Many Magic Mushrooms Lurk in Black Angel's Indigo Meadow

As an experiment I plan, not on beating you all over the heads with my makeshift attempts to provide insider knowledge on the way guitars jolt out their wild magic identities, the way drums unleash torrents of machismo bluster, the way the vocalist is summoning confusion from a horrific center of a menacing other dimension. Nope. I'm simply going to tell you how it can be said that Austin psychedelic rock band Black Angel's "Indigo Meadow" is uncomfortably similar to the stages of one distorted drug trip. The best way to convince you of this is to attach a song title to the sensations it most readily hints at. Ready? Let's go then my partners in local flavor. The title track is the first link in the suspension bridge. Vocalists Christian Bland and Alex Mass have had it with the Man. Time to get as whacked out as possible using whatever pocket change will net them cheap, low rent district drugs. Drummer Stephanie Bailey hammers out her flustered approval. "Evil Things" slide into view. Pretty nasty hits going around the room. You may or may not have heard of folks who are so caught up in a trip that they swear insects are crawling on them. In goes the needle. Tighter, higher shock to the system. Organ burnout can't be too far away, can it? "Don't Play With Guns", a title that requires no justification for the at least partially educated amongst us, symbolizes the drug indulgence at its peak, inches away from going over the falls. As for "Holland" the post-hangover color palate is softer, as is reinforced by Kyle Hunt and Alex Mass's keyboards. They know better than to startle you when that nasty headache is growing more and more impossible to shrug off. Gone are the clanging, nothing to grab onto waves of oblivion. In their place are soft keys and better odds of terra firma forming under your feet. "The Day" brings you the first signs of coherent grasping of big concepts. Christian reintroduces us to the maddening cycle of the day-by-day. Up it goes. Down it goes. Up comes the next day. Down goes the next day. Not necessarily ad infinitum, but it's the first opportunity you've been afforded to shake loose the bong binge that seemed like a good idea at the time. Before we proceed, kudos to this band for successfully graduating from the Doors/Jefferson Airplane school of hallucinogenic experimentation. One puff of this group of songs and the late '60s have returned to tighten the migraine pulling at either end of your skull. "Love Me Forever" likes the skin its in. Could it be you're a new man now? Bass, guitar, vocals, and drums are know on the same side instead of rubbing salt in those morning after chills. Could it be there's some firm legs to stand on anger brewing from both "War on Holiday" and "Broken Soldier"? In any case bonus points to the band (or record label) for knowing the right sequential order for these tracks. In the case of "Broken", upon closer reflection you can see the image of a soldier, khaki pants cinched up tight, helmet strapped, locked, and ideally loaded. Nice job, Stephanie. You've snapped the right photograph of a stalwart battlefield vet going off to the needful, although his needs as an individual homosapien may be quite different. "Twisted Light" wriggles up the arms, toiler bowl at the ready, chowder blow pushed to the immediate agenda. Even songs like "You're Mine" which hint at the promise of some untainted romantic interaction are "jazzed up" shall we say by the ongoing fuzz feedback terrain of people in the throes of hanging too loose for comfort. Coming to the far end of that shaky suspension bridge we are greeted by "Black Isn't Black". How ironic. Hear how the guitar seems to be fading in surreal fashion at the close? That's right, people. We really are vicariously experiencing a tripped out yokel's fade into blackness. With any luck this sad sack is headed straight for the Land of Nod where he will go to get some sense shaken back into him. That way when the next day's sun rousts him, he might of use to anyone in the outside world. Christian nailed the uneasy, yet relief-inducing fade. If you like going where The Doors and Jefferson Airplane have laid their heads then "Indigo Meadow" is just your brand of powder affected paradise. You may try to avert your eyes from the train wreck but voyeurism screams, "It's not our nightmare, lunkhead! Let's see how the less fortunate are faring!!" Sit back and inhale at your own risk.