COURTESY OF MATT CARMICHAEL
Frank Orrall preprograms some beats during a Chicago show.
Poi Dog Plus
Frank Orrall's 12-member
group hits home with
their latest album
Frank Quimby Orrall's 17-year odyssey with Poi Dog Pondering has been a rich one.
As the head man of the always-evolving musical ensemble, Orrall has seen PdP morph from a ragtag folk 'n' rock bunch busking on Kalakaua Avenue in front of what was the Woolworth store in 1986, to a 12-member soul-and-dance incarnation that is a constant favorite in his adopted home of Chicago.
In between were the years as a popular national alternative act based out of Austin, Texas, then Orrall's move to the Windy City in 1992, where his embrace of the local house music scene puzzled some of his old fans.
But the always affable drummer and former Hawaii resident -- a star on the local alternative music scene through the mid-'80s with his work in such noteworthy bands as The Squids, Pagan Babies and Hat Makes the Man -- has remained true to his muse.
The culmination of his musical wanderings may have finally been realized with this week's national release of PdP's latest CD, "In Seed Comes Fruit." And its fruition is probably due to an important trip the group made to Honolulu in 1999, three weeks after a lineup change.
For many familiar with Orrall's PdP project, seeing him on stage at Wave Waikiki, surrounded by unfamiliar Chicago musicians was intriguing. While they tried mightily to mesh pre-programmed beats with a live, soulful groove, it was obvious that the new PdP was still figuring out how best to present their music in a live setting.
Orrall acknowledges that feeling. Speaking by phone from Chicago on Wednesday, he said it was his intention to "go out to Hawaii, live under the same roof for about a month in my family's home in Hawaii Kai, and steadily work through this music.
"It helped with the bonding of the band members in a good environment and away from the distractions of Chicago," he said. "At the time, of course, we had upward of 22 people sleeping on air mattresses throughout the house!
"I admit I scared a lot of people away with that house music direction; my fan base thrown off by that, and when I changed up the band in '99, that also changed the fan base that was attached to the previous lineup.
"But Poi Dog was always a 'mulching' thing," Orrall said, drawing on a favorite organic metaphor. "I'd rather it change than stay alive as a static band entity."
FIVE YEARS LATER, PdP is ready to launch a major American tour in a couple of months to promote "In Seed Comes Fruit," with its generous and expansive groove. The band has an impressive frontline of singers in Charlette Wortham, Carla Prather and Kornell Hargrove; with veteran PdPers Susan Voelz on violin and vocals; John Nelson on drums; a monster bass player in Ron Hall; and a versatile horn player in Paul Mertens. (The group is rounded out by keyboardists Rick Gehrenbeck and Tim Gant, cellist Alison Chesley, percussionist Leddie Garcia, and longtime live film and visual designer Luke Savisky.)
COURTESY OF MATT CARMICHAEL
PdP's "In Seed Comes Fruit" CD | Photos of Frank Orrall, (left-to-right) Paul Mertens, Charlette Wortham, and Carla Prather in performance.In its fifth incarnation, the band has been a popular staple in Chicago, garnering several "best band" awards since 1997.
And each band member's contribution is more important than ever to Poi Dog Pondering's collaborative musical mulching process.
Nelson, a former Pagan Baby bandmate, shares a long history with Orrall, and was with him when the band went national. Nelson just moved to Chicago from San Francisco, where he and Orrall also share a side project outside of PdP.
Nelson rejoined the band last May, and said over the phone "that it was really nice to do it. I'd seen the band go through its various generations since I left and, frankly, I wasn't its hugest fan, although I enjoyed the soul influence.
"I continued to go to their live shows, and it was only when I was part of an opening act of theirs back in San Francisco, that I was struck at how authentic their soul flavor had become.
"Frank always remembered my history with the band as a percussionist, and when he recognized the importance of other projects he was doing that would take him away from being the drummer, I was seriously being considered as the band's next drummer."
And that's how Orrall operates at his best, purely by instinct. All of his band members are people he met either through Chicago recording sessions or recommendations from musicians he trusted.
"Dating back to our 1999 album 'Natural Thing,' the sound has continued to change," Orrall said. "On that album, along with the dance music, we were flirting with jazz, and now we've taken it to a whole different thing, with more orchestration, sound textures and music styles.
"It's a large, collaborative process, where I've opened up the songwriting to include the others. Sometimes I would record some small song ideas and send them out to the other band members, and they would respond with their own ideas about lyrics and chord changes.
"A good example is with the song 'True,' where the tempo was slowed down from the original and we approached it like a Sade track. It's important to draw on everybody's strengths," he said.
ANOTHER NOTABLE TRACK on the new album is "Keep the Faith," written in memory of local promoter, former manager and friend Greg Mundy, as well as Orrall's father, who was diagnosed with Alzheimer's before his death three years ago.
It's a song grounded in gospel, basing its lyrical heart on two phone messages made by Mundy's widow Cecilia and Orrall's father before the Alzheimer's struck. The messages of "the pain is too strong" and "keep the faith" are sampled throughout the track.
"It felt good finally using those phone messages," Orrall said. "Earlier on, it was just too powerful to try to put them in song, and it only took some time and perspective to hear how well these two messages 'talk' to each other."
And Orrall and the band have every intention to visit Hawaii as part of their tour, even though they may lose money due to the traveling party's size.
"Even though I'm rooted here in Chicago, I'm still rooted, in my mind, in Hawaii. I definitely want to come back and spend more time there since I bought my dad's house.
"Chicago is a good place to be musically," he said. "It's a big city but not as expensive as other comparable cities, and you have the ability to play with some really interesting and diverse musicians.
"Austin was huge and great for a while, but it got small really fast when I couldn't find anyone to share my enthusiasm and growing involvement in dance music.
"What got me started back in '89 was what was happening in Manchester, England, where bands like Happy Mondays and The Stone Roses were doing their take on Chicago house music. But I've always been involved with dance music, whether it was when I was playing with the Pagan Babies, or hanging out at the Wave after a Squids or Hat gig. As a drummer, it just made sense to me."
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