Review: The Mars Volta - "Octahedron"
What about the voice of Geddy Lee… How did it get so high? I wonder if he speaks like an ordinary guy (?) I know him, and he does” - Pavement, 1997 What about the voice of Cedric Bixler-Zavala… How did it get so high? I wonder if he speaks like an ordinary guy (?) I’ve heard him, and he kind of does” - GlassPipeMurder, 2009 It’s been just a year since the Mars Volta’s Grammy-winning The Bedlam in Goliath dropped, but everyone’s favorite pair of afroed Texicans are already back with a new set of spacey riffs, vexing time signatures and hallucinogenic lyrics comprising the eight songs of Octahedron. While comparing this post-hardcore/prog-rock/Latin-influenced jam factory to Rush is both a lazy description and an erroneous one, it’s harder to avoid on Octahedron than in the past. While this may be due in part to not promoting the album with a free Circle Jerks cover, and the album itself somewhat lacking the frequency of spastic freakouts found on Goliath,...