{"id":355,"date":"2001-08-23T19:14:00","date_gmt":"2001-08-23T19:14:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/?p=355"},"modified":"2024-03-24T19:15:38","modified_gmt":"2024-03-24T19:15:38","slug":"trees-walking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/?p=355","title":{"rendered":"Trees walking"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Yet another neo-progressive rock combo, ent, stalks the local forest looking for a new cult<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"The<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The lads in ent, sans tree suits, making a jolly good racket.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Channeling elements of minimalist classical music, \u00e0 la Phillip Glass, with King Crimson\/early Yes and Genesis, an artsy, instrumental quartet calling itself ent has simultaneously dislodged and elevated the bar for local musicians. Call what ent does \u201cpanic\u201d rock. If Frank Zappa\u2019s instrumental dabblings were spliced into cut-and-dried verse counts, somewhere to the left of that you might find ent, whose name betrays an e.e. cummings-like disdain for capital letters. The panache of these four young players\u2014median age, 20\u2014may seem awkward; it may cause anyone stumbling across their music for the first time to, well, panic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Carson McWhirter plays guitar and Warr guitar, the latter a multi-stringed abomination of an instrument akin to a harp\/piano. Ian Hill not only plays drums; he\u2019s also responsible for the pretty landscape shots on ent\u2019s EP cover. Scott Scheu is the group\u2019s other guitarist, and Dustin Koupal plays bass. From their humble beginnings in a couple of area rock groups, Samus Aran and Falling Under, the members of ent have blossomed into one of the West Coast\u2019s niftier instrumental combos.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After playing anywhere from two to six shows per month in and around the Bay Area, ent has attracted the interest of Darla-distributed Omnibus Records, which will release the group\u2019s forthcoming full-length debut. Omnibus seems to be a perfect home for ent\u2019s first formal release. \u201cI try not to think about labels too much,\u201d McWhirter says. \u201cI\u2019m not really into the \u2018music business\u2019\u2014not the majority of it, anyway.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The group\u2019s name may sound obscure, but any fantasy fiction fan should recognize its origin. \u201cIt\u2019s from The Lord of the Rings<\/em> by J.R.R. Tolkien,\u201d says Hill, who often engages in mindless acts of sparring\u2014the band members like to have swordfights in the countryside in their spare time\u2014that involve naked women, berries and a helluva lot of foamcore. In Tolkien\u2019s masterpiece, the ents were massive but mobile trees that came to the rescue of Frodo Baggins and company. \u201cOnce the movie comes out,\u201d he adds, \u201ceveryone will know.\u201d Dungeons & Dragons<\/em> enthusiasts? Maybe, maybe not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

McWhirter plays the aforementioned Warr guitar, which draws considerable attention at shows because of its awkward shape, along with the style of finger-tapping used to play the beast\u2014think the Chapman stick. \u201cIf you were to cut your fingers off and replace them with the hammers of a piano,\u201d McWhirter says, explaining his technique, \u201cand you put a massive fretboard behind the strings and then use your imagination, you might get something.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou may just get a mess,\u201d he adds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While McWhirter prefers classical and classic-rock fare along the lines of KC and the Sunshine Band and Captain Beefheart, Hill and Scheu are dialed into such texture-driven acts as Plaid, Squarepusher, Tortoise\u2014Chicago\u2019s finest experimental act\u2014and Sigur Ros. Koupal prefers noise on the electronica tip.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If ent isn\u2019t playing locally, you might catch up by checking out one of its favorite local bands\u2014Pocket for Corduroy, Hella, Deimos, Shortie, Electro Group or perhaps even Hi-Hat Attack, a group that uses nothing but hi-hat cymbals. \u201cI\u2019ve never really heard Hi-Hat Attack,\u201d Hill admits, \u201cbut the idea seems so rad.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whatever way you cut it, the panic generated by ent is pure sonic bliss. The five-song, self-titled EP, available at ent\u2019s live shows on home-burned CD-R, is a good introductory totem. If you\u2019re out looking for the next best thing to prog rock, look no further. One can safely consider ent\u2019s music, entertaining and downright precocious as it is, to mark a new chapter in Sacramento\u2019s rich musical history.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(SN&R)<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Yet another neo-progressive rock combo, ent, stalks the local forest looking for a new cult The lads in ent, sans tree suits, making a jolly good racket. Channeling elements of minimalist classical music, \u00e0 la Phillip Glass, with King Crimson\/early Yes and Genesis, an artsy, instrumental quartet calling itself ent has simultaneously dislodged and elevated […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-355","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-media"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/355","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=355"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/355\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":357,"href":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/355\/revisions\/357"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=355"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=355"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=355"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}