Band of Horses – Infinite Arms (2010)

Music festivals are all about nature: sleeping in it, chilling in it, puking in it, chopping bits of it down to make stages and orgy clearing and blasting it with soul-trembling trip-folk psych-hop grooves (best genre ever). Or so I imagine.

Here’s my list of previous festival experiences:

1. Homebake, 2009
2. TBA

So I’m working partly off assumptions here. I did notice though that this year, Splendour in the Grass offered carbon offset tickets for like $1 extra. Naturally, I didn’t pay that. Why should I pay the price when the environment can? It’s way richer than I am, in precious minerals if nothing else. Mother Nature craps gold. And farts, like, noble gases (because Mother Nature is a lady).

It’s therefore unsurprising that, in tribute to Gaia, spirit of the Earth, the Splendour 2010 lineup includes an impressive array of animal-themed artists, including Gypsy & the Cat, Boy & Bear, Frightened Rabbit, Grizzly Bear, Tame Impala and Lisa Mitchell (she has doe-like qualities). If we want, we could also throw in The Pixies due to their affinity with woodland critters. In for a penny, in for a pound, I always say!

I’m a fan of each of these artists, but the bestial band that’s really struck me is Band of Horses, who I’d shamefully never heard of before seeing them on the Splendour list. Firstly, I like that they have a good, strong name that just puts it all out there. It’s not a bevy of horses. It’s definitely not a conflagration of horses. And, sadly, it isn’t a pantheon of horses, even though that sounds cool. It’s a band, and they’re pretty good at being one. And while not all the band members are horses, and some aren’t even odd-toed ungulates (thanks Wikipedia), there is something horsey about their music – in a good way! Picture a bunch of chilled-out horses getting together on a Sundee arvo to bash out some melodious alt-rock with a subtle and pleasant country lilt. Feel that heart-nudging vocal harmony reverberating through your blood? It’s Band of Horses.

Since that whole horse thing was a complete red herring (if there’s not a band called Red Herring, there should be…there’s not much piscine representation at Splendour this year), I’ll elucidate.

It took me a couple of goes to really get into Infinite Arms, Band of Horses’ third (or trophomore) and latest album. Since then I’ve listened to it roughly infinite times, and when I’m not listening to it, I miss it like a junkie misses crack. I find myself craving it while walking the dog, in bed, even while I’m already listening to it. I’ve taken to sneaking my iPod into the bathroom at work so I can get a quick BoH fix. I emerge, pupils dilated, adrenalin singing through my body, hair matted with sweat, feeling dirty and a bit used, but confident that no one knows my shameful little secret, since there’s nothing unusual about me being sweaty and unfocused at work.

I dread the inevitable crash, knowing that I’ll hit rock-bottom sooner rather than later. When that happens, I’ll turn to my iPod in desperate, seeking solace in some old dependables or maybe picking up something new and untried off the street. Maybe I’ll be able to fill that horse-shaped void (Tame Impala might fit nicely), maybe not. Perhaps I’ll cry whenever I hear a BoH song, or curl up in the corner and whisper sweet nothings to myself. It may last for some time. Maybe I’ll get my life sorted, settle down, forget any of it ever happened.

Until, one day, I’ll be hoverboarding down the street listening to my SpacePod 6000. I’ll idly skip past one song, then another. I’ll look at my watch, use some future curse (like ‘Shizbot!’; future curse = current curse + robot), and boot up my hoverboard to 9 to catch my futurebus. Then I’ll hear those first stirring chords of Factory swell out of the speakers, I’ll feel the music flood my veins and invade my brain, and I’ll stop and go, ‘Ohhh, yeeaaahh!’

But until hoverboards are invented I’ll stick to riding bands of horses, and riding them hard.

The most distinctive feature of all BoH songs is, unsurprisingly, the lead singer’s voice. Ben Bridwell’s gentle American twang has a yearning purity that is weighted by layers of backup vocals and the playful pulsing of guitar and keyboard. Even tethered by the interwoven threads of vocal harmony that pervade the album, Bridwell’s voice still packs a punch, transforming the prosaic lyrics of slower tracks like Factory and Infinite Arms into something transcendently wistful.

The faster songs aren’t without their charms either. Dilly has a skip in its toe-tappin’ step that imbues the chorus with a buoyant energy, and NW Apt. is the closest thing to a straightforward rock track on the album – and is no less catchy for’t. I have no idea what most of the songs are about and the titles usually don’t help (Infinite Arms: a song bemoaning the world’s eternal state of conflict or promoting neverending hugs?), but there’s such a good energy in most of the tracks that I still get it. Or I think I do, which also works.

For me, there are a couple of misses. Evening Kitchen is too slow and uniform, and Older, the song with the clearest country influence, is a bit too twee and nasal (I’m crying horsey tears of apology even as I type this). Maybe they would be more bearable if they weren’t next to one another, if they were broken up by the sheer awesomeness of Laredo or joyful slow-builder On My Way Back Home. But they’re not, and that’s a disappointment that I will bear with me for all my days.

I guess I could understand if people can’t really get into Infinite Arms – understand that they have some kind of aural or emotional disorder! I imagine it’s an album that polarises people. There will be those dour multitudes for whom the beauty and the brilliance of this clean, sweet music just slips away, forever out of reach. There will be those who kinda like it, but aren’t compelled to obsessively listen to it for every waking moment of their lives. And then there will be those enraptured souls who, like me, hunger for the distant world this album conjures: sad, empty places beneath winter stars, the warm lights of home somewhere in the distance, and a ghostly pantheon of horses looking down on it all, gently nickering in benediction.

Standout tracks: Laredo, On My Way Back Home, Dilly, NW Apt.