Damaged in Transit is a live trio album by bassist Steve Swallow with tenor saxophonist Chris Potter and drummer Adam Nussbaum. It was recorded on tour in France in December 2001 and released in 2003. Swallow wrote all nine pieces, titled only Item 1, D.I.T. to Item 9, D.I.T., as a compositional exercise that relies on melody more than on chord structures. With no chordal instrument in the band, Potter carries most of the melodic load.
The record came out on XtraWATT, the sister imprint of WATT, the label run by Carla Bley and Michael Mantler, and Swallow produced it himself. Bill Strode recorded the concerts, Swallow mixed them with Tom Mark, and Greg Calbi mastered the result. According to BBC Music, the booklet prints the sheet music of all nine tunes. Swallow plays electric bass with a pick. His soft, rippling lines work as counterpoint to the tenor, and they often link or introduce the pieces.
In The Guardian, John Fordham heard the opener as a bebop tune approached from several directions before it snaps into fast swing and a long tenor solo. Item 2 is a bluesy piece with Nussbaum, in Fordham's phrase, "at his most imperious" underneath. Item 3 is a slow ballad, where Peter Marsh of BBC Music found some of Potter's best moments. Item 7 brings out the saxophonist's tender side with fragile high notes and close dynamic control.
Fordham, giving the album four stars in October 2003, called it "a no-frills, flat-out, brilliantly executed piece of stylistically-sweeping jazz jamming", and compared Nussbaum's rumbling drums to Elvin Jones. Marsh compared the trio to Dave Holland's band and wrote that it engages "the head, heart and feet with their unpretentious yet cerebral swing." Robert R. Calder, in PopMatters (2004), noted how rich in harmony the music is, and how well Potter uses his horn's resources without giving up beauty of sound. In his hearing the set opens with straightforward swinging jazz and never leaves it behind.
This is the CD edition, catalogue XtraWATT/11 (067 792-2), first released on 7 October 2003.
