The first I heard about this band was from a friend who saw them at The Metro. He was amazed - he said they played about seven songs in ninety minutes; that everyone got a lengthy everyone-else-leaves-the-stage solo, including the bassist; and that the sold-out crowd ate it up.

Then I was at a bar and I heard this music that I was immediately sure was The Mars Volta: loud, careening rock and roll jam music. It turned out it was indeed The Mars Volta, and since I can sometimes like loud rock and roll jam music, I put a few requests for more in the jukebox. Lots of it was just spaced-out jammin', but there were moments that were over the top in ways you can only achieve if you've been in a nonsensical space jam for five minutes.

I say not crap, but I'm curious what others think of this band. I want to hear more and see what they're like in person.

Absolute and total crap.

I was a big fan of At The Drive In's In/Casino/Out LP back in the day. Saw them in Dallas and Denton and was blown away. This was back in the day ('98?) when I was a little punkier rockier. I still think quite fondly of those shows.

Had a chance to see TMV for free a few months ago in Dallas. After waiting an hour for them to play (and the opening act was a guy doing spoken-word -- no equipment to move), they came out and the kids lost their shit.

It sounded like At The Drive In playing Kansas songs. We left five minutes into the first song, embarassed for them.

There were a lot of Tool shirts in the crowd, which might explain a lot.

But I think I'd rather listen to Tool than these guys.

mb

NOT CRAP, but with a stack o' waffles. I like where they're going, but I want to see if they reach it. I kind of like some moments on the "Deloused" album, but others do seem a bit noodley. The guy who did the sound manipulation died a couple months ago, I think, so I don't know where that puts them.

Dream Theater sucks, dude.

I would have to say NOT CRAP in the least. In my humble opinion they may be the only mainstream thing that has come out in a long time to actually have artistry and purpose behind it. Sure it's extravagant and has a tendency to lose its listeners during moments of complete silence but one can trust that everything that was put down on tape had a purpose, a function within an atmosphere of sound. after all purpose is what separates crap from not crap.

At the Drive In has to be judged as a completely separate entity. Besides, its easy to see that Cedric and Omar's crazy ideas were what made ATDI interesting. If there was a fight between the two camps that emerged from ATDI (TMV vs. Sparta) Sparta would lose.

I'm going to say NOT CRAP, only because Tremulant is one of the best EPs I have ever heard in my life. Anything post-Tremulant is awful. That was when they got rid of Eva, and started hanging out with the Red Hot Chili Peppers. They started jammin with them and shit, and even let them play on Deloused. Lame. But I suggest anyone listen to Tremulant if you haven't before.

My opinon on the whole Sparta vs. TMV is they both suck. They NEED each other. Each band is just ATDI without the other half. Neither band will never ever top anything they did in At the Drive-In.

Ha ha! His lyrics are totally fucking stupid. "And the award for most frequent use of a thesaurus goes to..." I felt the same way about ATDI. CRAP CRAP CRAP. I think we touched on this malarkey in the "Smart-Guy Words" post a few mos. back.

I did really enjoy that Inertiatic ESP song though, but I've been totally underwhelmed by how poopy all of the related bands are. Secretly I kinda like the Volta in spite of itself. Waffles doused in CRAP.



Faiz

Lobster Magnet wrote:I'm going to say NOT CRAP, only because Tremulant is one of the best EPs I have ever heard in my life. Anything post-Tremulant is awful. That was when they got rid of Eva, and started hanging out with the Red Hot Chili Peppers. They started jammin with them and shit, and even let them play on Deloused. Lame. But I suggest anyone listen to Tremulant if you haven't before.

I'm inclined to agree with you on this. If they cut out a lot of the jamming they'd be so much more interesting, but listening to the ten minute songs on their album is pretty tedious... supposedly they play Cicatriz for half an hour at shows nowadays. It just seems so... unnecessary.

I've heard less than one whole track from this band so I can't really vote on it. Jon Theodore, the drummer, is a friend of mine so I would like to say they aren't CRAP because of this. I just read that their new album has a 32 minute track on it. Are these guys any good?

Their new cd is up there with Jlow and fifty cent on the charts. I only heard 2 songs from it and didnt like it. It sounded too much like the last one and got boring immediately. I liked their first release, and when I saw them live a little over a year ago it was great. I would go see them again I suppose, but im not getting this new release. One thing thats good about it though is that its only about 7 dollars