52 Albums That Shaped My Life - #26

Clutch – Blast Tyrant

(DRT Entertainment – Weathermaker Music, 2004)

Buy the album here

These words are a foreign language in my brain…. I didn’t really like Blast Tyrant when it came out.  I found it fluffy, poppy, and lyrically esoteric on the first few listens and decided I was better off without it.  I had stumbled across Clutch when they supported Raging Speedhorn in Glasgow (to our delayed collective confusion) and was overjoyed and blown away on first listening to Pure Rock Fury.  PRF is an album that hits with hardcore intensity, delightful blues-tinged jams, wild vocal dexterity, and that bursting-at-the-seams garage heaviness that I adore.  By the time the more polished, key-infused rock ‘n’ roll of Blast Tyrant came around I was rabid for “Pure Rock Fury II”, and found myself slowly backing away from the new album as if trying not to offend it.  It just wasn’t what I wanted.

Luckily, I was wrong.  It’s exactly what I wanted, what we all wanted.  Blast Tyrant is crowd-pleasing, life-affirming, perfectly conceived and executed rock ‘n’ roll from the best active rock band in the world.  Clutch have continued to sharpen to a fine point their approach on Earth Rocker and Psychic Warfare, but it’s on this album that guitarist Tim Sult, bassist Dan Maines, drummer Jean-Paul Gaster, and vocalist Neil Fallon reached their zenith.  The extended jams of earlier work like Clutch, the heaviness of PRF, and the more tightly packed simplified rock of Earth Rocker all meet in the middle of this band’s phenomenal career to produce a record that genuinely gets better from first track to last. 

“Mercury” rolls in on Sult’s heavy yet rounded and warm riffing, Gaster’s balanced drumming, and Maines’ beautifully light touch on bass before silence descends and Fallon cries out “Daedalus, your child is falling and the Labyrinth is calling”.  The difference between this record and PRF is instantly recognisable – the assured guitar sound is rockier and distances itself from their hardcore roots, the drumming is about feel rather than punching a hole in your eardrums, and Fallon’s vocals are more diverse than ever.  By the time we get to the dancefloor-filling “The Mob Goes Wild” it’s clear that the band are musically channelling Chuck Berry, Elvis Presley, Tom Waits, and AC/DC while drawing on Fallon’s unmistakable talent for telling frontier-type stories touched with sci-fi, fantasy, and mythology.  But there is barely any time to take note as the songs fly by in a flurry of brilliant riffs, genius vocal hooks and choruses, perfectly delivered drum fills, and general rock prowess.  “The Regulator” brings a moment to breathe and reflect.  The beautiful acoustic guitar intro is goosebumps-inducing, while Fallon’s deep and smooth vocal carries the listener off in to the world of The Regulator.  When the song bursts into its rocking chorus it feels as if you are being lifted by the very angel feathers Fallon sings of, and the hairs on your neck will to stand to attention until the guitar slowly fades out and into “Worm Drink”.

Other high points on the album are “Cypress Grove” with its rock single feel refining the intent of earlier album The Elephant Riders, “Army of Bono” where Fallon’s ripping chorus vocal points forward to his unmatched performances on Earth Rocker and Psychic Warfare, and the breakneck speed and superb backing vocals of “Subtle Hustle”.  But the whole album finds its perfect representative in “(Notes from the Trial of) La Curandera” where immediacy, jamming, storytelling, and otherworldly feelings of being carried off somewhere combine to supreme effect.  Sult’s riffs are huge and uplifting while Fallon’s voice is equal parts gravel and soaring melody, giving the impression that the song exists in the clouds somewhere.  And I think this is the key difference between this record and PRF: where the former was very much a gruff, earthy album, Blast Tyrant takes flight from the very beginning and never puts you back down.  It’s a journey that makes you feel weightless, inspired, and almost breathless.

This is all thanks to the skills of each of the band members.  There is at least one song that perfectly displays what each of them does better than any counterpart in any rock band in the world.  The sheer array of insane and catchy guitar sounds Tim Sult produces on “Profits of Doom” sets him apart from his contemporaries, while Dan Maines’ controlled and rumbling performance on “Worm Drink” does more for the song than any other instrument while simultaneously not drawing any attention to itself.  Jean-Paul Gaster also has this skill of being able to serve a song without outwardly showing off.  During “(In the Wake of) The Swollen Goat” Gaster sits just behind the gigantic riffs powering the whole song with insane fills, exquisite feel on the high hat, and perfect timing.  And if you thought that Neil Fallon was all shouty and gruff, just skip to “Ghost” to hear his sonorous tones and melodic range deliver another of his gripping stories.  I used to daydream of perfect all-star rock and metal band line-ups when I was a kid, plucking a frontman from this band and a guitarist from another, but I don’t need to any longer.  Clutch are all I could ever need from a rock band, and they fill my heart with joy. 

      

52 Albums That Shaped My Life - #44

Steve Von Till – If I Should Fall to the Field

(Neurot Recordings, 2002)

Buy the album here

Steve Von Till is a teacher, a father, and a musician. In listening to his second solo album, If I Should Fall to the Field, it is important to recognise his place in the world, in his family, and in his art. For his folk songs express not only his reverence for art and music, but also the concept of lineage, both cultural and familial. Von Till ponders, in his writing, in the choices of songs he covers, and in the tone and imagery he employs, how he has received these musical traditions, but also his standing in his family history, and what he may leave for coming generations. As a guitarist and vocalist of Neurosis, he has become one of the most influential artists in the hardcore, post-rock, and post-metal sub-genres, releasing more than ten crucial albums for fans of this music since 1990. However, it is in his solo work that we come to know the heart of the man, the passions that drive him, and the things he holds dear. It is a moving piece of music: a family heirloom, an ode to generations past, and an expression of nature, life, and death all found in the human body.

“To The Field” beautifully encapsulates this permanence of human life through a connection to nature and the food it provides us: “On my sustaining life,/I will be as yew, with the grain.” It's a message that Von Till seeks to convey with quiet and almost imperceptibly building instrumentation. The gentle acoustic guitar introduction is joined by his sonorous voice, before electric guitars, organ, and drums gather to burst into life with the album's most dramatic crescendo. Warmth and contemplation in his voice are replaced in this moment with an anguished, wordless wailing that feel as if carried on the changing winds mentioned in the opening of the song. It's a song that contemplates human death feeding the earth, and in that way finding eternal life. This sentiment finds its partner in “This River” where “dreams were washed out to sea”, and “blood like fuel is fed to the fire”; and a similar wordless outro carries us on waters that flow to “the edge of the earth”. In these songs human life seeps in to the earth and in to the waters, feeding nature and finding permanence and renewal. The untempered expressiveness shown in these crescendoes is rare on an album that otherwise exercises restraint, preferring to allow the simple instrumentation, rich vocals, and dark, poetic lyrics pull us in to its contemplative atmosphere.

Von Till is clearly contemplating his place in the folk tradition. For hundreds of years folk songs have been passed from generation to generation through performance, re-writing, and re-recording. The authors of many of these songs remain unknown, but respect is shown to the traditions of folk music by artists who find new ways to perform old songs, or old songs to convey new thoughts. By including a beautiful cover of Neil Young's “Running Dry” and a fiddle-heavy rendition of traditional folk song “Am I Born To Die”, he inserts himself in to a folk tradition that is simultaneously looking back for inspiration, grounding, and belonging and reaching forward to the next generation, offering them this rich history. Von Till's “Am I Born To Die” carries with it, in his tortured and strained voice, the weight of the history it has seen, and for some reason has always reminded me of “America the Beautiful”.

At its heart, the history this album presents is one of family, of belonging, and of acknowledging the sacrifices of previous generations. As such, “Hallowed Ground” and “The Harpy” are its emotional core, portraying Von Till's admiration for both nature and his forefathers. The two seem inextricable on this album, and “Hallowed Ground” is its high point. The beautiful atmospherics reach new heights on this song built around stark imagery, gently repeating acoustic strumming, and punctuating electric guitar. Von Till's deep voice is bold and portentous, filling the song with a sense of impending doom. But it is revealed that this doom is perhaps in the past:

Grandfather's hands bled for us here

Hallowed ground forever.

His admiration for his forefathers has led him to include a recording of his grandfather reading “The Harpy” that was made by his father in 1961. A poem originally written by Robert W. Service in the early twentieth century is read here with the old time, rural feel that has informed the sound of the entire album. While the backing music is almost inaudible, the coming together of three generations of Von Tills is a fitting end to an album that interacts with its traditions, both of folk music and family. The serious, contemplative music of If I Should Fall to the Field inspires a desire to connect with nature, with music history, with other generations of our families, and ultimately to Steve Von Till himself. A teacher, a father, and an incredible musician.