I’ve been considering a full on life change for the last few months – the kind where you literally drop ties and possessions and ignite the fires of recreation. How appropriate then that I dusted off this track from Young Galaxy’s third full length Shapeshifting. The band stays true to their name throughout the album, floating in an undulating cosmos, steady as a calmly beating heart. Cover Your Tracks opens with a heavy bass drum that resonates somewhere deep in your chest. Steel drums excitedly fill layers around the beat, and the vocals complete the triumvirate of sound.
Black sky cloaks the mountainside A land beyond our lands I’m witness to and witnessing And how it plays now hand I’ve always said I’d trade it all For places unadorned My mind is calm and animal And sharp and reborn Throw away your letters and numbers And make sure to cover your tracks Throw away your desires and treasures And make sure you burn all the maps.”
My first spin of this song transported me almost immediately to a kindred spirit, The Knife’s Pass This On. Maybe it was the echoing steel drums or the fierce pounding bass or lyrics that take you all the way to feeling. In any case, I could feel the musical world in its constant reinvention, always building on itself and saluting its forerunners. While reminding myself of all the things that define us, I continue to feel the need to strip it all down to the core, to the true nature of things. It’s all vaguely Buddhist, I know, but necessity is the mother of invention and, in this case, self-reinvention. Enough existentialism. Get to the jamz. Also, enjoy the supremely eccentric video from The Knife.