The drums shuffle along with gusto, but then the thumping bass arrives, adding to the danceable rhythms and sway of the jazzy instrumental. The album “dance! skip! hop!” starts with a bang, or should I say, “thump?” Listening to its self-titled track, I can see a crowd hitting the dance floor immediately: celebrating the vivacity, the briefness of life, trying to hang on to every note of the conversation between the picked guitar, plucked bass, and cello notes. The drums accent each phrase end before insisting, with another fill, that the band should rejoin. The chatter between the instruments becomes agitated and discordant as the rhythms melt into a chaotic scene before settling back into the foundation rhythms that started the record. The track is tense, with the melodies sounding busy and slightly insistent, like someone who has to wrap up a very important conversation before their ten o’clock. The agitation increases again before the guitar slides into the universe and the song ends.
The next track, “a(ways) For CC and CeCe,” keeps the rhythmic momentum moving, with the interplay between the different instruments as spritely and nimble as ever. The cello strums and guitar responses are two old friends (who argue frequently) having another go. For them, the art of the argument is valuable in and of itself; it’s their purpose. Two intellectuals at a park debating politics, or, in old age, trying to recall their kids’ names. All the while, we’re held by the exchange. The slide electronic guitar is a wonderful pairing with the bowed cello portions, rippling and warbling against each other, playing each others’ slides, overlapping, diverging, but on the same page about the end destination. The song is fairly long, but feels like it passes too soon.
A man snaps his fingers and rotates his feet in time with the grooves on “Oo Long!” His snapping is nearly offbeat, but his feet click together in the perfect time. People at the laundromat look up with disinterest and then continue about their day. He continues hopping around, between the washer and dryers. A few children run to their parents in fear, but he just laughs and winks at them before slamming his head on the door on his way out. After recomposing himself, he runs and leaps over a few bushes on his way to what’s nextdoor: McDonald’s. Inside, he forces himself in front of several families waiting in line to grab their Happy Meals before insisting that he’s actually Ronald McDonald and is owed a free hamburger. The staff refuse, and he’s quickly escorted out of the establishment. Shame.
“Under the Aurora Sky” is a meditative track that sees all players at their most tearful. Tough, emotional moments are shared between souls pouring themselves onto a vast canvas of thought, turning an impasse into a highway of meaning that connects perspectives through understanding. I’m reminded of Vinnie (“Spaceman”) Bell’s guitar work as the electric guitar, along with its effects, cast a haunted afterglow onto the melodies and musical phrases spoken between the players. Tenderness gives way to an electronic, fiery intensity that rips and shreds its way into the song’s soul—deep enough to scar, but held away from the soul afterwards long enough for it to heal before reexposing it again to the fire. It’s heralding and impactful.
The final track, “Silver Spring Fig Tree,” plods along in a soft, mournful progression before the instruments disassociate and dissolve into scattered tones, scalding and drumming the ears, only to then return to the same plodding progression that insists but also drags along—as if our protagonist is passionate but running out of steam, stumbling along for the final hurrah. Is the fig tree still standing at this point? A symbol of growth, consumption, and rebirth that draws others to its large canopy? Or has the tree long withered, and the musicians are describing its heyday? The children would roam underneath its branches, searching for figs to snag, sneak, and snack before returning home to spoil their dinner.