2017 Year in Music: Bardo Pond - Under The Pines

Bardo Pond

Under The Pines

(buy from Fire UK; download or stream on Bandcamp; ok Spotify fine)

Longtime Philly psych vets Bardo Pond generally operate in primordial ingredients – brothers Gibbons' guitars scrape earth and sky, with occasional vocals and flute blowing in on the wind from frontwoman Isobel Sollenberger, all anchored by the wandering, trenchant rhythm section, shifting-yet-solid, a slow-motion tremor. Stoner rock doesn't sum up the parts; and "heavy" is too nice 'n pretty – Bardo Pond songs aren't born – rather, they seem to crawl up from ooze and just as often melt into the ether.

Under The Pines continues to distill their wall-of-sound in more concise fashion following 2013's similarly taut-yet-expansive Peace On Venus. The recording, done again homestyle, clarifies some of the murk, and places Sollenberger's vocals on near-equal footing with the guitars. A few heads rolled or roiled, I'm sure, but her mix of summoning squall and brooding chant operate here as an equal – so it's refreshing to hear that represented in the mix, not to mention the songs.

"Crossover" opens the record in classic Bardo Pond form – you fall right into a lead riff before going for a bit of a near-Zep turnaround. Sollenberger enters and all is well – this is classic rock for the psych set, guitars hard-panned and dueling in sprawling, painterly fashion. It's almost hard to believe you haven't heard this song before; though at a tidy five minutes, thirty seconds, it doesn't go on forever.

We get other Pond tropes, here, too – "Out Of Reach" is a slow, heavy dirge with a sparkling intro solo. The skies clear when Sollenberger enters, as guitars set to sparkle around the edges. The wordless chorus hints at the storm to come. Minutes pass, and guitars expand, rhythm section takes up more space unnoticed, like a glacier climbing down the mountain lip-first. Just when you expect them to wash away with the storm, they kick into double-time – a Hawkwind-ian or kraut-touch; or just masterly improv? Whatever. The Gibbons are set free here, and it all enters fog machine mode, an aural moss covering all ground, Sollenberger's chants occasionally piercing through the haze like mottled beams of light.

There are a couple miniatures – maybe excerpts from lengthy recordings? – "My Eyes Out" ends side A with a keening lead guitar that loops gaudily over a steady, forged-metal rhythm. The solo enters halfway through and they ride it into the clouds. "Under The Pines" is as close to scorched-earth blues as we get – a dark take on time or mortality, or maybe the upside-down version of folk standard "In The Pines". It's syrupy and stomping and slow, barometer rising, air thick.

"Moment To Moment" embraces a riff that's nearly from the front-porch, of a kin to Earth's take on country-doom (2008's The Bees Made Honey In The Lion's Skull). Yet, with acoustic slide, it's bizarrely anthemic, it's crawling, muscular pace and near 10-minute length could qualify. We finally get Sollenberger's flute here, which floats in gauzily, but ends up carrying things across rippling sheets of guitar and torch-bearing, keening vocals.

"Effigy" provides an instrumental benediction to the record – and a welcome second flute appearance – a melancholy, tripped-out shuffle that's a counterpunch to the swagger of "Crossover". It's comfortable, richly textured, and conjures a wide vista of sound, that (I loathe to say) could even lure in a 'post-rock' fan or three. Somebody please pay these fine folks to score their film (did they do that before and I missed it? The price of an extensive discography). 

psychedelic things i liked when i was a kid, vol. 1

while at the annual minnetrista art show (amelia had 3 photos...one got an award of merit) in my favorite decrepit-manufacturing-town-turned-struggling-state-college-based-municipality (reasons enough for a multi-hour road trip here and here), i got embroiled into a conversation for trading artwork (amelia's that is..not my chicken-scratches) for artwork of former professors, both of whom work in printmaking.

this isn't one of the pieces, but similar in flavor. the repeating, but off-centered border is equally repetitive and off-centered...the visual equivalent of kraut or drone, in a way. i really dig on the simple motifs of the fish, swimming simply in different shapes, as well as the spherical patterns inside the peacock's feathers. kinda feel like you could get lost in their 'groove'.

anyways! drinking some cafe bustelo one day at work, along with posting my history with vinyl at musicalfamilytree, got me wondering, "did i just end up appreciating this strand of music/art on my own? or was i predisposed to this even as a child?" a couple of examples have made me think that i was born with an off-center brain:

bullfrogs & butterflies was an old gaither family effort for kids. until this past Christmas, i hadn't listened to the record in at least 20 years. i thought i wouldn't recognize any of the music, but like the cover image, it had seeped into my brain, imparting a sense of familiarity. the art, though, is what really stuck---some strange amalagamation of hillbillies and fey psychedelia, all prancing around on Witness-lush green backdrops. i mean, who wouldn't want to journey to a land so saturated in color?

Barbapapa was the title character and series name of a french children's book series / animated show. we only had one that i remember, as pictured above. Barbapapa's can take any shape they choose, and live in a sort of Eden, complete with (mostly) nude children. in the book, barbapapa saves animals and people from industrial waste & pollution...via a series of brightly colored pictures of the barbapapa's taking all kinds of forms, and the sludgy-waste rendering the rest of the world dyed in grays, reds, and purples. considering my parents were pretty (standard, in indiana) conservative----strange that we would have this book and read it often. but, they were pretty much one-issue/hot-button voters, and other than that, fairly apolitical. they let me read about anything i wanted (i remember wandering the adult section in 2nd or 3rd grade and getting told where "books for your age" were by a condescending library employee), and i did! so i should thank them for that.