Don Allred's Country 07 Comments Pt. 4 Go way into town, but only to where the streetlights haven't been shot out yet, and in the nimbi of yon streetlights, amidst the mists, behold Miz Pam Tillis, with her big, dark green eyes, her long, dark brown hair, her small, calm, brave face (cute not zombie, yet almost totally re-constructed after a wild child car crash at 16, as she'll tell you).On Rhinestoned, her A-list Nashville Cats provide the perfect settings for lush, overcast, ruefully lucid musings, not too chairbound, either: "Life has Sure Changed Us Around" is a chance (?) encounter with John Anderson on the sidewalk, musical traffic going about its business (oh baby), as they get het up and cautiously check each other out, while referring to days and nights when they were much younger, much less responsible (or with much fewer responsibilities). Followed immediately by "Someone Somewhere Tonight," as she suddenly sits up, all too awake, and sees very far in the dark (whoever she's talking to is probably sleeping like a baby on the next pillow, and not like it's a ballad of bravura pathos to wake his ass up, she knows better than to believe in such). But it's my idea of what a pop country hit album should sound like, one idea anyway, although ultimately she's maybe too much the victim; should turn the tables and/or have more ambiguity, ambivalence at times (though there is one where she's mentally explaining to a guy that she's always been the one left behind, and now she doesn't seem that thrilled to find out he's apparently not leaving; doesn't fit her expectations/plans). And there are a lot of good variations on familiar themes, like a waitress telling 'bout how she learned not to trust her car or her heart to a certain someone, certain kind of anyone. Another good should-be-more-popular pop country (with soap opry, somewhut proggy, [but only like the early solo albums of Scott Walker, if he'd stayed in the States] cowboy) album is that by Protest Hill, but don't get me started, just check the link in Top Ten above, to review and song-stream, please! Past the possibilties of that "Band In The Window" Pam's intrigued by, and those "Matches" behind the mirror Protest Hill's looking for (well, in something that opens uplike a rusty little medicine cabinet, the kind with old snapshots curled up behind the bottles with the faded-to-invisible prescription labels), the cowboy-slash-farmer finds a nice hallway, where Bobbie Nelson's AudioBiography rolls solo piano every evening, with guest appearences by Willie's vocal and guitar, with Jody Payne, second guitar on the first and last tracks. She does a standard ballad ("Crazy," "Stardust," etc) then a boogie-woogie (or related), but for the most part, it's the ballads that really get me ("Stardust"!), because of the way her momentum and lyricism reinforce and build on each other. So she doesn't really need the up-tempo stuff, but it's good too (keep the customers moving right through Silver Ceety), and "Down Yonder" is certainly as much of a trip as I'd always hoped, after reading Tosches and vainly searching for a playable record of it by Jerry Lee's earthly inspiration, Del Wood (hey Mr. T., I'd even settle for that "Psychedelic Mockingbird" of hers you seem to warn us of). Johnny Bush's Kashmere Gardens Mud: A Tribute To Houston's Country Soul is just like it's billed: the poignantly straightforward title track, memoir of a house that was bleak enough even before Mama left Daddy (and the kids? He doesn't say—a kid who thought it was his fault for the split?) is followed by several honky tonkers who gain by "Kashmere Garden Mud" 's implied contextualization (can see that it's the son or jilted husband, or maybe the runaway wife or her intended, further down the line, who might be tossing down another, while tossing off, "So I'll sail my ship alone, and if it goes wrong, I'll blame it all on you.") But there's a tendency to old-school enunciation and evenness of tone and cadence, to a formalism, which can overtake the earned stoicism and poise. Despite and in part because of his careful baritone (and the fact it is a baritone, so gravitas sometimes seems like gravity, with no rainbows in any useful place). Especially when applied to a museum jukebox full of chesnuts. So yeah, A Tribute to Houston's Country Soul (including big band blues, which he rides very correctly, tall in the saddle). And Willie Nelson steals the show on "Send Me The Pillow," but Johnny's somehow a little more evenly matched with the pre-Willie-quirky Floyd Tillman on "They Took The Stars Out Of Heaven," and both tracks are def keepers. Even more somehow 'bout it, Johnny and Willie's verson of "Pancho And Lefty" gets me much more focussed on that song than the Willie's previous hit take. Willie times Merle times Townes times Pancho times Willie times Federales times Cleveland = too much charisma in one track for plain ol' me. But Johnny's journeyman equivalent of this "transparent prose" some speak of thins the atmospherics just enough to clear my ears. And certainly the musicians (like Buddy Emmons on steel guitar) do their bit: dig that jaunty stagger-step on "I'll Sail My Ship Alone." And actually, the song-choices aren't all familiar, but they're all apt: "I Want A Drink Of That Water" ("that He turned into wine") syncretizes the Saturday night and Sunday morning themes (not that the latter isn't usually closer to gentle regret than outright repentance). Welcome in, it's one heck of a museum to sail, at least (and Mr. Bush makes sure you won't have to sail it alone). (Pt. 5, the last part, follows)https://thefreelancementalists.blogspot.com/2008/02/at-my-aunt-memorial-service-program.html

07 Country Comments pt. 5: Best of the Superfluous and More!

Don Allred's Country 07 Comments pt. 5 At my aunt's memorial service, the program included an African-American-sounding hymn (ca. late 18th, mid-19th Century transcription? Or later, probably, transcription-wise), "Come Away To The Skies": "Come away to the skies, my beloved arise, and rejoice in the day thou was born." Piano, vocals, slight trills, suggesting wings. "Wast"? Never heard that, or any of this song before; amazing (and graceful). She was once referred to as "the Dolly Parton of classical and Baptist music." Meant as a compliment, and rightfully so. Recalled the pastor, who also has a bluegrass band," She played forte. A member complained, and she asked what she should do. Ah told her, 'Play louder.' " The Charlie Daniels Band's Deuces is Charlie's duets album, with his stalwarts serving here as first-class bar band, hoisting a set of covers and re-hashed personal chestnuts. No Z Z Top numbers, much less guest shots, alas (see CDB's Tailgate Party for the former, and other good cover versions)(for a contrast/compare session with Z Z and CDB's POVs, please see my "Sharp Blessed Men" archived at villagevoice.com) But "Jackson," with cool-wailin' Gretchen Wilson, has a sleek stomp and kick, somewhut a la Z Z. Descending porch bass notes are greeted by wristwatch-tapping rhythm guitar, in "Signed Sealed Delivered I'm Yours," with Bonnie Bramlett. Even the lesser tracks are rattled along by the characteristically, expertly harnessed speediness, which sometimes gets looser and surfaces as anxiety in his manifestos. But on this album, "Let It Be Me" (with Brenda Lee) is more poignant for its briskness, its flexing: the female duet partners, especially, know how to soothe him (and the old, familiar songs) just enough, to bring out the brio over the brittleness. Without undue earnestness getting in the way---like Vince Gill does on "The Night The Drove Old Dixie Down." (Contrast with the Allman Brothers Band's version on Endless Highway: they don't allow themselves to solo much, much less over-emote—Gregg doesn't even groan! But he's appropriately unhappy.) The Scruggs brothers whine their way through "Maggie's Farm"; they should please shut up and pick, like Daddy Earl does. Still, Charlie and Darius Rucker have a fine time zinging the hapless, right through "Like A Rolling Stone," like Perez Hilton and Michael Musto with better material. The joke's on Charlie in "Evangeline" ("I hear your laughter in the rain"), where he's ably assisted by the Del McCoury Band (haven't yet determined whether CDB also plays on the tracks featuring guest instrumental chunks), and Del himself sounds swell, in homage to Elmer Fudd (a supporting role, and he's fine with it, as always; suits him better than solo spotlights). "What'd I Say" is filigreed with the curly burly slightly furtive sub-Ray intonation of Travis Tritt's trivia; "Daddy's Old Fiddle" doesn't have enough of Charlie's old fiddle or Dolly Parton's old schtick (she's expressing interest like a politician on an off day); "Long Haired Country Boy" is best of the superfluous, with Brooks & Dunn clapping along and staying out of the way of the song's long-lidded, don't-tread-on-me undercurrent. Charlie don't "take a toke" here no more, but the line about the TV preacher stays, despite his own return to the fold, and it foreshadows the advent of "God Save Us From Religion," with Charlie's fellow deacon, Marty Stuart. The title is the sumna of a "barroom philosopher," who's mainly building a castle of bottle caps, but Charlie and Marty surely sound with him (consciously intended as sympathetic irony?). Charlie and Montgomery Gentry are all big, high-strung, hit-the-note guys together on "Drinkin' My Baby Goodbye," and finally, we get an actual instrumental, "Jammin' For Stevie," with Charlie and Brad Paisley trading well-considered, enterprising guitar stunts, proving that Southern Rock can still be more than a museum. Nice vapor trails and aftervibes to end the album on a peak; as Paisley would say, it (and at least 60 %of the CD) is "time well wasted," to say the least. (I'm under-rating a little, in honor of Charlie's currently evident allegiance to "Always leave 'em wanting more.") PS: listening to a song on the radio: haven't quite yet got who's doing what to whom, but it's a quietly shapely tune, passing through stoned beauty, way under the saucer, under the formica tabletop, in the slightly blurred, burred chorus, the soothing monotony, and Paul Newman's just met Piper Laurie, they're sitting in a booth in a bar in the gray daylight, and he's watching her talk just a little too carefully, as she gets wasted (he's trained to watch people, no matter what). Although she's dedicated to getting her courage up, stoned song baby's been there done there. ("Morphine" something, by Gillian Welch and David Rawlings, on a live broadcast; they're always better live, breathing better, reaching, finding an audience in front of them, and something else I can't see, can Paul? Does it and how does it matter, considering what will happen? It makes some kind of difference, differences, to the audience, while the scene continues, and sometimes after the show's over)(ebba debba th-th-th-that's all foldkz!)

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In the Coming Year!

Video Games I Want To See in the Coming Year
by John Wójtowicz

Russian sex-traffickers in speedboats with submachine guns off the
coast of Dubai – the classic!

The one where hitherto peaceful fishing vessels open fire on each
other, Iceland and Portugal, for instance.

The role-playing game where the psychopath BDSM overlord makes you do
data entry in a poorly lit cubicle in a windowless room for 13 hours
with breaks only for bathroom and the vending machines for 52 weeks
straight with no vacation.

Inventing & marketing utterly superfluous flavors & products with
names like "Choco Rico" and "Odorific" and "Licorice Guarana Pheromone
Deluxe".

Railroading an election by juggling the votes by rigging the voting
machines by blaming it all on tiny little pieces of paper.

You run a virtual factory on a video screen that produces make-believe
objects just like the real ones they used to make here and they now do
for real in China in filthy factories right this minute round the
clock.

Live online webcam dating where you're required to appear entirely
naked, in your natural hair color, showing your passport, driver's
license or photo ID, credit and employment history, proof of health
insurance, blood test results, SAT scores, MBTI, MMPI, astrological
chart, and Enneagram.

The game where you get to change history by altering the President's
brain chemistry based on the dosage of the various antidepressants,
synthetic opiates, methamphetamines, and commercially available
alcohol you permit him to consume.

Business simulation model where you take your own real-life
professional peer group and alter the parameters of the Tall Proud
Successful Alpha Male and the Fairytale Career-Girl Princess. Watch
the Male fail to perform when you happily hide his Viagra! See the
Princess tweak when she can't go purge in the ladies' room after the
big business dinner!

The game that eliminates all the combat games. The game that
eliminates all combat. The game that levels per-capital income across
the globe as investment bankers dive out of windows.

– j.w., winter solstice 2007

Turn The Page And other Delights (Part 1)

By Don Allred
"Everything I do is just a little wrong,
Everyday for me is the same,
Everyone I know is getting' in my face,
And I only got myself to blame."
That's Bob Seger, just before declaring (with a little swagger) that
he's about to "Wreck This Heart," the first track on Face The Promise,
his first album of all-new material since 1995's It's A Mystery.. As
on that album, Seger's pissed. But this new set is not divided into
confrontational social commentary versus near-greeting-card verses
about the joys of family life. No, Face The Promise is a richer mix,
emotionally and sonically. At 61, Seger knows there's enough blame to
go around, and for what. But he also knows how far knowing that will
get you, so "Wreck This Heart," for instance, is less about
self-recrimination than it is a pretext to cut loose, via guitars,
bass and drums. (Bits of keyboard on some tracks, but the air is
finally free of antiseptic, Roy Bittanesque billows and pillows.
Mainly and appropriately, since much of mainstream pop country now
taps 70s hard rock, you get A-List Nashville Cats. J.T. Corenflos,
whoo-hoo!) Und also the historically inevitable duet with Kid Rock:
"Real Mean Bottle," written by Vince Gill, about Merle Haggard,
ummkay? It's real good, honkies tonky honkin' down the highway. Yet
there's no macho nostalgia either. That's right: Bob Seger, of all
people, is not doing nostalgia anymore.
Well, not as much, anyway. But it's basically a familiar approach,
and he can't help invoking comparisons, mostly favorable. Although,
Face The Promise does have a few tamer examples of his patented
medium-speed numbers, not quite ballads: "Seger mediums," he calls
them. As he once admitted, "They were a challenge to write, now
they've become formulaic."
But Seger's always been ready to teach us, on his recordings and in
his overall career, about the trickiness of adapting, the need to
remain unsettled. His earliest known songs bear this out, as collected
on The Singles 1966-1967, a deleleted, but still findable, Capitol
Records release. Seger's first single, "East Side Story," is about the
inevitable rise and fall of a novice thief, who brags about his
ability to deal with soft, rich folks. The song stomps along in the
face of doom, punkily enough. Attitude is less predictably employed in
his second single, "Ballad Of The Yellow Berets." In effect, its
gleeful delivery is as much a takeoff on Sgt. Barry Sadler's solemnly
monotonous original, "Ballad Of The Green Berets," as it is on the
"yellow" mid-60s Vietnam War protestors. But then the third single,
"Persecution Smith, " shows up, and Seger's music seems to take a
great leap forward, forcibly enough.
"Persecution Smith" speeds along, like Bob Dylan's contemporaneous
"Subterranean Homesick Blues." The antique folk-rock style is still
startling: the song, like its protagonist, jangles along, in a stiff,
rusty, but tireless way. Smith is a compulsively radical reactionary,
the embodiment of entropy, but human enough to torture himself and
everybody else he can reach. The crudeness of the song makes young
Seger's vision more unsettling, more believable: "Persecution Smith"
is just plain old, and getting older all the time. "He's here, he's
there, he's everywhere" seems more true than corny, in this case,
because Smith infiltrates everything, like dust.
This kind of dust forms the question mark in the title of the fourth
single, "2 + 2=?" In "East Side Story, " the fallen bad boy's
girlfriend cried, because he died like she knew he would. In this
song, the girl cries because her boy dies in a war, and "she just
doesn't understand." How could she not understand? What is there to
not understand? Doesn't she know there's a war on? What kind of girl
is this, what kind of country, what kind of war, if she doesn't know?
In 1971, Seger released an album, Mongrel, about the adventures of a
long-haired misfit, determined to strut his stuff in the gray teeth of
conformity. "You can call me Lucifer, if you think you should, but I
know I'm good!" Yet such cockiness has to deal with killjoys, the
ones who are "Leanin' On My Dream," in which the narrator finally
joins the protestors, when he gets his own draft notice. "Lord, you
shoulda heard me scream!" He doesn't claim to be any better than the
"Yellow Berets, " and he's no less stubborn than the vicious
reactionaries in "Looking Back": "Too many people lookin' back!"
Although "Looking Back" was recorded along with the tracks that
appeared on Mongrel, it first appeared as a stray single. Its LP debut
was on Seger's 1976 concert album, Live Bullet, the commercial
breakthrough of which really was a case of too many people looking
back. That's where he became a merchant of rock nostalgia, and
something of an addict, which may well have affected his ability to
check the quality of the goods, though his masterpiece, Night Moves,
appeared the same year, and it addressed the craving for nostalgia,
tracing the dusty, creeping awareness of age. From getting a kick out
of remembering "workin' on our night moves," to waking up and
thinking, "Ain't it funny how the night moves," which needs no
question mark, because it's a feeling the singer already knows too
well. And what happens when you guard your hard-won too well, so there
just isn't so much "left to lose."
The follow-up, Stranger In Town, was pursued through fun "Hollywood
Nights," by the perfect urn of "Still The Same," eyes wide open as he
slides gently downhill through the cliches, through "Feel Like A
Number," where, as Robert Christgau says, "The banal critique of
quantification is renewed by Seger's measured intensity." (Just as
"Turn The Page," is about watching and otherwise participating in
mechanical reproduction of self, with an appropriately spooked,
subdued vocal, typically run over by big mouth James Hetfield, who
sneered at Seger, who provided him with a radio hit cover, probably a
bigger hit than any Het' up originals.)Yeah, "measured intensity,"
the better side of Eliot's "I have measured out my life in coffee
spoons," and this affinity is one of the reasons he got lured so far
into the production cycle. (That, and the downwardly mobile middle
class [he and his mother and older brother were abandoned by his
work-drink cycling, multi-instrumentalist/bandleader/Ford Motor
company medic/medial school dropout father] equivalent of what Rodney
Crowell diagnosed as his own "sharecrop mentality.") Not that people
from quite different backgrounds don't get squeezed as well, and don't
get dragged along through a lot of other stuff that's leaning on their
own dreams. Negotiate, work within the system, pick your battles, then
dig in your heels, even if you get stiff enough that you get dragged
some more, even when there's a good detour. Count it out, here we go.
Later, he would imagine being young and proud and "Making
Thunderbirds" ("in '55", when he was 10).
Yeah, so, as you probably know too well, he (and possibly you, and
certainly I) indulged his mix of autumnal (yet sometimes sufficiently
rocking) insight and mere mush for many a year, many a multi-platinum
record.

Turn The Page And O.D.(Pt. 2)

TURN THE PAGE AND O.D. (PT. 2)
It's A Mystery only went gold, but Seger kept trying to make another
album of (even sharper) social commentary, because he became a father
at forty-seven, and while that was his self-stated reason for
"retiring," to take care of his kids, he's got a lot to sort out and
sing about, to his family, to himself, to whoever listens. He's got a
new song about war: "No More" is the title, and the point. He sounds,
not necessarily older than on most of Face The Promise (where the
raspy wailing top end of his range is gone, or obscured by clouds),
but he's especially weary on this track. He's doggedly dog-tired of
having to sing about war; he remembers previous occasions all too
well. And that's a good cure for nostalgia: a strong memory. PS: in
the middle of this our life's journey toward Face The Promise
[1997-2006], came 2003's Greatest Hits 2. Key might well be track 4,
"Beautiful Loser." Little Brother Underdog stops worrying long enough
to kid and look quizzically at his His Way of getting in even or
especially the hard or anyway long way. And does indeed scoop up some
beautiful losers, lost from the spotlight: prime but mere album
tracks, not hot singles; hot but not overplayed singles; soundtrack
contributions; covers/derivations; and stuff that would have been good
on Face, but he'd ditched that and started over, knew he already had
tons of stuff to chose from. It all sounds great, in this context.
Even track 1, "Understanding," from the Teachers soundtrack, though
boring, is thematically apt, and leaves no bad (or other) aftertaste,
as the continuity quickly kicks on. The Night Moves blues karma guy,
who went back to "Mainstreet," as carved into the great shining
mausoleum of Greatest Hits Une, is now sweating "Fire Down Below, "
and needs to be reassured by the enlightened butt respectors of "Watch
Her Strut." (GH1 released in 1994, opened to the no-fault collision
insurance of "Roll Me Away," but the only exit was via Rick Vito's
great, groaning slide solo, which finally discharged or at least
dislodged the younger-self-as-ancestor worship of "Like A Rock." Even
"Night Moves" didn't sound as good in this context, where the midnight
insights seemingly led to ever stiffer rituals.)
Meanwhile, back on GH2, inspired derivations x departures incl.
"Sunspot [Sahmspot] Baby," big sad eyes, drawls, draws for the bit o
honey who's ripped off Underdawg. Savors the crime scene details of
Broocian but dab hand "Manhattan," just showing the younger geezer how
to write and sing one. Ditto the Waits-written but minimally mannered
"New Coat Of Paint." Wailing in the tick-tock machine of Rodney
Crowell's "Blame It On The Moon." (Hey, an actual hit on GH2; getting
technical again, are we!) Self-writ duet with Martina McBride,
"Chances Are," gloriously. (This is how it's done, Kenny Rogers.) On
"Satisfied," he confides he needs some truth, some dignity, some
beauty, "But meanwhile, I need a place to hide." On "Tomorrow," he
can't tell you what happens when/if "neutrinos have mass," or about
anything else up ahead, but suggests the utilization of "the sports
section, the weather channel, a good battery." Did all that, and now
there's a new album after all! And almost as good as this, or close
enough, if you've got both, and other good stuff.

March 10, 2007

walking through the square
past all the brunch restaurants
to get my hair cut

TUSK!

Atlanta-based Mastodon, polymathic rawkissers of rippling thud, and formerly the hardest-touring, biggest-selling band on indie metal's highly esteemed Relapse Records, made their major label debut in September '06, with the Warner Brothers release of Blood Mountain. Ensuing online discussion topics, pro and con, will be dealt with in the following manner:

1. "Mastodon Are Mainstream Metal Wannabees." Wrong, they already were mainstream, and no wannabees. At least, to a non-specialist hard rock fan, it seems like all the bands on the "edge" (on Relapse, especially) are the default mainstream of metal. These are the acts who sustain interest and success, via die-hard fans, as CD sales and big-ticket tours continue to die. (Are you going to see Van Halen with your uncle? Again?) If you count only who's on the top of the charts, notice that Iron Maiden made the Top Ten this fall, and Slayer made the Top Five. Maiden's purple mulch, Slayer's rainshark riffage, and both bands' unabashed bashing, are obvious (early) inspirations to Mastodon and their colleagues. Which leads to...

2. "Mastodon are Metallica '86." See 1. No Hollyweird Hair Metalneck overground to rise above, from their San Francisco clubfringe exile. And no Eurometal mail-order-only darkness to enlighten the starved masses with, not when downloads are spilling out of every home, school, and library screen. Also,Mastodon are very old, unlike Metallica in '86.

Yes, and if we must talk about "the edge," Mastodon, in their mid-thirties, are now touring more than ever, away from their wives and kids more than ever, and were recently reported as saying they still hadn't seen any big paychecks. Despite adapting to the pressure, Mastodon refuse, so far, to rehash their influences, nor do they take any other conventionally mainstream approach. They don't write about girlfriends and parents or children or parents or drugs or The Road, unless these are red bulls and striding behemoths on 2002's Remission; tales of Moby Dick, Captain Ahab, Thor, and lava lovers on 2004's Leviathan; not to mention birchmen, sleeping giants, crystal skulls, Cysquatch (child of Sasquatch and the Cyclops), and mortal soil, on 2006's Blood Mountain. They also don't have a dominant-to-domineering lead singer (speaking of Metallica). They all four sing "lead," exchanging imagery like they do instrumental vignettes, getting better with each album, and, on Blood Mountain, guest vocals (and lyrics) of Neurosis' Scott Kelly fit in seamlessly, as do the distinctive intonations of Queens Of The Stone Age's Josh Homme and The Mars Volta's Cedric Bixler-Zavala.

3. "Mastodon's got the Ironic Metal Hipsters flocking in, stinking up the joint." Not like True Heads of Metal can't be hipsters, in the sardonically askance sense, and the ones who try to take metal "tropes" utterly seriously, and/or begrudge all outsiders any degree of askance (or study, or credulousness, for that matter), well. Irony, and whatever else you want to call the degree of distance necessary to get perspective (so that you don't confuse it with sarcasm or piety either), not only can co-exist with seemingly unmediated response, it can be a part of that response. The ultravividness of true starpower passes right through caricature (for light years, is the idea, and crying all the way to the bank, etc.) See Bob Dylan, Madonna, Axl Rose, Britney Spears, and many other politicial figures.

4."Mastodon's also got all the other indie rock people flocking in, trending away from acid folk." Maybe, but Mastodon are true indie rock people, commitment-wise. Also, Mastodon's lyrics are ultravividly multi-faceted: meant to be open to different interpetations, despite committment and other consistencies, like critters--all of that as any acid folk could hope to be. And acid folk is another side of prog, and Mastodon are into prog. When drummer Bram Dailor sings about a "labyrinth" in Blood Mountain's "Circle Sasquatch," he sounds like he's calling through the labyrinthine curvature of a vibrantly metallic mask, which is appropriate to all of Mastodon's words and music. (Not that they, especially with Dailor, can't swing like a wrecking ball.) Prog can be about rigor, not rigidity, getting in shape to go exploring, not just getting in shape. Nor do they settle for man vs. nature triumphalism, or man vs. nature rise & fall, even. It's man in nature, and vice versa, but especially striking is the former, like on Leviathan, when submission to Ahab is calculated, even with the beatdowns, there's a sense of direction, and even Ahab's trying to calculate how far he can get, into the blowhole of creation. Later that same voyage, it seems that getting thrown into a volcano can also be a crewman's opportunity (an ultimate entry-level gig). No matter how far they get, the albums always end with contemplation of something elsewhere. With instrumentals: Remission 's "Elephant Man," Leviathan's "Joseph Merrick" (AKA the real-life, thoughtful Elephant Man), and, best of all, Blood Mountain's "Pendulous Skin," which would be a good description of the Elephant Man. Or it could be the guy from the previous song, "Siberian Divide," so cold, hallucinatory, and plain hungry that he tried to eat himself. He could now be "Pendulous," being both gnawed and thawed. But he's here, and sounds happy: one of the Mastodons is singing along, down among the instruments, "Now that I've begun…" Don Allred