've never really been "high." My friends always dangle the offer in front of me and I always seem to make the best of friends with people that enjoy smoking marijuana as a weekend pastime. I think I've seen enough drug use in my time to know what it's about, for the most part, but I don't know if I'll ever break my proverbial drug cherry (I'll keep you posted). One of the best things, when high, is to listen to long drawn out music such as Pink Floyd or Godspeed You Black Emperor!, or so I've been told. I can't imagine any person who enjoys this type of music when high, then, not to truly enjoy the stylings of Tarentel.


Each song moves at its own pace as Tarentel use the full 74 minute capability of the CD format. Unlike most other CD's, I wouldn't have it any other way on this particular release. While most other CD's of this length become tiresome long before the final track, Tarentel, instead, use the time to fill out their compositions to epic status.


The record starts off with the plodding "Steede Bonnet." The guitars unfold the song as time goes on to reveal a tapestry of echo and delay. The use of repetition through the song is lengthened to become almost trance inducing, but right before it slips into a mode that might bring on boredom Tarentel reveals another piece to the song. The song eventually ends in the same repeated guitar pattern from the time that the song started as it slips into the next track.


"When We Almost Killed Ourselves" comes out like an explosion, with blaring guitars and a blunted bass line. The drummer pounds out a beat that sounds oddly reminiscent of Tool, while the guitar starts to melt into a groove, only to break free in the next few seconds once again. The song continues with this tension and release bent until it slows down entirely to a dirge tempo and settles into the solid groove that Steede Bonnet had set in the opening track.


There are only five tracks on the album. They seem to follow the same type of structure as the two detailed above. While it may seem clichéd and overdone, the music of Tarentel is a top notch tradition to your "space rock" collection. To top it all off, as with Pink Floyd and GYBE!, the music is quite capable sober, too. So, go light up a spliff or not and listen to Tarentel. You know you only need this as an excuse.