I haven't had a running diary for anything since I blogged during the season 3 finale of Glee, and that's something I want to do. I also want to talk about my favorite album ever, The Earth is Not a Cold Dead Place by Explosions in the Sky. I always talk it up, saying how powerful it is for me, but I think that the best way to truly represent that is to go through each song and talk about specific parts that resonate the most. I'll be listening to the songs on my iTunes (better quality), but if you want the YouTube videos to follow along, here is a good place for that.
First Breath After Coma
0:15. The bass drum comes in first after the guitar, in a heartbeat sort of way. After listening to this music for so long, I think that the heartbeat is a part of a lot of music off this album. I'm not sure if it's intentional or not, but I notice it in Your Hand In Mine, which I'm sure I'll get to in approximately 40 minutes.
1:16. I'm also just sitting in front of my computer, looking around my room. Nothing special really going on. Just a man and his music.
6:16. This is my first real favorite part of the song, mainly because of how the guitars come together, following one another. It's also a little ways into the first time that faint ringing note in the background is there. I feel like this verse, or whatever you want to call it, is the prelude to the ending, which is over two minutes away. Having an ending to a song last for that long makes it seem like forever, which is exactly what this song means to me.
7:40. First goosebumps while listening to the album.
8:10. The ringing note comes right to the front, stronger than ever before. Everything picks up at the ending. This might be my favorite part of the entire album...for a decent amount of time now (let's say months), I've felt that I could die to the ending of this song. Everything could come together at once, leading up to the end, exactly as it happens in the song.
9:18. The last note.
The Only Moment We Were Alone
0:45. I've always wanted to be able to actually learn every part of every song on this album on the guitar and piano. Finding some way to put all three guitars together on the piano would be absolutely perfect, and this is one of my favorite parts of the album to play on piano, with that one bass note hitting every eighth note.
3:24. Again, two guitars coming together, and again, another favorite part of the entire album. This just makes me think really good things.
5:33. I wonder how instrumental bands make music. When you use lyrics in songwriting and music making, you can easily convey your mood, tone, and feeling. But when there's no story to interpret other than what you hear, what exactly can you draw from it? How am I supposed to know what the drum beat represents? I guess that's the beauty of instrumental music. It's just there, right in front of you. What you do with it is up to you. (Can I get that extrapolated to a metaphor for life?)
7:52. I remember during Values Game during Orientation that I said that this part was when I feel most alive. The buildup to this starts at 7:19, and ends with the explosion at 8:30. During those pauses though...when nothing is going on, I feel everything going on. It's like all the music went from my headphones to everywhere within me. So incredibly powerful.
9:27. Click.
Six Days At The Bottom Of The Ocean
0:00. When I'm laying in bed listening to this album via laptop or iHome, I kind of forget that the first few minutes of this song happen. I remember realizing that once and thinking that that's what the first few days of being at the bottom of the ocean must feel like. A little while in, you just wake up, and you're there. It's too bad I never really hone in on any part of the beginning, because there is some really good music involved.
2:07. Of Explosions in the Sky's six albums, The Earth is Not a Cold Dead Place sounds so unlike any other. I can find similarities in their latest work to music dating all the way back to 2001 (this album was released in 2003), but there's nothing in these 45 minutes and 37 seconds that's close to anything else. Which might be why I've never really been able to put words to the feel of it. It kind of just happens. Going back to that whole "it's just there" thing.
4:48. I forget how I even got into this band, but I do remember the first imagery I had of this album, and it comes at this part right here. The time signature (6/8) and guitar picking pattern makes it seem like a game of cat and mouse between two people. The chase, the hunt, the games. The slow, patient process of it all. This culminates with the strongest imagery at 6:59 and the eighth notes of the guitar, making it seem like the ultimate dance, the ever-elusive ending.
8:18. I love the cymbals in this part, and the drums leading into the next song.
Memorial
0:00. It's weird, I don't remember getting goosebumps at all during Six Days at the Bottom of the Ocean, but I immediately get goosebumps at the start of Memorial. It has to be because of the harmonies, and how they just dig into me. Kind of reminds me of the moment after the dust settles in some desert war. In winter. With snow. I know there's no snow in the desert (I think), but I feel like snow should be included in here somewhere.
1:39. I love how the harmony comes into play three seconds before this part (1:36), leading into the chord. You can clearly hear it too (2:04). Everything comes back home eventually.
3:55. There's the heartbeat again, and I noticed it some 15 seconds into it actually happening.
4:42. I love the bass line in this part. I mean I love the bass part throughout the entire album, but it's best in Memorial. It kind of leads into the next note, where you can feel where it's going to go next. Maybe I have an unfair advantage, having listened to this song dozens of times (83 since January, according to iTunes), but the bass line just makes sense. It feels right.
7:20. Another crash that's preceded by a lengthy lead-in. Man, those are awesome.
7:53. I absolutely love the guitar that comes in here. It feels so powerful, almost like someone's screaming.
Your Hand In Mine
0:00. This is probably the most-known song off the album, but I can't decide if it's my favorite or not. It used to be, and if it's no longer, it's not for any bad reason, but I'm just not sure. I definitely remember this song being around since junior year of high school, so I guess that answers how long I've been listening to Explosions in the Sky.
2:27. Another "good feeling" part of the album (see: 3:24 in The Only Moment We Were Alone). And then the drums pick up, and everything once again comes together.
3:34. There isn't any minor tonality to this song, and there's a little bit of that in each of the other songs. So I suppose it only makes sense that this song is the feel-good one of the album.
4:38. I love the drums in this part. It's almost as though they cascade down upon something, as the guitar shoots up through the sky.
5:02. This begins my favorite part of the song, where all of the little intricacies come into play at the same time.
5:27. The reverb here...I feel like my entire body is set on reverb when I listen to this part. And there's the heartbeat again, just as it was at the beginning of the album.
6:46. You can very faintly hear one guitar note playing the tonic on eighth notes. That will stay from here until the end, which I only started noticing after many listens to the song. Everything comes together one final time, for four phrases, and then just stops, leaving that one note (7:42). Thirty-five seconds of that one note, reminding you that there will always be something after the end.
Well then. Three-quarters of an hour later, after about ten rounds of goosebumps, the album is over. I've done my best to put my feelings into thoughts and words, and I sincerely hope that you give these songs another listen. Eventually, something will stick, whether it's something I mentioned here, or something you pick up on your own. Try and find time to just be. To listen to this music, and to have everything in front of you at once. Just be.
No comments:
Post a Comment