The fourth show for the 2016 Lowell Summer Music Series has been announced, and it is a jam band. Dr. Dog will be making its first appearance at the Series on Saturday, August 13th!

“Dr. Dog’s latest album could very well have been their first. It could have been their only album; or it could have never been made at all. It’s either a refined culmination of 15 years of collaborative music-making or the blunt instrument on which they cut their teeth. This chicken vs. egg debate will be for historians to decide; fact is that if The Psychedelic Swamp was a half-baked idea back in 2001, it has been reborn in 2016, fully baked.”

Dr. Dog (Official Photo)

“The Psychedelic Swamp is Dr. Dog’s ninth album, and third studio release with the ANTI- label. Most of the songs were among the first ever written together by Scott McMicken and Toby Leaman along with the friends and cohorts that would evolve into Dr. Dog. This early endeavor helped shape their worldview of a label-defying, multi-hyphenated indie-psychedelic-rock-folk-basement-Americana-touring band. Many artists might cringe at the idea of revisiting the works of their younger selves. Not Dr. Dog. “I’vve never looked back at that time with anything other than real affection,” McMicken said. “The original tape could have disappeared and never been heard again, and I still would have held it dear to my heart, because it was the closest I’ve ever been to a true creative process.”

“If the seeds that were planted in The Psychedelic Swamp helped give voice to many of Dr. Dog’s songs over the years, this revisiting finds the fruit of 15 years of collaboration in full bloom. Fans will recognize the harmonies, the puckish wordplay and the introspection, but it’s impossible to place these songs in the Dr. Dog chronology. The album opens with “The Golden Hind” echoing the dreamy low-fi pops and whistles found on the album Easy Beat (2005), while the next song, “Dead Record Player,” could just as easily been found among the smooth front-stoop soul of B-Room (2013). It’s as if past, present and future Dr. Dog are collaborating in a kind of timeless recording studio. Even the songs within Psychedelic Swamp borrow from each other: Leaman’s “Bring My Baby Back” is a whole song sprung from a single line in “Engineer Says.”

“Leaman says this is not a rock opera with a traditional A-to-Z narrative arc, but rather a tapestry of Phrases’ search for happiness. “I’m comfortable calling it a concept album, for sure,” he says.”

Tickets for the Dr. Dog show are priced at $34 in advance (fee-free!), $40 on the day of the show (if available) and children 12 and under are always free courtesy of Eastern Bank. There are also premium seats – beach chairs are provided by the Series – set in two rows directly in front of the stage for $134. Tickets go on sale at 9 a.m. on Wednesday, March 2 through Lowell Summer Music Series.

For those of you who are unaware of the  Series, or if you are aware of it but have never attended a show there, it is an outdoor (weather permitting) concert series held on National Park Service grounds in Lowell, Massachusetts. The Series is not-for-profit, which helps keep the ticket prices reasonable.

Surrounding Boarding House Park are old mill buildings, part of the Lowell National Historical Park, which you can tour if you arrive early enough. They provide an unusual setting for an evening of great music and ambiance.

The Series generally runs from late June to early September.

This Series is dear to my heart. I have been a season pass holder since 2007 and it is one of the highlights of the year (and of summer in particular) for me. Many lasting friendships have been made there. I expect this will be another excellent year!

I will post additional announcements for the Series as they are made.

Shows announced to date are:

July 16 (Saturday) – Colin Hay

August 13 (Saturday) – Dr. Dog

September 1 (Thursday) – ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic

September 3 (Saturday) – The B-52s