Butterss, Anna: Mighty Vertebrate (Vinyl LP)

Mighty Vertebrate is the International Anthem leader debut from Adelaide, Australia-born bassist and composer Anna Butterss.

Butterss has steadily become a first-call for tour and studio work since moving to Los Angeles (after a stint in Bloomington, Indiana) in 2014. They’ve racked up credits with notables across the indie, jazz, and pop worlds alike – including Makaya McCraven, Phoebe Bridgers, Jason Isbell, Andrew Bird, and Daniel Villarreal – but their most notable contributions to the burgeoning West Coast creative music scene have been as a core member of both Jeff Parker’s ETA IVtet and rising proto-trance supergroup SML, who Pitchfork says “represents the thrilling next phase of a vibrant L.A. community.”

Their first solo album, Activities, was similarly hailed by Pitchfork as "one of the most exciting, undersung jazz releases of 2022," but the improvise-edit-reconstruct method used on that record couldn’t be further from the foundation of Mighty Vertebrate, which began amid the very real challenge of threading solo work into the dense calendrical web of an in-demand collaborator.

The music itself reflects that structure beautifully, with the material being tightly composed and melodically realized by Butterss well in advance of production concerns. They eventually migrated the operation to Chris Schlarb’s Long Beach hideaway BIG EGO to track a selection of full band material. With Schlarb at the controls they reconvene a group of trusted longtime collaborators to bring their compositions to fruition: Josh Johnson (sax), Gregory Uhlmann (guitar), and Ben Lumsdaine (drums, guitar, production).

Black vinyl version.

1. Bishop
   
2. Shorn
   
3. Dance Steve
   
4. Ella
   
5. Lubbock
6. Pokemans
   
7. Breadrich
   
8. Seeing You
9. Counterpoint
10. Saturno