What's cool? Mastodon, "Asleep in the Deep"

What a long, strange trip

Mastodon guitarist Brent Hinds may have slipped his leash recently when he ranted about his hatred of heavy metal in an interview with Guitar Player. He's evidently been trying to overthrow the band from the inside for years, to make them into something "not such a heavy metal band." A quick listen to their latest single, "Asleep in the Deep" from last year's Once More 'Round the Sun shows that he's still got his work cut out for him.

The song has a fair amount of progressive rock influence, with rhythmic shifts, an interesting harmonic flow, and a trippy bridge interlude, but the band's metal credibility remains intact with offset guitar grind, restless bass throb, and a thickly shadowed vocal atmosphere.The lyrics paint a paranoid picture of threat, but ultimately seem to find victory against the dark miasma of fear. Maybe so, but the feeling is anything but joyful or confident.

As enjoyable as it is to settle into the Gothic embrace of "Asleep in the Deep", this showed up on my radar because of Mastodon's new surreal video for the tune, directed by the artist, Skinner. Think of it as the psychedelic response to the GoPro cat channel on YouTube. With his owner passed out on the couch, our feline hero splits in search of adventure. Almost immediately, he finds himself in a strange black-light zone, surrounded by a pack of bizarro cat-monkey puppets. And that's before the cat is dosed with some psychoactive milk. Then it gets a little strange...

This is definitely a treat, so sit back and enjoy:

Recording review - Matt Stevens, Lucid (2014)

Musical tiles coalesce into a more complicated mosaic

Matt Stevens’ latest solo sketchbook borrows cubist techniques to deconstruct his musical aesthetic and juxtapose all of the perspectives into a single work. Any given point has its locus of continuity and the songs flow into one another in a meaningful way, but on first impression, the project as a whole seems scattershot as it slides from driving post-rock through acoustic art rock to jazzy interludes. But it turns out that Lucid is well-titled, after all. Step back and take a look at the album in toto and you'll see that Stevens draws on the looped guitar experiments of his early work and the more intense exploration of his recent work with The Fierce and the Dead to assert himself. Like Walt Whitman, he is large, he contains multitudes. And although he lets all of these musical personas loose, he’s also invited a host of talented players to join Any given angle or track provides a different window on Stevens’ development as a player.

My first introduction to Stevens was his 2010 solo album Ghost (review), with its wonderfully evocative acoustic guitar loops and jazzy touches. Some of the new tunes call back to Ghost’s sound, like the Beatlesque jazz of “KEA” or the Latin-tinged post-rock of “The Other Side”, which is reminiscent of Ghost’s “Burnt Out Car”. At the same time, Stevens’ heavier tone with The Fierce and the Dead is also well represented, especially on standout tracks like “Unsettled”. Bandmate Stuart Marshall provides the phenomenal drum work that locks the tune down with taut rhythms and tight flourishes. Marshall’s cage barely holds the flailing tantrum of guitar in check. That discipline supports the raw chaotic expression, creating a dynamo of energy that sounds like some kind of head-banging King Crimson mutant. Speaking of Crimson, drummer Pat Mastelotto lends his solid, open-fill drumming to the angular guitar exercise of “The Ascent”. The progression is torn from the Robert Fripp handbook, but the metallic guitar borrows more from players like Steve Vai. Stevens channels a vein of pure emotion and vents out against the mathematical structure of the piece.

That passion and flair set up the sharp transition to my favorite track on Lucid, “Coulrophobia”. “The Ascent” drops away, leaving a vacuum. Tentative, moody notes drip softly into a starlit pool, like Porcupine Tree covering “Echoes” by Pink Floyd. A nervous shimmer of tension lurks at the edges, but never quite comes into focus. Like a dream, there is no control as the tune slowly unfolds at a calculated pace. The nervous energy can’t shake the calm lack of volition and it builds towards a thin trickle of terror. The piece summons more of a sense of sleep paralysis than scary clowns for me, but the savory element of fear certainly comes through. Unfortunately, the song is over all too quickly, moving on to the moody drive of the title track.

In fact, with the exception of the epic piece, “The Bridge”, which runs almost 12 minutes, most of these songs are shorter vignettes. This is what gives Lucid its sketchbook feel, but this, too, is part of Stevens' artistic sense. Where many of his post-rock peers drag out their songs into long-running feasts, he prefers to make instrumental tapas, which showcase a idea with clarity and then set up the next exciting flavor. Lucid collects all of these into strange collection of contrasts and surprises, but the net result is a great musical meal.

Recording review: Joe Satriani, Unstoppable Momentum

Raise the prog-fusion flag and respect the axe!

There was once a golden age of progressive fusion. Back in the early ‘90s, performers like Eric Johnson, Steve Vai, and Joe Satriani astounded audiences with showy fretboard work and expressive melodies. The genre took its parentage from jazz fusion guitarists like John McLaughlin and Jeff Beck, but it borrowed heavy metal techniques like extreme whammy bar abuse, two handed tapping and speedy sweep picking. Largely instrumental, these songs followed jazz’s modal structure rather than relying on metal-style riffs or old school verse-chorus-bridge arrangements. After a few short years of public acclaim, though, the imposing style fell out of favor. Johnson became hamstrung by his own perfectionism after releasing Ah Via Musicom (1990) and Steve Vai’s followup to Passion and Warfare (1990), 1993’s Sex & Religion, got mired in band politics and ego clashes. Satriani had a good run of albums from 1987’s Surfing with the Alien through The Extremist (1992), but the next year’s release, Time Machine, didn’t fare as well. Like all but his truest fans, I lost track of his solo work around that time, but Unstoppable Momentum seems to pick up where The Extremist left off.
The songs run through a variety of moods from the introspective Gaelic feel of “I’ll Put a Stone on Your Cairn” to the funky electric boogie of “Jumpin’ In”. But Satriani’s ability to tap into the emotional well of each tune is a constant strength across the album. His playing mindset also separates him from his metal-head shred-meister cousins. Treating his guitar like a vocal track, he doesn’t burn through all of his technical tricks in a single song and he’s rarely repetitive or constrained by a collection of riffs.

On “Can’t Go Back”, Satriani’s initial guitar melody effectively sings a chorus, “Can’t go back/ Though you try,” which forms a recurring foundation for the rest of the song. The tune has a new wave feel anchored by Chris Chaney’s bass and Mike Keneally’s keyboard shimmers. The guitar takes on a reflective tone as it argues its point. The energy builds, capturing the frustration of looking back and fighting the past. His solo opens into that emotional turmoil with cathartic abandon that culminates in a dynamic drop to reset the song for a second pass. The band restates the earlier arguments, but never falls back into the same frustration, creating a sense of acceptance.

By contrast, “Shine on American Dream” is simpler and more direct. The throaty rock vamp of staccato guitar crunch supports a bluesy Americana vibe. The uplifting sense of pride lacks subtlety, but the earnest delivery gives the tune an anthemic quality. With the right set of words to convey the song’s optimism, this could be the breakout radio single for the album. Satriani stamps the tune with his imprimatur, adding a fluid, show-off lead that adds the perfect touch of pomp. The other radio-friendly cut, “A Door Into Summer” is less effective. Like “Shine on American Dream”, it relies on a less-developed structure, but the busier vocal line of the guitar doesn’t make the same impact.

Over several times listening to Unstoppable Momentum, it was the pensive darkness of “Lies and Truths” that gradually became my favorite. Keneally’s keyboard opening creates a sense of chill. This turns to tense calculation with Vinnie Colaiuta’s tight syncopation on the drums. The production ping-pongs Satriani’s detuned guitar from side to side, suggesting an argument. The next section lurches into a malevolent counterpoint groove reminiscent of Robert Fripp’s tense angularity, which represents the lies part of the title. In the “truths” section, the band comes into harmony, flattening the rough edges into a simpler forward drive. The layered guitars sing rising tones of affirmation before dropping the song back into the difficult question: which are the lies? A ripping two-handed solo vents its anger before the song runs through the lies and truths again. The interesting back story to this song is that Satriani played an experiment on the band with this track. Although he had already decided on the final title, the band was given a working title of “Fast Robot” during the recording sessions. He liked the effect this had on the band’s decisions about what to play. Colaiuta, for instance, gradually picked up complexity in his drum part until it built into the sound of a robot gone haywire. In the context of the real title, this helped drive the anger and tension of the song’s second half.

I’m glad to check in again with Satch and find that he’s still keeping the prog-fusion flame alive. While it’s not likely to spark a popular revival of the genre, Unstoppable Momentum is solid offering sure to please fans and impress guitarists of all levels of experience.

(This review first appeared on Spectrum Culture)