INTERVIEW: Dextro

Image by David Hall

Ewan Mackenzie’s Dextro operates an elusive, periodic model par excellence. For over two decades the Scot’s guiding mantra has been high quality, low frequency; a succession of four-year cycles in which exquisite records have broken spells of extended dormancy. Other pursuits have informed this pattern – particularly now he’s returned to the drum stool of Newcastle’s all-conquering Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs – though equally pertinent is Dextro’s function amidst the multi-instrumentalist’s extensive musical portfolio.

“I think of Dextro like therapy; music as a form of meditation and self-reflection as opposed to a ‘project’,” outlines Ewan. “That said, I do want it to keep getting better! I like it to be as in touch with my own emotions as possible. I generally find that the more the music helps me, the better it sounds.”

An absorbing fusion of electronic and traditional instrumentation, Dextro likewise offers solace for listeners with a penchant for longform ambience and cathartic escapism. This was especially true of An Hour Is A Sea, an unwitting companion on many a state sanctioned stroll during those surreal spring and summer months of 2020 – and despite the stabler circumstances surrounding its release, there’s no question its follow-up sports similar medicinal potential.

“The title Respire got me thinking about western philosophy, and how so much of it is concerned with recognising ourselves and our society in relation to nature,” Ewan reveals. “We exist within a huge ecosystem which, no matter how hard we try, we’ll never fully understand. We can’t extract from it or dominate it, and yet we’re generally making a mess of it. I wanted Respire to detach from humans as much as possible – to appreciate that wider ecological world.”

I wanted Respire to detach from humans as much as possible

Certainly, this thread of interconnectivity is embedded throughout the new album’s 45-minute runtime. Sprawled across eight captivating cuts, its ideas represent the most eclectic and sonically adventurous Dextro fare to date, without compromising the cohesion that’s characterised Ewan’s catalogue from the get-go. There are jazzy flourishes on opener Forgetting, trademark spectral synths on Autonomy Fantasy Annihilator and simmering bursts of distortion on In Memory Of The Always Already – yet the emotional core coalescing these enveloping guitar, piano and electronic motifs transcends both mood and genre.

Principle among the new album’s innovations are contributions from guests Faye MacCalman (saxophone), Kate Halsall (harmonium) and Tom Merrit Smith (cello). The former connections were sewn before an audience at Breathe In Me, a one-off evening of collaboration staged back in 2022. “The remit for that show was very improvisational, and that was a space I’d never wandered into before,” Ewan recalls. “It felt like jumping off a cliff with a hand glider… there were elements of it which made me feel mortified, but I learned loads and found it really inspiring.”

“On the flipside,” he continues, “though most of my material stems from live shows, some of these songs were written at the piano and were far more studio-based. This record was probably as distinct as those two approaches to writing have been from one another.”

Issued via Pigs x7 bandmate Sam Grant’s Mr Medicine Records, the upshots defy their humble conception in a manner which simultaneously feels revelatory and naturalistic. An engrossing evolution of the Dextro palette, Respire witnesses a fitful, uncoerced creative mode bear fruit once more.

Respire is released on 13^th September. Dextro launches the album with a show at Newcastle’s Star & Shadow Cinema on Friday 20^th September.