Have You Ever Seen The Rain? A Quick Review Of The New Album From Seedsmen To The World (His Name Is Alive, Etc.)

A collaboration between Ethan Daniel Davidson and Infinite River (Joey Mazzola, Gretchen Gonzales, and Warren Defever [His Names Is Alive]), Seedsmen to the World is one of this week's most transfixing records. A deconstruction of hoary rock standards, as well as a genre-shattering attack, the co-release by Blue Arrow Records and Birdman Records is also pretty darn clever.

Opener "Blood" is space rock of a sort, a distillation of late Sixties acid rock across 12 minutes. Imagine if aliens landed and tried to learn the blues and you'll get the idea. Elsewhere, "Home" is more straightforward, a brief respite, while "Brown" recalls Yo La Tengo and The Bevis Frond. This is expansive stuff, but not indulgent material, with the diversions taken not as important as the methodology of getting there. Things are being unspooled and pulled apart in slow motion, and the effect is nearly hypnotic. Closer "Rain" dissects a CCR gem with a sitar-line as sharp as a razor.

Seedsmen to the World recalls Defever's mid-Nineties His Name Is Alive material a tiny bit, though this is far broader in scope, and less contained in its quirks. And some of it certainly owes debts to the stuff Davidson's offered in the past, but for the most part the record sits in a unique space, a genre all its own, even as it's the sound of a genre or two being destroyed as it's explored. Fans of Spiritualized and Galaxie 500 may find moments here that seem familiar, but the whole enterprise really stirkes a series of notes that are far more abrasive on purpose, with moments of release teased out of the explorations here.

Seedsmen to the World is out now, co-released by Blue Arrow Records and Birdman Records.