In 10-second intervals-- the first few bars of a fuzz-drenched guitar riff, the opening thuds of a tribal drum beat, the first line dripping from a stoned vocal-- the Black Angels can sound like the coolest band on the planet. If only there didn’t have to be an endless series of identical 10-second intervals after that; what’s initially thrilling about these Texas psych-rockers gets run through a loop that quickly turns monotonous, then tedious, and finally deadening. Their fourth album, Indigo Meadow, is more of the same.
Just as 2010’s Phosphene Dream was relatively compact and poppy compared with 2008’s Directions to See a Ghost, Indigo Meadow finds the Black Angels once again downplaying their psych side and playing up the rock. Not that the group has exited its original era of inspiration-- the menacing Farfisa organ fills and trebly guitar buzz keep the vibe firmly rooted in the 60s-- but the references have shifted a bit, away from “Sister Ray” and toward the Yardbirds and Nuggets. This suits the Black Angels’ current line-up; now down to a four-piece, they resemble a knuckle-dragging garage-rock band from the LBJ years now more than ever. Instead of prattling over a simple, pulsating groove for several minutes, the Black Angels now apply their muscular clomp to bluesy vamps like “The Day”, which nods towards the Yardbirds’ version of “I’m a Man”, and pseudo-menacing claptrap like the clumsy “Always Maybe”, which has the trippy keyboards and “spooky” vocal affectations of a darkly campy Strawberry Alarm Clock track.
It’s a not a crime for a revivalist outfit like the Black Angels to occasionally lapse into flower-power corniness; if delivered with a little self-awareness, it adds to the appeal of the anachronistic package. What’s not forgivable on Indigo Meadow is the pretension. “Don’t Play with Guns” is one of several mid-tempo slabs of snaky, druggy (or “druggy”) silliness that would go down just fine if the Black Angels didn’t take their own lyrical bullshit (“Now Angie, she was a demon/ She had six arms and Lucifer eyes,” etc.) so seriously. Unfortunately, the Black Angels seem themselves as bullshit artistes; in the press materials for Indigo Meadow, singer/multi-instrumentalist Alex Maas has the gall to suggest that “Don’t Play with Guns” is a comment on mass shootings like the tragedy in Aurora, CO, even though the song was written days before the massacre. “In "Don’t Play with Guns" the antagonist is a female who has the power of persuasion over a man,” Maas says on the band’s website. “Substitute the female antagonist with a Nation, substitute the manipulated man with yourself. Heed the warning: Don’t play with guns.”
You mean these songs are meaningful warnings so long as you substitute the shallow clichés in the lyrics with real-life substance? What a convenient trick. The sprightly “Broken Soldier” is a more deliberate “message” song about societal violence, concerning a fighting man who posits that it’s “hard to kill when you don’t know what side you’re on.” But applying Maas’ logic to the rest of the record, Indigo Meadow can mean whatever you wish. (The dreary “Evil Things” must be about the federal budget sequester.) Sorry, but that doesn’t pass the smell test. Indigo Meadow isn't a window into the modern world; it's an escape from it. Bullshit is fine if you can sell it, but the Black Angels have finally laid it on too thick.
