Patiently Awaiting the Meteorite – Strange Intuition

URL: http://patientlyawaitingthemeteorite.band/

“Strange Intuition” comes straight out of your speakers intent on shaking you out of whatever doldrums you might be experiencing. It has a sternum rattling rhythm section attack propelling things along and the guitar work has an appropriately jagged quality while still radiating the sort of warmth that draws listeners further into the song. There’s an artfulness, however, to the way the band takes on these arch traditional elements of rock music compared to their contemporaries and a lot of that is reflected in the way the arrangement’s turns suggest nothing less than a change of color – Patiently Awaiting the Meteorite will slow things down, strip things down to its essence, and deploy its musical weapons in much different ways while still maintaining the coherence defining their songs from the beginning onward. This is rock music anyone can get behind in 2018, even those who profess to dislike or have long since abandoned the form.

They may not be a traditional rock band, but they definitely have a strong grip on the potential inherent in bringing a strong rhythm section together with hard charging guitar lines. “Strange Intuition” begins with a relentless blast of drums and guitar, with an underlying bass giving it extra ballast, and listeners will feel entertainingly bulldozed by the inexorable nature of that roll. They are smart enough, however, as musicians to keep shuffling the deck for listeners and the arrangement shifts at all the right points to give the song more dramatic lift. It’s a marvel to hear how well the Grand Brothers and Dee, in his capacity as a vocalist, orchestrate the movement of this song.

SHAZAM: https://www.shazam.com/track/415581235/strange-intuition

Dee has been honing his skills as a vocalist for moments like this for a long time and, with each successive new release, we can hear his growing powers as both an interpreter and as a singer clearly geared to responding to a song’s demands. He steps up to the challenge in a big way with this track, filling the lyrics with emotional meaning it might have lacked in the hands of a lesser singer, and has the attitude of a singer in a band rather than a solo performer grafted onto another artist’s musical project. There’s no question in his commitment and his writing doubles down on that – the opening two lines have the magical qualities that the best openings possess and it continues developing from there.

The song runs four minutes in length, but it seems like it’s over much sooner and leaves you wanting more. The band clearly possesses the chops and artistic imagination to extend themselves if they wished, but let’s be glad they understand how to write condensed material that, nevertheless, contains worlds of musical imagination rather than rehashing a single theme and relying on paint by numbers musical theatrics to maintain a listener’s attention. Instead, Dee and The Grand Brothers are giving us something much different with Patiently Awaiting the Meteorite. “Strange Intuition” is giving us rock music for a new century and we’re better for having songs like this around.

LISTEN/BUY: http://smarturl.it/CanyonDiablo

Amy Thigpen