Anywhere: Anywhere

When The Mars Volta and Minutemen collide...

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Bar Steven Wilson, there can be few harder-working men in prog than The Mars Volta’s Omar Rodriguez-Lopez and Cedric Bixler-Zavala, whose consistently high quality output is continually fired at us at an astonishing rate. Anywhere is Bixler-Zavala’s latest project, a collaborative effort with Mike Watt of Minutemen, fIREHOSE and The Stooges.

After the disappointing return of his once-brilliant punk band At The Drive-In this summer, it’s clear Cedric’s heart lays here, at the more abstruse end of the musical spectrum. In contrast to The Mars Volta’s frantic approach, Anywhere offer a more thoughtful, contemplative experience.

Unusually for the men involved, shades of other artists are detectable: Rosa Rugosa is a delicate, lacy thing that sets Kate Bush down in a Tex-Mex desert and leaves her mind to wander. The title track blossoms into a Kid A-era Radiohead exercise in beautiful nihilism, the singer’s Yorke-echoing falsetto lamenting,_ ‘I’m not anywhere’_ with a genuine sadness.

Their warm, acoustic wild west guitars lead into dusty, terrain with strange, wonderful noises leaping out at at you. Anywhere seems like a good place to be.

Emma has been writing about music for 25 years, and is a regular contributor to Classic Rock, Metal Hammer, Prog and Louder. During that time her words have also appeared in publications including Kerrang!, Melody Maker, Select, The Blues Magazine and many more. She is also a professional pedant and grammar nerd and has worked as a copy editor on everything from film titles through to high-end property magazines. In her spare time, when not at gigs, you’ll find her at her local stables hanging out with a bunch of extremely characterful horses.