Duster >> The air is on fire

I can't believe it's still California Month, tremor #62:

Duster - "Topical Solution"

(Up Records, 1997)

This song is a beautiful slow-motion apocalypse, with some lullaby-worthy guitar plinking and what I like to call an overall "autumnal feel."  I think he says "The air is on fire" at around the 1:11 mark, but you really need to have ears the size of a caracal's to understand what this sleepy m.f. is singing, and I have been wrong about lyrics before.

Amazingly, Duster were formed by some dudes from a screamo band called Mohinder.  I got into Duster on the same Up Next sampler CD I mentioned in the Tiffany Anders post yesterday, and was immediately impressed by how they arrived with their own fully-formed sound, not to mention a cool name.  "Topical Solution" (dig that double meaning) is probably Duster's best-known song, since the mp3 page on Up's site has offered it as a free download for many years, over a decade by my estimation.  Rock out, rock out, rock out, rock out.  Duster's primitivist approach to instrument-playing is a breath of fresh air at first, but can wear thin over the course of a 17-song album, especially when the first half of this album (Stratosphere) has most of the highlights.  As a reviewer on rateyourmusic.com said, "Great music to mow the lawn to, thats how i got into it lolz."  I bought this CD in 1999 or 2000, and got their decent EP 1975 a little bit later, and got their other album, Contemporary Movement, in 2008.

While googling "duster stratosphere" to find a cover pic for this album in .000001 second, I found this photo, which I think fits perfectly with the song, and even eerily matches the three-color font scheme I had already chosen for the band / song / label / year field above:

Yes, I like using chaos theory / serendipity / synchronicity whenever possible... The pic is from this page, and is titled sottacquagrande.jpg, whatever that means.

Planets with similar climates: Codeine - "Kitchen Light" (1993), Lowercase - "Willing To Follow You Down" (1998).


Currently eating or drinking: Alouette Berries & Cream cream cheese; Samuel Smith Oatmeal Stout (still brewed using water from a well dug in 1758; possibly the best beer I've ever had).