The Sensational Country Blues Wonders! – If I Stop Moving, I’ll Fall from the Sky
Self – released
https://thesensationalcountryblueswonders.bandcamp.com/
10 Tracks – 34 minutes
Jersey City’s Gary Van Miert muse has led him to reintroduce the sound of the 60’s psychedelic pop-songs into the cosmic consciousness. The accompanying notes about the album reference The Strawberry Alarm Clock, The Electric Prunes, and The Chocolate Watchband as comparisons.
Gary says that he saw The Beatles on Ed Sullivan when was five years old but was engaged in music even before that. As a young child he was captivated by the 45 rpm records of the day and, according to his mother, took him to bed with him. He traced the music roots backwards as many of us did in the 60’s. He cites noticing that The Beatles recorded several songs from Carl Perkins which led him back to him and from him back to Hank Williams. Similarly, The Rolling Stones led him back to Muddy Waters and thus following a path back to that era of blues performers.
Gary has always been intrigued by gospel blues and has performed as “The Gospel Wonder” and has played his classic gospel songs at many church services and events. He says that he has always been intrigued by that point where blues, country and gospel intersect. He says he uses the standard recording style of Sun Records as a basis of his music. He describes this album, his third, as “Psychedelic Americana”. No credits are provided for the album, citing that various session musicians were utilized in the making of the album.
He declares on the opening track “my stomach is rumbling, churning deep inside, the whole world is crumbling right before my eyes, holding the universe in the palm of my hand, I look into infinity and now I understand, “We Are Made of Stardust” in a touch of cosmic folk rock with a bit of sitar thrown in. He asks, “Why Did I Eat the Whole Bag of Mushrooms?”, which is inspired by his tendency to overdo things and by the Billy Wilder movie “The Lost Weekend” and describes the feeling of tripping out on the psilocybin-laced “shrooms”.
The title song is a metaphor for addiction as he advises “my feet were once on the ground, but now I’m skyward bound, I’m soaring high and for what it’s worth, I don’t want to come back to this earth”. The sitar again is a major feature of the song. “Golden Teacher” is about a specific strain of shrooms and describes the experience of its experiencing the effects for the first time. On “Head in the Clouds” he says “it makes me feel so very calm and can never do me harm”.
“I Rode the Bus with Joey Ramone” is about a very vivid dream Gary had about getting on a bus and sitting next to Joey. He says he remembers that he was offering him much advice, but he cannot remember anything that was said. “One More Cup of Mushroom Tea” was influenced musically by Donovan’s 1968 song, “Hurdy Gurdy Man”. He sings “This is a story about a boy named Tim, he drank some mushroom tea on a whim, around and around he swirled, now he is headed into a strange new world.” “Magic Glasses” rocks out as he sees the “darkness turn to light, see the sun begin to rise, see the color in the sky, see the world with brand new eyes” as he describes a transformation in his perception of the universe.
He says “Gravity” was inspired by Brian Wilson’s “Heroes and Villains”. The song is described as a humorous meditation of the chaos that would ensue if Earth no longer had gravity. A bit of barroom piano leads into this song with a kazoo filling in at its conclusion. “Sky Songs” completes the album with a discussion of how songs come to artists. Gary cites when bluesman Bukka White was asked how he made music, he said “I just reach up and pull them out of the sky – call them sky songs – they just come to me.” He further cites Keith Richards who said, “I’m an antenna, I just pick up an instrument and if there are any songs out there, I receive them”. Gary plays off both of these quotes in this song.
This is certainly a throwback album to the 60’s psychedelic era, preaching the use of drugs, a laidback humanity, and reaching out with love. Gary has a very pleasant, although somewhat twangy voice that constantly reminded me of someone whom I could never quite trigger. While an enjoyable listen, particularly if you grew up in the era that these types of songs were prevalent, the album as cited is ultimately a throwback pop album. There are no touches of blues anywhere in the album, if you are predominantly seeking the genre.
