It's a chilly, rainy day in Missylvania as the winds that drive the storm crackle overhead and break through the effervescent sky of divine pipe smoke. The asthmatic breath of the gods point everything ninety degrees to the southeast, and I, without an umbrella, dash the ten feet through the howls of weather to quickly unlock my car door and hurl myself into the front seat. The general plan is to do this without getting too soaked, but that is just a pipe dream and I hit the seat, scoot upright with added motion in my hips, and slam the door behind as a monstrous gust beats at my driver side window like a horde of banshees beating at the the stone walls of Blarney Castle. I am soaked. The droplets of water drip from my bangs and onto my shirt as I turn the key and the cold AC, still on from yesterday's ride, blasts me in my face sending tiny daggers of ice through my veins as it whips across the water on my arms and face. "There's got to be more to life than this" I think to myself as I push the partially visible compact disc hanging from the player into its slit and watch it disappear. Perhaps I'll be lucky this time. Perhaps not. I close my eyes for a brief moment as if the added mental effort on my part might sway the spirits of earthly probability to allow this small gem of gold foil and lacquered plastic is alongside prayed to produce some cheerful sound to accompany my drive to work. No such luck. I shall only be beckoned by the droning laughter of the rain and wind, the splashing of the cars as I pass them and they pass me on either side of the white lines barely visible in the storm.
I walk into work twenty-seven minutes late due to poor visibility and the ire of a front that is still mad at mankind for not sacrificing a virgin at midnight perhaps. Hell, I don't know, but I'm really sick of having to drive in this rain at this point. This time it cost me money, and all I wanted to do was disappear into my work, and escape for a while on some dreamy current of music, textured velveteen with the knowledge that it would be a while before I had to venture back out in the elements. I slipped into my chair with nary a word, turned on my computer, and immediately put on my headphones. I flicked the switch on my external hard drive contianing all the music I owned in the world, sixty gigs stretched across a spinning platter lik a pizza pie made of the wreckage of a world war II bombing squadron. What was I in for? Who could tell. I had made a concerted effort recently to pick up some new music, and was eager to try some of it out. I discovered a record label, TeePee records, that had a bunch of neat bands with names like Black Math Horseman and Ancestors. "Earthless. Hmm. Okie dokie. Bring it on, Earthless." I said to myself as I started the first track of the album "Live at Roadburn". There were only two songs on this album which wasn't really an oddity for some of these bands to whom I had listened. Often these indy labels put out EPs of live shows and whatnot. What ensued after that mouse click was nothing short of ninety minutes of groovy and about seven or eight inches past 'Damn.'
Earthless was exactly what I needed this morning. The first track, Blue / From The Ages, began with a warm welcoming of the crowd at the 13th annual Roadburn fest in 2008. Earthless, didn't waste any time, however, as Isaiah Mitchell's feedback ladened whine of sustain broke the air and hung there like a bumblebee caught in an updraft and smoking a phatty while watching Max Headroom sing Merry Christmas, Santa Claus. I couldn't really tell you where either of the two songs started, ended, or came together. Unlike so many jams, the beauty of Earthless isn't at the joining of two ends a la The Allman Brothers Band, but rather the journey between multiple destinations amongst the stars of a universe painted with multiple effects and rawness of the dusty, woody tone of Mitchell's trip across the cosmos. As note after note swirls about the others in aeruption of harmonic ether. each rhythm, each variation of rhythm seems to break through like a sentient piece of baker's dough kneading itself in a tumbling dryer of existential discovery. I begin to see exactly why they call themselves Earthless. They are not simply a 'jam band' though I've only run across one song of their's that's under 7 minutes long and has words, and that's a cover tune.
Just happy to be along for the ride is the bouncy tone of Mike Eginton just outside the background of Mitchell's serenade piercing the black void ahead like a comet, holding his pilot just a few inches above the complementary tides of drum after drum sent forth by Mario Rubacalba, Earthless' mad scientist that broguht the elements together. But in the end, you have to ask yourself, "Does the monster bend to the will of the scientist, or does the scientist bend to the will of the monster?" Through fifty-six minutes of greased lightning and blazing solar furnaces of stoner rock, the listener's ear are wrapped around a variety of intermingling rhythms backboned by Rubacalba and Eginton, and fat, meaty accompaniments architectured by Mitchell's Silver Surfer -esque unravelings. During this time and with a hardly a otice, I replaced the LCD in a notebook computer. I had reached my goal. I escaped the trying frustrations of my corner of the universe. I, indeed, had become quite, well, earthless myself.
All was not cherries and popsicles, however. Now, there's nothing bad about this album, but after fifty-six minutes, I realized why I didn't own a lot of jam bands in my musical repertoire. Jam bands are like porn in that it's just not fun anymore after about an hour. I need a bit more conclusion, summarization, or even finality in my life. Well, if not in an existential sense, then atleast in context of my music. Perhaps my appraisal would be different if I hadn't made a particular effort to listen to every portion of this album today. After all, this is the kind of album you put on in the background during a cokout with your friends and just let it hang in the background like a weather baloon made of awesome, pulsing just enough to occaionally catch someone's attention to appreciate it. I really like this album. But I can't sit for 90 minutes and listen to two songs, unless I have something to affect my sense of time to the point that time flies by or my mental functions completely drag like sliding down an incline made of caulk. In this, Earthless is no Allman Brothers, Rubacalba is no Gregg Allman, and Mitchell is no Duane Allman. But they are pretty damned good in their own right. Comparing the two isn't fair, though, as that's really comparing oranges and bike tires. Yeah, they are both round, but that's really about it. I could compare them to, maybe, some of the Widespread Panic jams, but then that just leaves me wondering 'Widespread who?'. But that wouldn't be fair to Earthless, right?
Alas, I digress.
Earthless Links:
Earthless @ MySpace
Earthless @ Wikipedia
Gravity Records
TeePee Records
Earthless @ Last.fm
Enjoy.
Invino Veritas
8/11/11
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