

"... strange things are stirring in Canada. First the estimable Henrys emerged from Toronto with albums of lounge lizard Weissenborn lap slide, and now, over on the west coast, Vancouver's Steve Dawson (lots of slide guitars) and Jesse Zubot (mandolin, fiddle) are putting together what they like to call 'strang' music.

#1 Pick for Roots album of 2000: "These two twentysomething Vancouver virtuosos are the best thing to happen to acoustic music since David Grisman and Tony Rice put together their groundbreaking quintet 20 years ago.

"Hailing from Vancouver, Zubot and Dawson are an acoustic duo (! -- guitars, fiddle, and mandolin between the two of them) specializing in a style of music they invented and dubbed "Strang." Drawing heavily from bluegrass and traditional folk, the pair manages to fuse in some jazz, blues, electronic beats, tuba solos, spoken word, and whatever else seemed to be at their disposal.

"Combining the tried and true elements of American blues and folk music with other sonic experiments, Zubot and Dawson have nicknamed their patented blend of influences 'Strang'. Their first release in 1998, appropriately entitled 'strang', garnered critical acclaim here in Canada as well as abroad (including an Estonia bluegrass magazine).

"...Their music is complex, yet cinematic, playful, erudite, and flawlessly executed. Music for players and fans alike."
-CanEHdian.com magazine, June 2001

"...an inventive young duo who deftly incorporate blues, swing, reggae and bluegrass styles into their melodic and hypnotic original compositions."