by Kris Handel (@khandel84)
Arbor Labor Union have always traversed some wild paths in their musical explorations of “West Coast” style freakouts and loose-limbed, early days Meat Puppets “country-core” over the past decade. Out to Pasture, their fifth full length, slows things down a little bit and has more of a ruminative, prog-folk feel while still throwing down the gauntlet of a scorching cosmic jam. Bo Orr’s vocals have the yearning of a man on a journey, his lyrics an earthly connection.
On tracks like “Hidden In a Drop of Dew” and “Repunzel,” we get explosive psych guitar and heavier, slightly bluesy space rock that fits into the updated class of “West Coast psych.” On the former track, the band drop into a repeating groove and atmosphere of wafting musical haze as Orr’s vocals elongate and trail off amidst ringing guitars and a rolling rhythm section. “Repunzel” melds Orr’s searching vocals with the harmonies of drummer Bryan Scherer, as the band wanders off into the outer reaches of space in a ragged, Crazy Horse-esque exploration with a dash of jazzy cool. The lyrical tale of escape in love and slight paranoia works very well here, as Orr softly wails lines like “They’ve got me chained to this wall/but damn it all/I’m gonna tear it down soon” that hit with a determined power.
The more mystical edge of the album is represented in songs like “Zodiac Man” and “Out to Pasture,” where we get the slightly more traditional blues-indebted psych with added time changes and fuzzy abandon. “Zodiac Man” is powered by snaking the slithering guitar lines of Orr and Brian Adams, as well as colorful keyboard injections and squiggles from Adams that add to the psych mélange. Adams’ guitar excursions travel some wild terrain here, adding a freaky element that plays nicely as Orr’s vocals calmly intone, adding some contrast. The title track has Orr at his most impactful, as he howls along to cycling slide and overdriven guitar while the rhythm section lays down an unrelenting and pounding foundation with some impressive fills from Scherer.
Out to Pasture is a fuzzy and wild trip down some exciting avenues, and Arbor Labor Union add some new tricks to their formula that add quite a bit of delight for the audience. With this record, the band manage to push themselves musically while moving back to the roots of of late 60s hazy psych jams. The band executes this style extremely well, and the music locks into a groove that flows from track to track, while the sequencing melds the different atmospheres together quite seamlessly. There is a joyful quirkiness at play here that sends the listener on a truly wonderful trip into nature, exploring many moments to gloriously get lost and enveloped within Arbo Labor Union’s dense and expansive voyage.