4 out of 5

Label: Rune Grammofon

Produced by: Elephant9

I go back and forth on Elephant9, and with Greatest Show On Earth having been my first exposure to the band, that back-and-forthness starts here.

There is, essentially, what I read about and got me interested in Elephant9 – a kind of genre smashing mix of instrumental prog and free jazz and post-rock and boy howdy that sounds right up my alley – and then what I hear, which is those things, but performed in such a precise manner as to kind of draw clean lines around “here’s the prog bit,” and “here’s the jazz bit.” What complicates my take on that is how technically proficient this crew is, and how quickly they’re able to transition from bit to bit. It just nonetheless ends up feeling more performative than I’d want, and is unfortunately subject to ‘if I’d heard this first’ syndrome – if I hadn’t heard the other music Elephant9 is shadowing (or any of the other bands with similar influences), I’d probably have my mind more properly blown. As is, I walk away duly impressed, but not necessarily with a strong urge to listen again.

Greatest Show’s sequencing, unfortunately, plays into this: the moody slink of opener Way Of Return is far from anything I would’ve expected, hanging on that post-rock tag in a way truly surprising for something on Rune Grammofon. At 5+ minutes, it’s also a fully developed idea and not just a cute intro: the band commits to going slow and steady, giving us a very drums and bass forward sound that would feel at home amidst 90s Chicago indie rockers. Followup Actionpack1 is then a complete mindstorm of badass swagger, again very heavy, but allowing in more keys and jazz, and absolutely exploding in percussion in its conclusion.

At this point, I’m all in on Elephant9, and pretty literally – I remember listening to this album when I got it, and while Actionpack1 was playing, I was ordering as many other albums from their catalogue as I could.

Now, before I continue, note that I’ve given this album a high rating. It’s deserved. The material is excellently produced, ultimately well balanced, and even if I feel like the tour took me places I’ve seen before, a tour de force nonetheless. While I believe in giving reviews over to subjectiveness – it is important for me to reflect how I feel versus how I think I should feel – there are instances where I think better background would open up my ears more, and a glance at several reviews (like even the Allmusic one) goes deep on listing out references and music-theory kinda analysis that are beyond me. On many occasion I’ll roll my eyes at that, except… I kinda think it’s what e9 wants to lean in to. In many less words: the bulk of their music may not be made for me, and I just happened into some tracks that were.

Continuing: once we’re on to Farmer’s Walk, the album shifts over into a prog / free jazz project, very strictly swapping between Hawkwind and Miles Davis, as suggested above. Farmer’s is essentially entirely a prog groove, using a very snazzy keyboard bop to start swirling a frenzy of notes around, building up to a frantic pounding of the beat – the drumwork on this album being a perpetual standout. Dancing With Mr. E starts in similar territory, but at its midpoint switches into jazz, going for open-ended freakouts. Again, we get to a clatter by song’s conclusion, through letting a shriek of keys and the bubbly bass take point. Our closers are chill-out variations of these two genres: Mystery Blend is laid back jazz; Freaks grinds on its keys for a slowburn psych freakout.

All of these tracks are good, and probably great; they are undeniably perfectly performed, with a recording / mix (Christian Engfelt and Marcus Forsgren on the former; Christian and the band credited to the latter) willing to absolutely blow out your eardrums with wall-of-sound, and the sequencing is – if somewhat misleading – purposeful.

I will continue to go back and forth on Elephant9, with my only real complaint being that it net doesn’t do anything absolutely new, instead choosing to do the familiar really well. But given that I never doubt the final product as being the intention, I lean towards giving it a thumbs up.