What They Choose to Write Music About

I have to begin this review of the just released album "Break in the
Clouds" by confessing and testifying - I love Elephant Revival!

I love each member of the band not only for their superb musicianship,
their songwriting, as singers and tellers of narrative in the lyric
and music of the song. I love them for being magical, wonderful Human
Beings. I love the drive for absolute harmonic perfection in the song
which they seek and achieve. And, perhaps, the thing I most love is
what they choose to make songs about.

In the general law of relativity musings of Daniel "D-ro" Rodriguez in
his song "What Is Time?" the song goes:

"...Even Einstein said “Time is not a condition in which we live,

It's a condition in which we think”

And we can change the ways we think..."

The thought naturally goes on that by changing the way we think - we
can change time and the Human Condition.

These lyrics voice a perennial message of the band which is: Our
reality is ours' to create.

In his time travel evoking instrumental "Lexington" Daniel "Dango"
Rose musically narrates an elementary school trip to a historic
mansion in his native Illinois in which he is thrown back into the
American Civil War.

The time trip raises extreme concerns among his teachers of their
young, sensitive student's mental health.

This sense of being psychically sensitive and to some extent haunted
by our personal and collective past time is again presented in Rose's
song "Sleeping With Your Clothes On".

Rose writes: "Is that a cricket in the kitchen
Or is that a tune left unwritten
Was that you of who I'm dreaming
Riding horses through the valleys of Virginia
Bareback in the brier
Soaked by the rain
Asleep with the light on
Asleep with the light on

"You are gone now my dear departed
Broken shades the broken hearted
As I'm dreaming in the morning
Distant shores of distant yearning
Take me back to the river
Back through the valley
Over the highest mountain
Asleep with the light on."

It is also evoked in Bridget Law's in all ways amazing instrumental
"Ancient Seas".

Law evokes her Celtic musical heritage and influence, and in all ways
exhibits her own transcendent, individual, musical genius. She has
composed a beautiful, passionate piece of music that seethes, crashes
and boils with the primal waters and the force of ancient oceans.

In his song "Feathers Fly" Rodriguez narrates his experiences of
loving fellow band member Bonnie May Paine and makes a universal,
timeless anthem about the power of love:

"...We gaze into the stars, bodies on the ground.
Our minds and hearts they leave, become part of the sky.
Now we can go and live forever.
And if we die today, at least we'll know the secret".

"Drop" is Paines' description of her mystical, magical union with the
unity of the universe, and the universe's mystical union with her:

"...But the hour was one time because
I slipped into a flower
Recalled the time to climb the vine
A honeysuckle tower
I was water brought to lifted leaves
Of daffodils and day lilies
Drank into the grace of trees
The aspens eye, the willows weep

That hung so low it touched below
The surface of a still puddle
Did I behold, reflection told
Looking back at me, the eyes of my body
So I jumped in, back into my skin
And sang this song of where I'd been."

And last but in no way least is the prodigious and wise songwriting
and in all ways distinctive singing and musicianship of Sage Cook.

In "Go On" Cook gives his sage advice to all who are leaving their
childhood and preparing to begin their autonomous life:

"...don't wait don't fear

don't work too hard less you love it

cause you're here

you're here through ever shifting shades of now

somehow

its love its LOVE

love it keeps me high enough

the drugs and sex have lost respect and sacredness

its sad but true

most things can hurt or help its up to us

I know we're here to sew some seeds

I hope they grow..."

Another perennial theme of the band is voiced in this song which is:
In the on-going creation of your reality - be guided by Love.

Few bands have the distinction of being the creators of a whole new
gender of music. Elephant Revival are the progenitors of a musical
form which has become known as Transcendental Folk.

This label is an attempt to in some way describe the musical, lyrical
and unworldly, extrasensory powers of the band both personally and
collectively.

During the bands live performances the traditional ending of the show
is for Paine to sing a'capella, in her own inimitable style. This band
tradition is carried on in their albums.

'Break In the Clouds" ends with Paine singing "Breathe" - her call to
transcendental consciousness:

"Open your hands
Breathe deep
Calm yourself
Breathe

Down the valley
Beneath the trees
Alongside the river
That's where you'll be
Whispering through the patient wind carrying cottonwood seed
Saying to resistance now, release
There is a stillness in the ground beneath your feet

Still there is movement to be found both remind us to

Open your hands
Breathe deep
Calm yourself
Breathe."