Skyharbor -- Guiding Lights

9/10

It's late autumn, 2014. I've been back in school for nearly two full years now, working on a second degree, taking a hard right from the English degree I got the first time, into Chemical Engineering. The first year and a half passed like a dream. I had quit my full time job, which was admittedly temporary, and coming to an end, and I went full force into school, just as my wife began to work full time. After failing my first Calculus test, I'd gone on a tear, destroying Calc I and II, Biology, Physics I & II, Chemistry I & II, Bio and Chem Labs, intro to Chem Engineering, and (ironically) Econ. Who says an English major can't also be a Chemical Engineer?
Well..my life does. The fall semester of 2014 had been fraught with hardship. Deeper into engineering-focused classes, I suddenly found the homework staggering, and the tests nearly impossible. I'd put in dozens of hours studying, which would have previously gotten me an "A." However, despite all that work, I'd barely pull a "C." The other students, most nearly 15 years younger than me, barely seemed to have to put any effort into it, except for, ironically, their mandatory English and Econ courses, which they regarded as cruel and unusual punishment. I should have shown them all the A's I made as an English major.
Everything came to a nadir on one awful week. The farmers who worked the sugar cane fields that completely surrounded my house pulled the short straw at the refinery, and they had to loudly harvest every morning from 3:00-7:00. Their combines and cargo trucks were so heavy, they shook the walls and floor of my house. The corresponding lack of sleep effectively turned me into a walking corpse. Then, a series of unfortunate events ruined my childcare, and I had to miss study time to take care of my young son. Naturally, I somehow had a test in every single class the next Monday. I decided I would cram that weekend, which, due to more unfortunate events, turned into cram that Sunday. Naturally, when taking my wife and son to get something to eat that day, my wife locked her keys in the car during an absolute downpour. Everyone got drenched, and better yet, Pop-a-lock couldn't get the door open. After hours and hours, the door was finally breached. By then, the sun had nearly set. I hadn't cracked a book. I drove my wife and son home, and then went to the student union to study. I covered barely anything, got no sleep, and tanked all three tests.
Then came the knockout punch. My wife's company suddenly realized they had no money to pay their employees. Everyone was immediately let go, indefinitely. Suddenly, our only source of income was the 10-hours a week of nights and weekend I worked at the library.
Without a moments hesitation, I dropped out of school.
What happened to my life? I won "most likely to succeed" in high school. During my first tenure in college, I was several professors' star pupil. My wife skipped the fourth grade, and graduated from college in three years. Here we now were, in a trailer in the old Mississippi riverbed, essentially unemployed, with bills to pay, and a five-year old to feed. I felt completely defeated, which is, apparently, when I am the most dangerous.
From a religious perspective, this is likely because these are the times I am most reliant on my faith. God has always come through for me in the darker hours. However, these were extremely dark. How would we avoid getting kicked out on the street? How would we pay for food?
My wife went back to the hair salon she'd worked at half a decade before. I picked over 2,000 pounds of pecans, which were selling for a historically high price that fall. We applied for food stamps. I went back to the university and re-enrolled for the spring, but in accounting this time. In the last month of the year, the ground under the sleeping pecan trees now bare, there was but one thing to do: wait. What would happen? Would everything work out? Would my family be okay?
I decided to take my son for a hike. I planned that after lunch, we'd cross the Audubon Bridge to Port Hudson State Historic Site. However, I wanted to listen to some new music on the drive. I agonized over spending the $8, but decided it was a mental health necessity. I noticed that the progressive metal band, Skyharbor, had just released their second full-length album, Guiding Lights. I loved the first one, so I bought this one blind.
My son and I left the shorn and burned out sugar cane fields, and drove through the countryside, and across the river. It only took a few minutes for me to realize something special was happening.
Though it was only 3 p.m., the sky was magenta. The music coming out of my car speakers was mystical and magical. I kept glancing back at my son in his booster seat, and he somehow seemed to also realize the unreality of the moment. We pulled into the parking lot, and though I turned off my car, the opening, beautiful, searching guitar notes of Skyharbor's "Patience" stuck in my head. They would stay there for the duration of the hike. We got out of the car and into the seemingly glowing air, Earth's breath. There was some strange combination of stillness and movement--the wind was certainly blowing gently, shifting around the fallen leaves, and yet everything felt sealed in some vacuum of a moment that seemed never meant to end. My son and I hiked through that beautiful, living forest, under the magenta sky that tinted everything in an unnatural glow, and my son seemed to feed off the energy, throwing leaves in the air and chasing them around like some spectral spirit of the wood. I thought about life going forward. Man, I can't screw this up. This kid is counting on me. And yet, this fantastical, yet real afternoon seemed to be a gift from the universe, a reassuring message from God: everything is going to be okay.
I never wanted the hike, and this eternal, healing sunset to end. As we made it back to the car, and "Patience" ended, the first mysterious notes of Guiding Lights title track began. The music felt the very aural embodiment of the environment. Suddenly, the scattered wispy clouds shifted from silver to gold. I drove slowly through the forest, back to the highway, eyes transfixed on the sky.
Ironically, I've heard that Guiding Lights' lyrics center around vocalist, Daniel Tompkins' relationship with and his joy over his young son. Guitarist, Keshav Dhar, says, "It is not a story per se, more like a common thematic thread of positive energies and uplifting emotions. Life is far too short to waste on negative thoughts." That's most definitely the vibe here.
There are some chunky riffs scattered around, but none of them are dark. There's a ton of mystery in the searching, effects-heavy guitar leads, though--that is to say, there's depth and layers to the positivity here. This certainly isn't pop music. The drums are active, virtuoso. The defining element, though, is Tompkins' high, yet powerful and angelic vocals. They paint just as much atmosphere as anything on Guiding Lights. The songs are often stretched out far past the five-minute mark, spacey and cosmic. This is a truly special album.
Yes, this is a classic Nicsperiment album review, many hulking paragraphs about my personal life, and barely ten sentences about the actual music. That's just the way it is. I'm not even about to give an objective review to an album I was listening to when literal magic happened. As for what happened next, that spring, as an accounting major, I got a 4.0, and a mix of me crawfishing and library moonlighting and my wife cutting hair miraculously paid all our bills. Late that summer, I got hired at a sweet job utilizing the accounting courses I just took, and this time I dropped out of school for overwhelmingly positive reasons. My wife went back to school and got her masters. My son got into one of the best schools in the country and started kindergarten. Wow. Miracles do happen. That last chapter of Job is legit.
I'm sure at some point, I'll face seemingly insurmountable hardships again. I'll always have my faith to lean on. When I meet someone who is antagonistic to it, I scratch my head, and wonder why they would begrudge me something that benefits me and has no negative effect upon them. When someone like Neil deGrasse Tyson mocks it, I wonder what he is leaning on as his entire world crumbles. Will he ever drink in that mysterious, healing air? I'm sure he would try to logically explain it, but science is a lousy, unforgiving god. I love science, but I like to keep my religion separate from it. I don't think I need to make a union between my belief that man both evolved from apes, and has been blessed with a soul by an almighty creator. The intangible and tangible can co-exist without being reconciled. Otherwise, concepts like forgiveness, grace, and mercy could not exist. Perhaps this is the proselytizing review of the Every Album I Own series? I'm not sure what happened here. I wasn't intending to go in this direction. I appreciate getting to write reviews for albums like Guiding Lights, which allow me to get to this headspace, though. I hope next time I am experiencing the intangible, there'll be another Guiding Lights to help elucidate the experience.


2014 Basick
1. Allure (featuring Mark Holcomb) 6:46
2. Evolution 5:39
3. Idle Minds 7:46
4. Miracle 5:59
5. Halogen 7:02
6. New Devil 6:55
7. Patience 4:42
8. Guiding Lights 9:22
9. Kaikoma (featuring Valentina Reptile) 4:37
10. The Constant (featuring Plini Roessler-Holgate) 9:33