There are, as I am sure, dear reader, you are aware, plenty of rockstars who are still touring late into their twilight years. And, you’re entitled to feel a tinge of envy. No, it’s not because of the constant flow of revenue or because of the fans lovingly chanting their names that you should feel jealous. To my mind, the greatest thing that these old musicians get is the chance to play their biggest hits every night and, in this way, be reminded of who they are and who they used to be.
That’s a pretty marvellous thing, especially if you’ve dedicated your life to making art. The fact is that, for the rest of us, life just sort of slips by, memories get jumbled up, and, occasionally, we’re left to wonder just what part we were supposed to play in this whole drama.
In many ways, the gentle push of time toward nothingness is what dominates Tijuana Taxi’s mystical psych-rock trip of self-discovery on the album “Mirages.” It’s a set of songs where the sound seems to dissolve, reassemble itself, and disappear in an endless loop.
At the same time, all of this is very much a matter of interpretation. These songs are waiting for your input before they truly come into being. Just take a listen to the opening track “Wander,” with its drone-like electric guitars that come together like a gigantic, never-ending scream of the desert. It’s the kind of song that a more cerebral version of Kyuss, perhaps, would’ve dreamt up.
And, the more you invest your time into understanding just where these roads mapped out by Tijuana Taxi lead, the more likely you are to get lost. “Dru” is a pummelling stoner-rock track that makes you feel like you’re driving through a blizzard, and “Mystified”, with its metal meets shoegaze sound, acts as a kind of sonic Fata Morgana projected across the dust of the endless road.
But, there’s more than just dreamy hard-rocking guitar music that Tijuana Taxi has to offer. Even intense, initiatic road trips require moments of quiet reflection. You’ll locate those in the acoustic guitar sections of the songs “Looking at Air” or “Muck.”
Still, before you know it, it’s light outside, and the road endlessly demands that new travellers work to find out its secrets. Songs like “Ostinato 2” or “Slip Out,” with their powerfully distorted, but melodically sounding guitars, and with those patterns that form and vanish, are the last hint that this journey doesn’t actually have an end, and, most likely, you won’t be able to properly recall where it all began.
Where does it all leave us? Always on the lookout, constantly on the move. The album’s closer, “Erasure (January),” ties it all together. The post-rock composition brings the finale closer to the start and then glues them into a circle shape. All that’s left is time and slowly drift in it.
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