Dreamt for Light Years in the Belly of a Mountain
Encyclopedia
Dreamt for Light Years in the Belly of a Mountain is the fourth and final album by Sparklehorse
before Mark Linkous
' death in 2010. It was released September 25, 2006 on Astralwerks Records.
, Linkous slowly began recording the tracks that would become Dreamt for Light Years in the Belly of a Mountain at his Static King Studio in North Carolina. He would later tell an interviewer that his depression had stalled the creation of the album, stretching the recording process out to about five years. In 2006, he told Pitchfork Media
that many of the songs that made up Dreamt for Light Years track listing were actually songs that had been cut from It's a Wonderful Life: "Well, I'd quit working for a while and it started to get really difficult to live and pay the rent. So it was really getting down to the wire where I had to turn a record in. I had some stuff written that I didn't put on the last album, because they were just really pop songs. They felt like anachronisms on the last record. So I saved all these little pop songs."
After hearing 2004's The Grey Album
, which mashed up
Jay-Z
's The Black Album
and the Beatles
' The White Album, Linkous invited the album's producer, Danger Mouse
, to come to North Carolina and help him finish the tracks he had begun recording.
Although it was Sparklehorse's first studio album in five years, approximately 25 minutes of the 55-minute-long record were released in some form previously. "Ghost in the Sky" was originally released on the Japanese pressing of It's a Wonderful Life. "Shade and Honey" was sung by the actor Alessandro Nivola
in the 2002 film Laurel Canyon
, and Nivola's version is also found on the soundtrack. "Morning Hollow" was previously found as the hidden bonus track
on It's a Wonderful Life. The track "Dreamt for Lightyears in the Belly of a Mountain" was originally released in 2001 under the title "Maxine" on both the LP version of It's a Wonderful Life and on the Gold Day EP.
"Ghost in the Sky," "Don't Take My Sunshine Away," and "Knives of Summertime" were released as singles in the weeks leading up to the release of the album.
was created by artist Robert Pokorny. The image that would eventually wind up as the record cover was originally made for a promotional poster for a Sparklehorse in-store concert at Fingerprints Records in Long Beach, California
. Linkous later said that he "loved that image from the first time I saw it, and I just knew that was going to be the cover of the next album... {Pokorny} really has a great sense of realizing imagery from the music he listens to. I can't really describe anything about that image that represents anything specific in the music, but it just really seems to fit to me."
, LA Times and Entertainment Weekly
), it was graded poorly by several publications. Coke Machine Glow noted that the production style of the record was "greedy and belabored", with "everything in its right place, but everything is too obvious or too proportionally gaudy to warrant more than a signatory 'lo-fi' moniker." Now Magazine wrote that all "the refurbished material makes this more like a B-sides and outtakes collection...not terrible, just half-assed."
Sparklehorse
Sparklehorse was an American indie rock band led by the singer and multi-instrumentalist Mark Linkous.-History:Sparklehorse's first album, Vivadixiesubmarinetransmissionplot featuring Bob Rupe of the Silos and Cracker, was a modest college radio success...
before Mark Linkous
Mark Linkous
Mark Linkous was an American singer, songwriter and musician, best known as leader of Sparklehorse. He was also known for his collaborations with such notable artists as Tom Waits, PJ Harvey, Daniel Johnston, Radiohead, Black Francis, Julian Casablancas, Nina Persson, Sean Terrington Wright, David...
' death in 2010. It was released September 25, 2006 on Astralwerks Records.
Recording
After the release of 2001's It's a Wonderful LifeIt's a Wonderful Life (album)
It's a Wonderful Life is the third album by Virginian indie rock group Sparklehorse, released in 2001. The album features appearances by Tom Waits, PJ Harvey, John Parish, Nina Persson, Vic Chesnutt, and Dave Fridmann.-Track listing:...
, Linkous slowly began recording the tracks that would become Dreamt for Light Years in the Belly of a Mountain at his Static King Studio in North Carolina. He would later tell an interviewer that his depression had stalled the creation of the album, stretching the recording process out to about five years. In 2006, he told Pitchfork Media
Pitchfork Media
Pitchfork Media, usually known simply as Pitchfork or P4k, is a Chicago-based daily Internet publication established in 1995 that is devoted to music criticism and commentary, music news, and artist interviews. Its focus is on underground and independent music, especially indie rock...
that many of the songs that made up Dreamt for Light Years track listing were actually songs that had been cut from It's a Wonderful Life: "Well, I'd quit working for a while and it started to get really difficult to live and pay the rent. So it was really getting down to the wire where I had to turn a record in. I had some stuff written that I didn't put on the last album, because they were just really pop songs. They felt like anachronisms on the last record. So I saved all these little pop songs."
After hearing 2004's The Grey Album
The Grey Album
The Grey Album is a mashup album by Danger Mouse, released in 2004. It uses an a cappella version of rapper Jay-Z's The Black Album and couples it with instrumentals created from a multitude of unauthorized samples from The Beatles' LP The Beatles...
, which mashed up
Mashup (music)
A mashup or bootleg is a song or composition created by blending two or more pre-recorded songs, usually by overlaying the vocal track of one song seamlessly over the instrumental track of another...
Jay-Z
Jay-Z
Shawn Corey Carter , better known by his stage name Jay-Z, is an American rapper, record producer, entrepreneur, and occasional actor. He is one of the most financially successful hip hop artists and entrepreneurs in America, having a net worth of over $450 million as of 2010...
's The Black Album
The Black Album (Jay-Z album)
The Black Album is the eighth studio album by American rapper Jay-Z, released November 14, 2003, on Roc-A-Fella Records. It was promoted as his final studio album, which serves as a recurring theme, although Jay-Z returned to solo recording with Kingdom Come in 2006.The album debuted at number one...
and the Beatles
The Beatles
The Beatles were an English rock band, active throughout the 1960s and one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music. Formed in Liverpool, by 1962 the group consisted of John Lennon , Paul McCartney , George Harrison and Ringo Starr...
' The White Album, Linkous invited the album's producer, Danger Mouse
Danger Mouse
Brian Joseph Burton , better known by his stage name Danger Mouse, is an American musician, songwriter and producer. He came to prominence in 2004 when he released The Grey Album, which combined vocal performances from Jay-Z's The Black Album with instrumentals from The Beatles' White Album.He...
, to come to North Carolina and help him finish the tracks he had begun recording.
Although it was Sparklehorse's first studio album in five years, approximately 25 minutes of the 55-minute-long record were released in some form previously. "Ghost in the Sky" was originally released on the Japanese pressing of It's a Wonderful Life. "Shade and Honey" was sung by the actor Alessandro Nivola
Alessandro Nivola
Alessandro Antine Nivola is an American actor, perhaps best known for his roles in the films Best Laid Plans, Jurassic Park III, Face/Off, and the first two films of the Goal! trilogy.-Personal life:...
in the 2002 film Laurel Canyon
Laurel Canyon (film)
Laurel Canyon is a 2002 American drama film written and directed by Lisa Cholodenko. The film stars Frances McDormand, Christian Bale, Kate Beckinsale, Natascha McElhone, and Alessandro Nivola.-Plot:...
, and Nivola's version is also found on the soundtrack. "Morning Hollow" was previously found as the hidden bonus track
Hidden track
In the field of recorded music, a hidden track is a piece of music that has been placed on a CD, audio cassette, vinyl record or other recorded medium in such a way as to avoid detection by the casual listener...
on It's a Wonderful Life. The track "Dreamt for Lightyears in the Belly of a Mountain" was originally released in 2001 under the title "Maxine" on both the LP version of It's a Wonderful Life and on the Gold Day EP.
"Ghost in the Sky," "Don't Take My Sunshine Away," and "Knives of Summertime" were released as singles in the weeks leading up to the release of the album.
Album cover
The album coverAlbum cover
An album cover is the front of the packaging of a commercially released audio recording product, or album. The term can refer to either the printed cardboard covers typically used to package sets of 10" and 12" 78 rpm records, single and sets of 12" LPs, sets of 45 rpm records , or the front-facing...
was created by artist Robert Pokorny. The image that would eventually wind up as the record cover was originally made for a promotional poster for a Sparklehorse in-store concert at Fingerprints Records in Long Beach, California
Long Beach, California
Long Beach is a city situated in Los Angeles County in Southern California, on the Pacific coast of the United States. The city is the 36th-largest city in the nation and the seventh-largest in California. As of 2010, its population was 462,257...
. Linkous later said that he "loved that image from the first time I saw it, and I just knew that was going to be the cover of the next album... {Pokorny} really has a great sense of realizing imagery from the music he listens to. I can't really describe anything about that image that represents anything specific in the music, but it just really seems to fit to me."
Reviews
Though the album garnered mostly positive reviews (notably from Pitchfork MediaPitchfork Media
Pitchfork Media, usually known simply as Pitchfork or P4k, is a Chicago-based daily Internet publication established in 1995 that is devoted to music criticism and commentary, music news, and artist interviews. Its focus is on underground and independent music, especially indie rock...
, LA Times and Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly is an American magazine, published by the Time division of Time Warner, that covers film, television, music, broadway theatre, books and popular culture...
), it was graded poorly by several publications. Coke Machine Glow noted that the production style of the record was "greedy and belabored", with "everything in its right place, but everything is too obvious or too proportionally gaudy to warrant more than a signatory 'lo-fi' moniker." Now Magazine wrote that all "the refurbished material makes this more like a B-sides and outtakes collection...not terrible, just half-assed."
Track listing
- "Don't Take My Sunshine Away" – 3:05
- Mark LinkousMark LinkousMark Linkous was an American singer, songwriter and musician, best known as leader of Sparklehorse. He was also known for his collaborations with such notable artists as Tom Waits, PJ Harvey, Daniel Johnston, Radiohead, Black Francis, Julian Casablancas, Nina Persson, Sean Terrington Wright, David...
– voice, guitar, bass, synthesizer, strings - Danger MouseDanger MouseBrian Joseph Burton , better known by his stage name Danger Mouse, is an American musician, songwriter and producer. He came to prominence in 2004 when he released The Grey Album, which combined vocal performances from Jay-Z's The Black Album with instrumentals from The Beatles' White Album.He...
– sampler, drum programming - Sophie Michelitsianos – voice
- Scott Minor – drums
- Steven DrozdSteven DrozdSteven Gregory Drozd is an American musician. He is a multi-instrumentalist and lead guitarist for The Flaming Lips.-Early life:...
– drums
- Mark Linkous
- "Getting It Wrong" – 2:16
- Mark Linkous – voice, electric piano, bass, sampler, drums, pump organ, optigan
- Danger Mouse – organ, sampler, drum programming
- "Shade and Honey" – 4:08
- Mark Linkous – all instruments
- "See the Light" – 3:42
- Mark Linkous – voice, guitar
- Scott Minor – drums, electronics
- Dave FridmannDave FridmannDave Fridmann is an American record producer and musician. From 1990 onwards he co-produced all releases by Mercury Rev and The Flaming Lips...
– bass - Steven Drozd – echo guitar
- Melissa Moore – violin
- "Return to Me" – 3:18
- Mark Linkous – voice, classical guitar, sampler, chamberlin
- Alan Weatherhead – pump organ, lap steel guitar
- Johnny Hott – piano
- "Some Sweet Day" – 4:20
- Mark Linkous – all instruments
- "Ghost in the Sky" – 3:28
- Mark Linkous – all instruments
- "Mountains" – 3:42
- Mark Linkous – voice, guitar, sampler, bass
- Dangermouse – organ, sampler
- Johnny Hott – drums
- "Morning Hollow" – 7:23
- Mark Linkous – voice, baritone guitar, e-Bow Guitar
- Dave Fridmann – vibraphone, wurlitzer piano
- Sophie Michelitsianos – voice
- Scott Minor – drums, harmonium
- Tom WaitsTom WaitsThomas Alan "Tom" Waits is an American singer-songwriter, composer, and actor. Waits has a distinctive voice, described by critic Daniel Durchholz as sounding "like it was soaked in a vat of bourbon, left hanging in the smokehouse for a few months, and then taken outside and run over with a car."...
– piano - Joan WasserJoan WasserJoan Wasser is a violinist and singer/songwriter in the indie rock world. She began her career playing violin with the Dambuilders. She has released three albums as a singer songwriter, the 2006 Real Life the 2008 To Survive and the 2011 The Deep Field...
– violin - Jane ScarpantoniJane ScarpantoniJane Scarpantoni is a classically trained cello player who has played on a number of alternative rock albums.She was a member of Hoboken, New Jersey's Tiny Lights in the mid-'80s, then went on to play with other musicians especially those associated with the Hoboken underground rock scene of the...
– cello
- "It's Not So Hard" – 2:52
- Mark Linkous – voice, guitar
- Dave Fridmann – bass
- Steven Drozd – drums
- "Knives of Summertime" – 4:19
- Mark Linkous – voice, guitar, sampler, tape loops
- Matthew Linkous – guitar
- Melissa Moore – bass, violin
- Scott Minor – drums, electronics
- Tim Regan – piano
- "Dreamt for Light Years in the Belly of a Mountain" – 10:35
- Mark Linkous – piano, guitar loop, chamberlin, orchestron
- Dave Fridmann – mellotron, chamberlin
- Scott Minor – casio, electronics
- Rex White – pedal steel