El Cielo

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El Cielo
Studio album by dredg
Released	Oct 8, 2002
Recorded	George Lucas' Skywalker Ranch in Nicasio, CA and at Longview Farm in North Brookfield, MA
Genre	Progressive rock Alternative rock Art rock
Length	57:08
Label	Universal
Producer	dredg, Ron St. Germain, Tim Palmer and Michael Rosen
Professional reviews
All Music Guide link ThePRP link Pitchfork Media link Punknews.org link
dredg chronology
Extended Play for the Eastern Hemisphere (2002) El Cielo (2002) Catch Without Arms (2005)

El Cielo is dredg's second album, released on October 8, 2002. Like dredg's first album, Leitmotif, El Cielo is a concept album. The title can be translated to mean "the sky" or "heaven" in Spanish, and to mean "peace and freedom of expression" in dreams.

Contents 1 About the album 2 Track listing 3 Music videos 4 External links

[edit] About the album

One of dredg's main influences on the album, El Cielo, was a painting by Salvador Dalí entitled Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bumblebee around a Pomegranate One Second Before Awakening, which is also what the acronym in "Brushstroke: dcbtfoabaaposba" stands for. The painting was unveiled in 1944 and clearly influences many of the album's core themes and song titles, for example a long-legged elephant ("An Elephant In The Delta Waves") with a papal insignia upon its back ("The Papal Insignia" was a song recorded for El Cielo but only saw release of Industry Demos, recorded in 2001 and didn't make it onto El Cielo). Also pictured is a woman lying in a canyon ("The Canyon Behind Her"). Band members have been quoted as saying that this Dali painting is sleep paralysis, a literal representation of the condition from which Dali's wife actually suffered.

This is further supported by the translation of the Japanese spoken words from the beginning of "The Canyon Behind Her" - "This album was inspired by a painting titled: 'Dream Caused By the Flight of a Bee Around a Pomegranate One Second Before Awakening'. It is recommended that you view this painting as you listen to El Cielo. It is as if one stimulus awakens other senses. In other words, it's about 'drawing music.'"

Early pressings of El Cielo were in a cardbord fold-out CD holder with pictures of clouds bordered by runes. Later pressings of El Cielo are in a generic plastic jewel case. The cover of the later versions are obviously the cover of the booklet, which is a sort of brown leathery texture with the band's name and the album name on it. The image provided on this page is the cover of the earlier, cardboard fold-out version. Both versions are otherwise identical and have the same booklet.

The booklet with El Cielo contains letters written by sufferers of sleeping disorders with descriptions of various experiences with or relating to sleep paralysis. Singer Gavin Hayes incorporates and expands upon the material found in the booklet for the lyrics to the album; All of the songs on the album (except the instrumentals, obviously) contain snippets of the text in the booklet.

Track 12, "Of the Room", is a remastered version of one of dredg's earlier demo songs, originally found on their 2001 Industry Demos, and later on Extended Play For The Eastern Hemisphere.

El Cielo has also been released in the SACD format. This particular disc is a multi-channel hybrid SACD. It is playable as a standard CD in a normal CD player. However, in an SACD player, the album is played in high resolution audio with surround sound.

The album was recorded at George Lucas' Skywalker Ranch in Nicasio, CA, and at Longview Farm in North Brookfield, MD. Producers included Ron St. Germain, Tim Palmer, and Michael Rosen.

Note: The song "Whoa Is Me" can be traced back to Shakespeare's "Hamlet," with the line "Woe is me," although this influence is unclear given that "woe is me" had become a popular phrase in the years following Shakespeare's play.

Rumors about El Cielo syncronizing lyrically and tonally with the 2004 movie Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind began circulating through internet forums in 2005. However, any instances of synchronization are quite clearly coincidental, as both the album and the film were in production at approximately the same time .

However, Dredg's album El Cielo does syncronize with the movie The Nightmare Before Christmas when started at the same time.

[edit] Track listing

1. "Brushstroke: dcbtfoabaaposba" – 0:57
2. "Same Ol' Road" – 5:14
3. "Sanzen" – 4:34
4. "Brushstroke: New Heart Shadow" – 1:33
5. "Triangle" – 5:03
6. "Sorry But It's Over" – 4:08
7. "Convalescent" – 3:32
8. "Brushstroke: Walk In The Park" – 1:40
9. "18 People Living In Harmony" – 4:28
10. "Scissor Lock" – 3:23
11. "Brushstroke: Reprise" – 1:33
12. "Of The Room" – 3:44
13. "Brushstroke: An Elephant In The Delta Waves" – 1:47
14. "It Only Took A Day" – 3:16
15. "Whoa Is Me" – 5:36
16. "The Canyon Behind Her" – 6:40

[edit] Music videos

• "Same Ol' Road" directed by American McGee.
• "Of The Room" directed by Ben Rehki.

[edit] External links

• A good resource for Sleep Paralysis, one of the themes of the album
• El Cielo at MusicBrainz
• Analysis of El Cielo

v • d • e Dredg Gavin Hayes  · Drew Roulette  · Mark Engles  · Dino Campanella Studio albums Leitmotif  · El Cielo  · Catch Without Arms Live albums and EPs Conscious  · Orph  · Extended Play for the Eastern Hemisphere  · Live at the Fillmore DVDs Crickets  · Live from the Henry Fonda Theater Singles "Same Ol' Road"  · "Of The Room"  · "Bug Eyes"