It’s a known fact among musicians that a song and the memory of the song are not the same thing. When I think of Jimi Hendrix's music It plays in my head with tons of distortion, guitar screams, wild beasts instead of a rhythm section and lots and lots of noise. When I think of Led Zeppelin or Deep Purple I think the same. But when I put on a record by any of the above all I hear is a passionate guitar player, a steady rhythm section and a good groove. It is the space in the arrangements they leave empty, the drum rolls that were never played (but could have been) and the effect pedals never turned up all the way, that make room for the listeners phantasy to fill in the “blanks”. That’s the empty seat in the band left for the audience to join in.
And there’s The Mars Volta! Their seats are all filled. There’s absolutely no room for outsiders. The memory of their music is the same with the actual musc. But, somehow that’s the first thing that immediately captured my attention and pulled me inside like a vortex. I suddenly heard everything that I loved in rock music in one place, from one band, on one stage and it sounded awesome. There they were - rocking hard, slamming, tripping, jumping, screaming and being loud, really loud. With every second of the song filled with sounds, dense as a brick, they simply struck me as a thunder.
It was the first time I have heard them and it was on the Yahoo! Live Sets. After that I picked up their albums and listened to all of them, but this concert made the strongest impression on me. It might be because they sound much more exciting live than in the studio, or perhaps it was because Thomas Pridgen was behind the drum set, I really can’t tell. I recommend you listen to these live versions of some of their best known songs and decide if I’m right or I’m still trippin’.
