Cloud Cult

With The Meaning of 8, Cloud Cult tone down some of their past eccentricities and experimentation to deliver the most mature and enjoyable of their five albums to date. Although their tours are "green" and their CD production environmentally friendly, Cloud Cult don't do extended hippie jams—a common misconception. Rather, they create a unique hybrid of indie rock, folk, and electronica, exemplified on standout tracks like "Purpose" and "Take Your Medicine."

Now gone are the live crowd snippets, amusing rhymes, and movies samples, which previously might have marred plucky tunes like "Alien Christ." Throughout, the Minnesota outfit blends cello, violin, trumpet, toy piano, samples, glockenspiel, and acoustic and electric guitars to create a rich sound that takes diverse inspiration from bands like Flaming Lips, Neutral Milk Hotel, Modest Mouse, and Pixies.

Thematically, this concept album addresses the significance of the number 8, the symbol of infinity, and better living through chemistry—both medicinal means and by bonding with people (as on the lilting "Chemicals Collide"). "Chain Reaction," meanwhile, begins with a double shot of acoustic and electronic percussion, adding a sharp string arrangement over layered vocals. "Put out fear and they'll feel fear. Put out love and they'll feel love. It's a chain reaction," bandleader/songwriter Craig Minowa sings. Cloud Cult has put out their most focused effort, and the returns are great.

- Jeff Kamin
04.10.07

On The Meaning of 8, gears are switched from the distorted hip-hop pop of the last Enon-flavored, Advice from the Happy Hippopotamus to a less scatterbrained, more glossy indie-rock album. While it may be a tad disappointing to have Craig Minowa downshift from his expertise of mishmashing styles, it's remarkable to hear how capable he is at creating songs in this specific genre. In fact, the start of the album feels driven by a musical chameleon totally intent on replicating the tunes of his peers (most blatantly Modest Mouse, Arcade Fire, the Flaming Lips, and the Polyphonic Spree.) Despite a more formulaic style and a reduced amount of experimental whimsy than before, the majority of these songs succeed. Where songs bubbled and blipped before, now they puff, bulge, and explode. The pieces are lush and well crafted, and often, as a songsmith, Minowa achieves a more poignant result than his immediate influences. The lovely and ripe-for-spring-fever single, "Chemicals Collide," features a Montreal indie-rock chamber pop formula that focuses on the build -- a guitar part slowly propels from finger-picking into a militant strumming over orchestral swells until the bottom drops out and then returns with a grandiose tom-fueled chorus. This new structure works especially well on the three songs that are the most somber and epic: "Hope," "Thanks" and "Dance of the Dead." They build skyward from lullabies to fourth-quarter supreme climaxes and contain the album's most heartbreaking and finest moments; especially upon realization that the conceptual overtones, saturated with philosophy and mortality, are inspired by Minowa's loss of his son. At the album's weakest moments, bits feel half-finished and almost like afterthoughts with a scattering of minimal instrumental jams and the whinier "2X2x2" and "A Good God" obstructing the view of an otherwise inspired and unusually focused vision. In most cases, the melodies are powerful, painful, and embellished with a potpourri of headphone candy -- xylophone, glockenspiel, piano, music box, vibes, and cello, combined with a variety of distorted synths, guitars, basses, and Bonham-esque drums. Ultimately, the shining moments outweigh the weaker ones (despite the exceptionally long running time), and, when Minowa hits his mark somewhere between the direct homage and the overly abstract, the results are sublime and engaging. ~Jason Lymangrover, All Music Guide