The experimental rock group Earth released a video for their most recent track “The Colour of Poison.” The song is apart of their unreleased album Full Upon Her Burning Lips and is the second single to be released after “Cats on the Briar.”
The track is relatively slow at roughly 65 BPM and the drummer plays sparingly, typically only hitting a closed hi-hat on each quarter note and embellishing every once in a while with a light crash. What pulls listeners in from the start of this track is its stop and go feel. Frequently, the guitarist and drummer play for a measure or two, pause, play for another measure or two, then pause again. These abrupt stops delay the listener for a variable amount of time as they wait for the guitarist to start up again. The song has a pretty full and rich sound as all the guitar chords and single notes have suspended sounds. The slow and repetitive melody of the song allows listeners to focus on small interesting aspects of the song such as it’s infrequent chromatic chord progressions and distorted harmonizations. “The Colour of Poison” is very much a traditional rock song with a chill and cool vibe that pulls you lazily along.
Essentially, the music video is a series of black and white overexposed videos that overlap one another. Before you think you know what your looking at, another short video and image is superimposed over the original clip and the visuals shift. Though this should be disorienting, the calming clips and the gradual transitions provide something that’s much more meditative than confusing. With videos of hands reaching down, light reflected in swimming pools, leaves and trees blowing in the wind, and drifting clouds the footage represents aesthetically pleasing and calming scenes that make it incredibly watchable. The slow rock and roll music over the video provides a laid back tone with a super cool feel. The “Colour of Poison” music video is definitely something you could watch over and over and over.
Earth formed in 1989 in Olympic, Washington. The members consist of guitarist Dylan Carlson and percussionist Adrienne Davies. They quickly became known for their minimalistic rock sound that hasn’t been afraid to dip into new genres. Their most well known for their first album Earth 2: Special Low Frequency Version which gained them popularity and began their cult following. Most recently, Earth has announced the upcoming release of their ninth studio album Full Upon Her Burning Lips which will be released in May 2019. Additionally, the group will be touring this spring.
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