Earth and Sir Richard Bishop at Camden Underworld

Earth and Sir Richard Bishop at Camden Underworld

21 July, 2008
by: Robin

Dylan Carlson formed influential band Earth in 1990, and pretty soon Sub Pop agreed to release their first record on the strength of a show. The Melvins had already made Sabbath-type metal slower, but with their slack-stringed pondering Earth were on a crawl to see how sludgy music could get before it stopped going anywhere altogether. Strangely, the strength and vitality of their early records seems to come from a metal-style fixation with doom and from an appropriately turn-of-the-'90s apathy. You might say chronic downer usage (which allegedly damages perception of time) more or less made Earth the complete package, but although Carlson squeezed out three more classic albums before '96, it contributed to blown recording sessions, led to the contempt of the label and left him for a while the only member of the band.

Despite the gutter image, there is a purity to what Earth do, isolating the fundamentals hidden in certain musics and spinning them out in semi-naked form. And there is a purity in the intention to do it that must have kept the band going and, after a lot of time off in the late '90s, brought it back. The way today's line-up play sounds like a continuation of the trajectory of Earth's resurgence: still slow, still the equivalent of infectiously heavy eyelids, but distinctly upwardly mobile. There are foundations down in the dirt of their debut, but they're not obvious. Harmonies no longer consist only of tuned-down interference between tones, and arrangements actually progress, even peaking with dustings of electric piano. Earth have lost nothing more than they’ve gained, though. If there was a band this good playing in your town every night, you could probably quite happily fuck off the rest of your life and just become a drone addict.

Support act Sir Richard Bishop is a good choice to open for Earth. Similarly, he seems to subtract the unnecessary from blues, country and other traditions from around the world and amplify what's left. His music is sort of psychedelic but sort of earthy, and sort of lots of styles but definitely not any of them. There's something weird about him, and his playing, that makes it seem like if you decided to move, you might find yourself transfixed against your will. It's a bit scary, and pretty amazing.

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Robin