Drowned in Sound
Comets on Fire bring the ruckus
Every member of Comets on Fire has tried LSD at some point in his life. At least, that's what a recent article in Alternative Press on the Bay Area genre-stewing quintet noted. The group's music - a cantankerously frothy blend of psych rock, metal, blues, classical and folk - may cast suspicion on its members' chemical habits. But acid, among other hard drugs, doesn't fuel Comets on Fire.
"That is something that the press has latched onto since our first-ever write-up in a little indie zine," says singer/guitarist Ethan Miller about the connection between his band and substance abuse. "There isn't a drug aspect to the band - at least in performance."
Like the Mars Volta (another band constantly associated with mind-alteration), Comets on Fire's sound is the distillation of a wealth of knowledge about music and an idea of the boundary-less plane it can inhabit. In the course of a 25-minute interview, Miller name-drops everyone from Little Richard to Slayer, praises Neil Young for making a huge album while he was drunk, and criticizes Steely Dan for being too robotic.
Formed in 1999 in Santa Cruz, Calif., by Miller and bassist Ben Flashman, the band's self-titled 2001 release was a study in the rubber-band stretching of thrashing punk rock. It also features electronicist Noel Harmonson's spastic effects, mostly courtesy of an Echoplex tape machine.
After reviewing the disc for his zine Gramophone, former Matador Records publicist Ben Goldberg agreed to put out the band's second disc on his modest Ba Da Bing! imprint. "What I liked about them was their energy, the intense spontaneity in the music," he says.
Field Recordings from the Sun is a simmering collage that redefined the band's idea of structure, moving from short clips to extended prog jams. One track begins with a percussive clamor before spiraling into intergalactic metal that sounds as if it's gurgling up through a shower drain. The band worked in blues, melded in some folk (thanks to indie-folk iconoclast Ben Chasny of Six Organs of Admittance), and retained its effusive punk intensity.
"It was so much more artistically developed," Goldberg says. "They keep going deeper and deeper into the notion of what a rock band is."
As they went deeper, they climbed higher in status, and indie hit machine Sub Pop came calling. Never one to stifle his bands, Goldberg stepped aside as the Comets became a blip on the radar with a third release in 2004, Blue Cathedral.
Like Field Recordings, Blue Cathedral is a record with songs that can stand alone, but has an overall feeling of a bar where only absinthe is on tap and as the night goes on, people's faces meld into monsters like in The Devil's Advocate. The central tension is the push-pull guitar war between Miller and Chasny, now an official band member. While Chasny mounts critical praise for his own album, School of the Flower, he's also become the press' new obsession when writing about the Comets. Well, after drugs. "It should be important that Ben's playing with us," says Miller. "I think he's invaluable."
Goldberg adds, "[Chasny] joined Comets so he can shred."
And shred he and all the Comets do, whether on the feedback-laden breakdown of "The Bee and the Cracking Egg," the meandering organ of "Pussy Footin the Duke" or the crash of Utrillo Belcher's mad drumming and saxophone squalls on "The Antlers of the Midnight Sun."
The one constant in the band's progression has been Miller's gravel-stained banshee wails, which get Harmonson's Echoplex and pedal treatment until they come out as garbled wails. "I don't think it's totally positive that you can't understand the lyrics," says Miller. "The effect is intentional, but the obscuring is a byproduct."
Miller says the band may work on cleaning up the vocals a bit for the next record, which will cull from new classical music influences as well as sounds of tourmates Wolf Eyes and Sunn O))). The partially written album reportedly has a vibe of '80s metal like Iron Maiden and Faust crossed with Procul Harem.
Note: Some drugs may be used in the making of the album, but Miller says they'll be limited to ibuprofen for the back and aspirin for the head.
music@creativeloafing.com
"That is something that the press has latched onto since our first-ever write-up in a little indie zine," says singer/guitarist Ethan Miller about the connection between his band and substance abuse. "There isn't a drug aspect to the band - at least in performance."
Like the Mars Volta (another band constantly associated with mind-alteration), Comets on Fire's sound is the distillation of a wealth of knowledge about music and an idea of the boundary-less plane it can inhabit. In the course of a 25-minute interview, Miller name-drops everyone from Little Richard to Slayer, praises Neil Young for making a huge album while he was drunk, and criticizes Steely Dan for being too robotic.
Formed in 1999 in Santa Cruz, Calif., by Miller and bassist Ben Flashman, the band's self-titled 2001 release was a study in the rubber-band stretching of thrashing punk rock. It also features electronicist Noel Harmonson's spastic effects, mostly courtesy of an Echoplex tape machine.
After reviewing the disc for his zine Gramophone, former Matador Records publicist Ben Goldberg agreed to put out the band's second disc on his modest Ba Da Bing! imprint. "What I liked about them was their energy, the intense spontaneity in the music," he says.
Field Recordings from the Sun is a simmering collage that redefined the band's idea of structure, moving from short clips to extended prog jams. One track begins with a percussive clamor before spiraling into intergalactic metal that sounds as if it's gurgling up through a shower drain. The band worked in blues, melded in some folk (thanks to indie-folk iconoclast Ben Chasny of Six Organs of Admittance), and retained its effusive punk intensity.
"It was so much more artistically developed," Goldberg says. "They keep going deeper and deeper into the notion of what a rock band is."
As they went deeper, they climbed higher in status, and indie hit machine Sub Pop came calling. Never one to stifle his bands, Goldberg stepped aside as the Comets became a blip on the radar with a third release in 2004, Blue Cathedral.
Like Field Recordings, Blue Cathedral is a record with songs that can stand alone, but has an overall feeling of a bar where only absinthe is on tap and as the night goes on, people's faces meld into monsters like in The Devil's Advocate. The central tension is the push-pull guitar war between Miller and Chasny, now an official band member. While Chasny mounts critical praise for his own album, School of the Flower, he's also become the press' new obsession when writing about the Comets. Well, after drugs. "It should be important that Ben's playing with us," says Miller. "I think he's invaluable."
Goldberg adds, "[Chasny] joined Comets so he can shred."
And shred he and all the Comets do, whether on the feedback-laden breakdown of "The Bee and the Cracking Egg," the meandering organ of "Pussy Footin the Duke" or the crash of Utrillo Belcher's mad drumming and saxophone squalls on "The Antlers of the Midnight Sun."
The one constant in the band's progression has been Miller's gravel-stained banshee wails, which get Harmonson's Echoplex and pedal treatment until they come out as garbled wails. "I don't think it's totally positive that you can't understand the lyrics," says Miller. "The effect is intentional, but the obscuring is a byproduct."
Miller says the band may work on cleaning up the vocals a bit for the next record, which will cull from new classical music influences as well as sounds of tourmates Wolf Eyes and Sunn O))). The partially written album reportedly has a vibe of '80s metal like Iron Maiden and Faust crossed with Procul Harem.
Note: Some drugs may be used in the making of the album, but Miller says they'll be limited to ibuprofen for the back and aspirin for the head.
music@creativeloafing.com