Dead Meadow (Dig)

Dead Meadow | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (September 19, 2006)
• Original Release Date: 2006
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Xemu Records
• ASIN: B000HEWGA6
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #66,473 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. Sleepy Silver Door

2. Indian Bones

3. Dragonfly

4. Lady

5. Greensky Greenlake

6. Beyond the Fields We Know

7. At the Edge of the Wood

8. Rocky Mountain High

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Green skies and green lakes, November 18, 2006

By 

E. A Solinas "ea_solinas" (MD USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Dead Meadow (Dig) (Audio CD)

Dead Meadow is one of those rock bands that feels classic -- they love vintage hard-rock and psychedelica, as well as fantasy and horror.

All those elements come into play in their self-titled "Dead Meadow," which has fortunately been rereleased after the success of last year's "Feathers." And this particular nugget of hard rock still has it blurry appeal -- a slow-burning, intense stoner-rock sound, with a psychedelic edge and eerie lyrics.

It opens with a staticky, crackly buzzing noise -- then a foghorn-like bass barges in and starts playing ponderously. The one instrument is so overpowering that I had to turn down the volume -- and the drums came in, breaking up the bludgeoning basslines. There are some murmured lyrics, but they're submerged under the heavy stoner riffs.

Having weeded out the casual, the album careens into the faster, drum-driven "Indian Bones," and the eerie, slightly awkward "Dragonfly," with its slow guitar riffs. Then it's back into dense psych-stoner-rock, which is distorted slightly to give it a surreal edge, and swirling electric guitar solos that blossom out.

There's a brief acoustic interlude -- "At the Edge of the Wood" -- which is just a folky, meandering little melody that lacks the heavy, intense feeling of the other songs. It feels a bit out of place, but is followed up by the tightly-wound, aggressive rhythms of the grand finale, "Rocky Mountain High."

"Dead Meadow" is not the best album that this band has put out -- they were all young at the time, and sometimes the music shows their inexperience. But this is also an album that most bands would be proud to produce. Their knack is in taking what seems like simple stoner rock, and twisting it into an swirling mass of "wah-wah" effects and sprawling proggy noises.

It has a pretty simple instrumental lineup -- Steven Kille plays the blunt, raw basslines, while Mark Laughlin (now no longer with the band) produces drums hard and sharp enough to blast through the foggy music. Jason Simon both plays a nimble guitar, and offers the rather drowned-out vocals that you have to strain to hear.

And their songs are beautifully written, full of nature-lovin' wise men, owls, trees and Native American imagery, like a more scattered Jim Morrison. Their knack for lyrical writing is absolutely exquisite at times ("If the lady of the morning light/Lets her hair flow down/She'd warm the frost covered ground...").

And they even homage pre-Tolkien writer Lord Dunsany, set to the driving rock tune "Beyond the Fields That We Know." It's a pretty eerie song. "Winter winds reach icy hands/into my room/carried away under gleaming/eyes of glowing moon..."

While you can hear Dead Meadow's inexperience in this album, you can also hear their raw talent and blossoming skills. It's solid and thoroughly enjoyable, and only promised better things to come.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars connecting the dots between Black Sabbath and Blue Cheer, Bardo Pond and Kyuss, October 3, 2006

By 

Aquarius Records (San Francisco) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Dead Meadow (Dig) (Audio CD)

This band's most recent album, Feathers, was one of our favorites of last year so it's nice to get this opportunity to revisit their first record which has been out of print for quite a while, the label (Joe Lally's Tolatta) that released it originally went out of business and the record was sort of lost in limbo. Their stoner-psych-rock prowess can be found here in its full glory connecting the dots between Black Sabbath and Blue Cheer, Bardo Pond and Kyuss. One of Dead Meadow's best attributes is their ability to make records that totally grow on you and seep into your skin listen after listen. This has been hitting the spot for us so much as of late that literally not a day has gone by that this hasn't been blasting out of our speakers here in the store! Such a welcome reissue, and for sure a must-have if you missed it the first time around in 2001, when we said the following about it:

Dead Meadow are a retro stoner psych rock power trio playing fuzzed out space-jams in a heavy and rollicking yet still kinda mellow mode. For fans of Blue Cheer and their fellow Tolatta act Spirit Caravan. They're also reminiscent of a more jammed-out, psychedelic Sleep, but with some gentle touches -- there's even interludes of acoustic guitar indie-pop. This one grew on us! [See!] It's definitely more "out-of-time" than most other stoner rock efforts, harking back not to the arenas of the '70s but to the garages and hippie pads of the late '60s. As such it stands apart from the current legions of Kyuss / Fu Manchu clones. The one weak point, the slightly whiny vocals, hardly matter amid the instrumental majesty of the electric fuzz guitar and bass action that dominates this album!

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Testament Of What Was To Come, September 22, 2006

By 

Justin Leg "Just Like A Coke Machine You Know... (Indiana) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Dead Meadow (Dig) (Audio CD)

Well, well, well. Instead of spending upwards to $100 on e-bay (seriously, and there was a buyer) for a first pressing copy of Dead Meadow's debut album, the band has instead taken the cost-effective advice of their fans and decided to hook in with Xemu Records that will do a three part re-issue installment of the band's earliest recordings.

Their debut is much more than what you would expect from a very promising band whom was all but 19-20 yrs old when they laid these tracks down. Singer/guitarist Jason Simon, with his ever present "Rubber Soul"/"Revolver" era voice, displays some great six string electric psychedlia and works the effects pedals with proper experimentation that is well above average creativity given his age. But what becomes most evident is that much credit is owed to the producer of this album for not letting these songs fall into the kind of slop job quality that is typically suffered by many extremely young bands.

Dead Meadow has skillfully evolved more in playing than in style since this recording. While this is a good album, fans may compare it to a watered-down blend of the riffage of 2003's "Shivering Kings" and the dynamic ambience of 2005's (masterpeice) "Feathers" albums. Hearing the original version of "Beyond The Fields We Know" is a treat although a more dominating version can be found of the Meadow's 2002 one night concert album "Got Live If You Want It". Given Dead Meadow's honed sound of The Beatles being mainlined injected with early 70's hard rock (think Sabbath and James Gang), this debut album makes a testament of what was to come with the group's recent albums.