Before these crowded streets, there stood my dreaming tree
Written: Nov 18 '00 (Updated Sep 17 '08)
Product Rating:
Pros: This is pretty daring and experimental for the DMB - and it works!
Cons: Some growly vocals, sexual references, and a few f-words in one song.
The Bottom Line: This album takes some getting used to, but it's nice to see the DMB stretching beyond their jam rock band beginnings and not settling for simple radio singles.
divad23's Full Review: Before These Crowded Streets by Dave Matthews Band
As is the case with many of the more casual Dave Matthews Band fans, my introduction to the group was their stellar Crash CD. It's almost always the case that when a band puts out such a solid and satisfying CD, they take a surprisingly different approach the next time out. This is definitely the case with Before These Crowded Streets. If you were originally drawn to the band because of their intriguing combination of acoustic rock, fiddle, sax, flute, and a host of other instruments, not to mention their incredible drummer, don't worry - you'll find plenty of that stuff here. But if your favorite tracks on Crash were the ones where the band let loose with a full-force jam session, then you might have to stop and think before buying this CD. It does have a few upbeat, jamming tracks here and there, but for the most part, this album is an exercise in plumbing the depths of Dave Matthews' soul.
Okay, maybe that's a little excessive - I doubt these are his most personal thoughts ever recorded. What happens when you're listening to this CD is that you're almost forced to examine the mood and the lyrics contained in each song - on past CD's - the lyrics could often be overlooked by those who were just in it for the good musicianship. This time, you've really got to listen carefully, and listen through a few times, before passing judgment. The sheer length of all of these songs (excluding the short intro) doesn't allow for a lot of peppy, ripe-for-the-picking radio singles. Here, the Dave Matthews Band's fusion of jam-band-rock and quirky jazz is married to a more brooding, "progressive rock" style. And I'd say it works pretty well, once you grow accustomed to it.
Pantala Naga Pampa starts off this CD, its foreign title clueing you in early that you may not understand every word of this CD the first time through, that this time the band is going for a more "artistic" approach, for better or worse. Clocking in at under a minute (and actually the only track on this CD that is shorter than five minutes!), it's a simple, upbeat invitation for the listener to come in and relax, presumably while Dave tells us a few stories of things that he's experienced or at least pondered since we last hear from him.
Rapunzel then jumps in - an unbelievably fun (if a bit confusing) love song, written with the suggestively sexy overtones Dave Matthews is infamous for. What makes this song stand out from some of the band's past tunes that are lyrically similar is that this one is much faster, and it has more changes in time signature than you can shake a stick at. While this makes it almost impossible to follow along with at first, you are graciously allowed over six minutes to catch on to a tune that only barely escapes being categorized as "organized chaos". People who analyze their music a lot like me will love this one, but don't expect it to remain unobtrusively in the background while relaxing with your lover. It's too feisty for that.
The Last Stop continues in an upbeat manner with a refreshingly normal rhythm, but the music is still quite unusual - the chords and fiddle playing evoking an Egyptian or middle Eastern feel. This is definitely one of Dave's more angry songs, directed at Christian fundamentalists who lie, cheat, wound and even kill in the name of their Lord. Pretty harsh subject matter, but speaking from a Christian perspective, I'd say Dave has every right to be angry at the sight of such hypocrisy - it makes me angry too. Dave's vocals are a little growly on this one, which is slightly unsettling at first, but it fits perfectly with the song. It amuses me that each time he sings "This is the last stop", the music stops momentarily and then keeps on going, making for another 6-minute-plus marathon. The song fades out nicely in a flurry of guitar, mandolin, and banjo picking.
Don't Drink the Water was the first single from this album, though I'm guessing it was often played in an abbreviated format. It's a more mid-tempo, slightly folksy tune, with a more standard rhythm that might deceive you at first into thinking the band's getting tired of being different. But listen to the lyrics - Dave is describing the atrocity of how white settlers have taken over Native American land and mercilessly slaughtered those who didn't catch the hint and move on to less green pastures. Pretty harsh subject matter - I think we've known for a while that the Dave Matthews Band, being an interracial group, has a fairly strong stance against racism, but this one really hammers their point home. What's interesting is that Dave sings from the point of view of the perpetraitor - "You must move on, or I will bury you." The banjo-picking (courtesy of Bela Fleck) gives this song a real down-home sort of feel which accentuates the mood quite well as the song builds to its climax, and the perpetraitor realizes that he has been cursed for his offenses against the Natives. That curse is that he lives with his hatred, his injustice and so forth - Alanis Morissette appears seemingly out of nowhere to back him up here, and it's a hauntingly lovely duet, even if I have my issues with Ms. Morissette.
A short, unlisted musical interlude follows, that is somewhat reminiscent of "Satellite" from the band's Under the Table and Dreaming CD, which leads nicely into Stay (Wasting Time). This one is another lovely romantic song, which sort of combines the moods of "Lie in Our Graves" and "Say Goodbye" from Crash. It describes being with a lover on a hot, sunny day, and wanting to do nothing but bum around with her and not have any responsibilities - though it's much more poetic than that. It's not as blatantly sensual as "Say Goodbye" - it could easily be the soundtrack to taking your wife or girlfriend on a nice Caribbean vacation. The almost gospel-sounding female backup vocals add a wonderfully playful mood to this song, and as it is on most tracks, Carter Beauford's unorthodox percussion is outstanding.
Halloween very abruptly takes you back into the whirlwind of Dave Matthews' brooding anger. Longtime fans first heard this song on the Recently EP, but this is its first appearance on a full album, and here some strings have been added, which makes the musical backdrop of the song sound decptively bright. Once Dave starts singing, you'll realize that he was likely pretty messed up in the head when he wrote this. His vocals are almost guttural, as if he's come back from the dead, which I guess fits with the subject matter of the song - he's cursing a former lover for leaving him, hoping that she regrets it and that she lives with that ghost forever. But it's really quite disturbing. I got used to this song and now I enjoy it somewhat, but I just can't get behind that sort of unbridled hatred. It's especially surprising midway through the song when he snarls, "Tell us, are you satisfied with f---ing?" It's the only time I've heard him swear on an album, and I can forgive it here because the music on this CD is so good. But well, you've been warned.
The Stone segues out of "Halloween" so smoothly that you might not realize the track has changed. "Halloween" essentially ends by flattening itself until it falls apart into a bed of somber strings, which leads up to an acoustic guitar intro that sounds almost exactly like "Drive In Drive Out" (my favorite song from Crash). However, this one never quite kicks in like "Drive" does. The tension of the song remains in a sort of holding pattern as it rambles along, with some understated but tasty drums, and sweetly mournful orchestration backing the song up. Here Dave is pondering some grave sin that he has committed, feeling the weight crashing down on him "as heavy as stone", worrying that he will have to pay for what he has done and pleading with a friend to help him escape. At this point, some light is shed on "Halloween" - this is my interpretation, but perhaps he is feeling guilty for the hatred he just finished unleashing. Whatever the interpretation, the two songs work well together, even if I could sometimes do without the first.
Another short musical interlude follows - this one is a little more upbeat and peppy, with the fiddle and sax echoing each other. Perhaps the band had a few musical fragments here and there that never developed into songs, so they just recorded them as is. In any case, Crush is up next, which I do recall hearing on the radio before taking the time to listen to this album, but likely cut down to about half of its eight-minute length. Put quite simply, this seductive, jazzy romantic ballad is a logical progression from the smash hit "Crash into Me". Dave seems to be pondering a night spent with the girl of his dreams - the one he admired from afar in "Crash", and now he can't quite convince himself that it all really happened. I usually don't prefer for songs to be this sexual in nature, but in all fairness, Dave prefers the poetic to the graphic, and when he sings "Lovely lady, let me drink you, please", it holds a wonderfully romantic power. I thought it to be a bit longer than necessary at first, but the music in this song is quite memorable, from the grooving bassline to the fiddle breakdown in the middle to the sexy saxophone - sometimes you just wish it would never end (and they do tend to drag this one out a bit longer in concert, as they do with many of their songs).
The Dreaming Tree continues on the theme of dreams, but this is more of a sad song. It's hard to piece together what's going on in this one - something about a child lamenting to his father that his "dreaming tree" has died. Maybe it's about growing up and becoming disillusioned with the world, or maybe it's about the band's experience with fame, facing the "crowded streets" before them and wishing for simpler days. Who knows? All I can say is that it's a gorgeous composition, and the band manages to maintain a complex rhythmic pattern of seven throughout the entire thing (it's either 7/8 or 14/16 or something like that; I'm not a music major).
Pig continues the moody second half of this CD after another upbeat interlude which actually sounds similar to "Pantala Naga Pampa". This song reprises another theme Dave Matthews is infamous for - death and the fact that we can't escape it. He's tackled it before in songs like "Two Step", "Rhyme & Reason", and "Tripping Billies", and here he acknowledges that: "Just thinking out loud - don't mean to dwell on this dying thing." I don't exactly agree with his conclusion - he seems to be saying that we have been given a lot of material goods in the world and that we are greedy if we want more (I think it's a dig at religion, but perhaps I'm just being defensive), but I do agree with his analysis that we need to stop worrying about death with our heads stuck in the ground, and start loving people. It does get a little preachy, and with such pretty music, Dave should probably reign in those growly vocals, but it's not a bad song.
Spoon dramatically concludes the CD, after one final interlude complete with some playful scat singing. By this point the first few times through the album, all of the long meditative songs on somewhat dark subject matter were really starting to mess with my head, so I was that close to concluding that maybe Dave Matthews had just gone crazy and dragged the rest of his band into his weird little world with him. Which is why it was kinda funny in this song when he sang, "Maybe you're a little crazy/But laughing out loud makes it all subside". For all of the dramatic deep thoughts he's dragged us through, he ends up just laughing at it, but I guess a little laughter and letting it go is healthy sometimes. I wasn't sure at first what this had to do with his spoon stirring his coffee, but perhaps that's what he was doing when he got the idea for the song. He keeps mentioning that he thinks of someone when he does this, but then he turns away - it might be that old lover again, and perhaps he's thinking of contacting her or at least resolving to forgive her, but then he seems to go, "Nah!" and move on to other thoughts. Alanis (who knows a thing or two about being bitter and slightly deranged) makes one more guest appearance here - she actually gets an entire verse to herself, and again she's a welcome presence as the CD draws to a close and the music builds up into a flurry of drums, banjo, sax, fiddle - all the elements get in their last licks here.
Make sure you listen carefully - after a little bit of silence comes a dreamy reprise of "The Last Stop", which Dave uses to say goodbye to the listener much like he used "Pantala Naga Pampa" to say hello.
Even if there are elements of this CD that leave me perplexed and a little frustrated, I find myself intrigued, and I come back to listen to it time and time again. Thank God Napster stayed online, because when I first downloaded these songs, I listened to them once, hated most of them, and deleted them. But then I gave it another chance a month or so later, and decided the CD was worth buying. I think any patient listener who liked Crash would decide similarly. But if you're investigating the band for the first time after hearing some catchy radio singles, this is probably not the CD for you to start with.
TRACK REVIEW SUMMARY Excellent: Crush, The Dreaming Tree, Rapunzel, The Last Stop, Don't Drink the Water, Stay (Wasting Time) Good: Pantala Naga Pampa, The Stone, Spoon Decent: Pig Weak: Halloween Skippable: NONE
Band Members: Dave Matthews: Acoustic guitar, vocals LeRoi Moore: Saxophone Boyd Tinsley: Fiddle/Violin Stefan Lessard: Bass Carter Beauford: Drums
Special Guests: Tim Reynolds: Acoustic/electric guitars Bela Fleck: Banjo Alanis Morissette: Vocals
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