edward sharpe and the magnetic zeros – home

what better way to start out september than with a song that ive been saving up for a while now? edward sharpe and the magnetic zeros have really struck a chord with me as of late. their self-titled album (also released as “up from below”?) is full of folk hits, some that sound extremely old timey (like todays song, “home”) and others that sound much more contemporary (such as the 6 minute closer “om nashi me,” the other song that i really wanted to post from this album). i think their album has been around for a few years actually but its just now blowing up, and with good reason. its been tough to really find much info about the band, but the little i was able to find is really interesting. the most notably interesting fact being that alex ebert (aka edward sharpe) was previously in a dance-rock band called ima robot. and i think he kind of lived the crazy rock star life and needed to ground himself. talk about musical versatility!

but it gets even more interesting. after cleaning himself up a little, he apparently got some cash from the late heath ledger to record, met jade castrinos, the lovely young lady whose voice you hear in todays song, and recorded an album on a 24 track machine with 12 other band members, all live. how cool is that? the group is basically a time warp in its sound, its recording methods, its wardrobe, its website(in this case, a hard to read time warp), heck, even its tour bus, which is an old school bus aka “a hippie wet dream”, according to drummer josh collazo (most of this info was found in this LA times article).

well, their efforts to revert to a simpler time, whether intentional or not, are definitely evident in their songs. todays song “home” sounds like it could have been a duet straight out of the johnny cash/june carter era. its just about as catchy as you can get with the whistled intro, trumpet interludes and simple but powerful chorus – “home/let me go home/ home is whenever im with you/home/yes i am home/home is when im alone with you.” if thats not enough, theres also one of the strangest spoken word exchanges in music history between singers jade and alex, which i will transcribe for you below:

Alex: Jade
Jade: Alexander
A: Do you remember that day you fell outta my window?
J: I sure do, you came jumping out after me.
A: Well, you fell on the concrete, nearly broke your ass, you were bleeding all over the place and I rushed you out to the hospital, you remember that?
J: Yes I do.
A: Well there’s something I never told you about that night.
J: What didn’t you tell me?
A: While you were sitting in the backseat smoking a cigarette you thought was gonna be your last, I was falling deep, deeply in love with you, and I never told you til just now.

Utterly heartwarming and morbid all at once. this album is one of my favorites that ive heard this year and will likely only grow more on me over time. good luck getting this song out of your head after you hear it for the first time.

edward sharpe and the magnetic zeros – home

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