Some albums transport you to deep subterranean caverns, dark abandoned industrial buildings, frozen tundra or can float you into outer space, but from the opening bars of Elephant Stone’s Back Into The Dream the curtains are thrown back to reveal the sunniest day of the year. This is a euphoric-psychedelic swirl of guitars, sitars, syncopated drums, tablas, and heavenly choirs of vocals.
Dreams, as referred to in the album’s title, are something the band like to mine for inspiration and Rishi Dhir – the creative force behind the band – says “I’m often caught in the web of intense, recurring dreams, which I think reflect my ongoing quest for identity and a sense of belonging,“
The third eye is well and truly open as sounds whirl like coloured oil on water and everything feels it’s in pursuit of bliss. Layered mille-feuille of electric and acoustic guitars, multi-harmonies, burned out electric piano, and joyous brush strokes of synths colour all the tracks from the sunburst of ‘Lost In A Dream’ to the tabla bounce and perfect drop on ‘The Spark’. There’s a 60s ‘Tin Soldier’ vibe on ‘Going Underground’, the galactic journey of ‘History Repeating’ from which we plunge into the deep-sea dive of ‘bae’.
‘Godstar’ feels like water lapping against a riverbank, ‘In The World’ unfolds, prog-like, from a pastoral opening to a heavy mid-section fuzzy stomp, and ends up with space-jazz, there’s the raga-meets-Tom Petty of ‘On Our Own’ and the Beatles-tinged closing song ‘Another Year Gone’.
Playing with all these layers is a hard balancing act if you still want to produce something that’s cohesive. If you’ve ever gone deep listening to the layers of Boston’s ‘More Than A Feeling’ then you realise that despite the complexity of its arrangement it’s all dedicated to the simple pleasure of listening to the song. Elephant Stone’s album is the same and, though they have lavished so much care and attention lavished on every molecule the ten tracks, all that attention to detail is merely a magnifying glass collecting all those rays of sun and focusing them into a powerfully uplifting whole. Play loud for maximum joy.
The band are Rishi Dhir: vocals, bass, sitar, guitars, mellotron, Farfisa, synths, percussion, Miles Dupire-Gagnon: drums, Jason Kent: backing vocals, piano, electric piano, Hammond, guitars, bass, Adam Kinner: sax, Robbie MacArthur: guitars, synths and Shawn Mativetsky: tabla.
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Review by Paul F Cook
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