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"Time Bomb"

Posted on May 22, 2009 at 04:43 PM

"I'm diggin' this one lately." That was the entire introduction my listening party received for the final song we would hear off Big Whiskey and The GrooGrux King. The previous songs were well received — we were all favoring "Shake Me Like A Monkey" as the strongest. Then we heard "Time Bomb."

The song starts out slowly. Dave's lyrics signal a time signature change, and it's set to a nice meandering pace. Then the song takes a twist. The lyrics are wild. Martians? How would that change the perception of a God? Where did that come from?? More instruments enter, and Dave swings into a falsetto. Wow, I think. Didn't see that coming.

One short stanza later it happens. I'll never forget my jaw dropping. I've been listening to this band since 1993, and I can't remember the last time I was stunned like this. The Dave Matthews Band turns into ... Sabbath! Or at least Pearl Jam. The pace quickens and Dave is screaming passionately — and wrathfully. He even sounds a bit like Eddie Vedder. And the explosion of sounds, from Carter and Stefan providing the backbeat, to Tim Reynolds ripping a guitar solo through the heart of this seemingly "The Dreaming Tree"-esque sound.

It ramps up quickly as the violence erupts. The tornado of sounds echo with haunting reverb. Almost the end you'd expect from a Stone Temple Pilots song. I've never been so spent from listening to a four-minute song. This is by far the most difficult song to describe too — maybe "The Dreaming Tree" meets Halloween. Or if AC/DC hijacked an ABBA song. It immediately jumped into my top five songs of the decade after just one listen, and I'm a hard sell on DMB songs after a single listen for the most part; I generally let songs grow on me. But not "Time Bomb." Maybe it was that powerful ending. Maybe it was Dave's heartfelt lyrics. What was he trying to say? And all that stuff about Jesus? It's not your typical pop song, that's for sure.

Play it again! Play it again! That's about all I could muster after I picked my jaw back up from the table. How this song hasn't been played live yet is a mystery to me, but I guess you have to save some of the gems for the summer. That, and it'll probably put a strain on Dave's fragile vocal chords, with the powerful anger screaming through his throat. But it'll be a monster live — with a longer beginning, a jam outro, this 3:58 dart will become an eight-minute Godzilla. And fans will be forced to their seats from exhaustion by the time it's done.

How good is it? People have different tastes, that's for certain. As Dennis Miller once said, there's a reason Kiss put out four solo albums; one man's Ace Frehley is another's Peter Criss. To me, it falls into that Holy Trinity of 2000-era songs: "Raven," "You Never Know," and "Shotgun." I guess that makes it a Golden Sombrero. I think it's the best song off Big Whiskey and The GrooGrux King. But in full disclosure, I have seen Iron Maiden live, so maybe the end of "Time Bomb" is just my inner "Run To The Hills" shining through.

I've heard a few people say that it's DMB's best song in five years. I agree with that. It eclipses anything from the last album, and anything from the 2006 songs (even the beloved fan favorite, "Shotgun"). The biggest compliment I heard was that it could fit into The Lillywhite Sessions material — far and away the most beloved by hardcore fans this decade. Some even said that it would fit with that golden era of the 1990's, when DMB could do no wrong in the eyes of their fans. But this much is true: It's a monster. And just like its name implies, when it erupts, fans who hear it for the first time will be blown away.

— Jake Vigliotti, antsmarching.org

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What to Expect This Summer From DMB

Posted on May 21, 2009 at 09:55 PM

In 2006, the Dave Matthews Band first ventured into the studio to record a follow-up to Stand Up. At least three studio sessions later — and about 25 different songs — Big Whiskey And The GrooGrux King is finally ready. It's not exactly headline news that DMB would rather be on the road than sitting around playing the same riffs over and over. Think of them as the anti-Beatles: The Fab Four sat in a studio for three years, and DMB wanted nothing to do with a studio for three years.

But just because you take a long time making something, doesn't mean that it's going to be immediately accepted as gold. And the DMB fan is fickle. Very fickle.

On April 14, the band performed at Madison Square Garden, and for the first time in four years, fans knew they'd be getting new songs, and had no idea what they would sound like. Seeing a DMB concert is not like any other show: Rarely do you find a crowd who recognizes when a band does something rare, or tries something different. When DMB broke out "Blue Water Baboon Farm" on the spring tour, fans knew what it was, and reacted with shocked glee. That doesn't happen at a Britney Spears show. These are fans that sing along to "#41," and it doesn't even have a chorus!

Six songs into the MSG show, DMB played the first studio song that fans had not heard yet. And a funny thing happened — fans liked it! "Spaceman" received a warm welcome. Later in the show, "Why I Am" debuted and was likewise received. In Charlottesville a few nights later, I watched a girl sitting two sections over from me sing along with Dave on "Spaceman." The song was three days old and she already knew the words! The following night, also in Charlottesville, the band teased "Old Dirt Hill," and then segued into "Why I Am" ("Why I Am" actually uses a part of "Old Dirt Hill" in it). And the crowd erupted! "Why I Am" got a louder response than "Old Dirt Hill" did in any of performance of it in the previous four years.

The hardcore fans take to radio songs like four-year-olds take to naps: They'll put up with them, but they'll make a fuss about them too. If you just did a random Q&A with some fans at a show, the only radio song that would probably be mentioned as a favorite would be "Ants Marching." So what gives with "Funny The Way It Is"? Fans like it! That's not supposed to happen. They're supposed to be all cool and go get a beer when the radio song comes on, but DMB fans sing along. Maybe, just maybe, this band knows what they are doing — taking their time, and putting out a product that fans enjoy.

The fans that drive 12 hours to shows, fly 2000 miles for a gig, stand up for the whole show even though it's their 54th — these people, the most ambivalent fans in the music world, love the new songs. And they've heard exactly four songs from the album. That tells you what to expect this summer from DMB.

And they haven't even heard the best song from Big Whiskey And The GrooGrux King yet.

— Jake Vigliotti, antsmarching.org

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Dave Matthews: The New CD

Posted on April 30, 2009 at 11:39 AM

Dave Matthews: For LeRoi Moore

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