3 out of 5

Label: Ropeadope Records

Produced by: Chris Kelly (recorded by)

8-string guitar maestro Charlie Hunter does his thing of somehow playing like two musicians at once while Bobby Previte dribbles all over an electronic drums setup, making for some of the funkiest, coolest beats… that end up getting stuck at a similar tempo for a good majority of this two day recording session.

Later recording as ‘Groundtruther’ with a rotating third member, Hunter and Previte’s initial 2003 meetup provides clear bones for moving forward, the duo egging each other on to iterate in their own ways: Hunter jazzes off of some grounded licks he lays down; Bobby gets really delightfully goofy, with almost boom-bap inspired beats onto which he brackets voice samples, metallic sounding percussion, and more. But I described this as “bones;” it becomes clearer after the duo’s initial energy takes a pause during the 8-minute, somewhat more minimalist Up There, that that eventual third member will be a necessary component: Hunter and Previte end up digging in on a somewhat limited approach – which is sincerely enjoyable, and within those limits they are such skilled players that they find a ton to discover – but nonetheless, Come In Red Dog’s tracks deliver a somewhat standard elevator music background (Hunter’s “bass” and a boppy guitar line; Previte’s head-bobbing beat) that it’s a bit too easy to overlook how much work it takes two musicians to not only make what sounds like a full band’s sound, but also to do it so confidently as to suggest they’d been playing together for years.

The kind of surprisingly flexible experimentation at the start of the session is what ends up requiring the third member of Groundtruther: Hunter and Previte get fully in sync quickly, and have maybe too much fun not pushing each other out of that comfort zone.