Epic indie pop tends to have a few recurring, powerful themes built into it. Broad concepts like brotherhood, survival, tragedy, and triumph often find their way alongside “big” music. Cloud Cult is building their reputation for conceiving this type of rock, but with a more eccentric and organic sense than their contemporaries. The Meaning of 8 is the next step in the band’s progression, featuring grandiose production, futuristic effects and Craig Minowa’s philosophic, passionate vocals. Cloud Cult takes these huge ideas and sounds and stuffs them into something like the geodesic dome at Epcot.
The most significant feature of The Meaning of 8 is its sheer variety of instrumentation. Cloud Cult creates such a wide array of styles from arena-sized anthems to raptronica that it occasionally veers towards dissolution, but overall, is a testament to what a few vehemently-indie musicians can accomplish. From the bouncy jam “Please Remain Calm” to the semi-industrial “Brain Gateway” to the hip-hopped “A Girl Underground”, the album covers a lot of territory. A majority of the songs run along a theme of intricate, yet forceful acoustic tunes with multiple layers of effects and wide range of drumming styles. The Meaning of 8 is something of a Dali mural.
Able to release records on their own terms and promote a lifestyle of conservational conversation, Cloud Cult can examine their lives and lives around them through a seemingly telescopic kaleidoscope. In “Take Your Medicine”, they offer introspection (“Look at all of those skeletons running from their closets”) through a powerfully decorated acoustic strum that ends up powerfully (“You can take it in stride/Or you can take it right between the eyes/Suck up, suck up/And take your medicine”). “Your 8th Birthday” is an emotional offering to Minowa’s late son, Kaidin, with vigorously rising strumming that builds into a tremored crescendo. There’s a profound human intensity in almost every song on The Meaning of 8.
Shrugging off the clench of the absorbant music industry to maintain their lives on their own terms, Cloud Cult have quietly been able to create a collection of music that approaches essential. Musically, lyrically, and socially, each one of their albums are extraordinarily deep, and The Meaning of 8 expands their fertile portfolio even further. The way Cloud Cult protects their interests enables them to produce more meaningful music, much like a diamond in the rough is intrinsically worth more than one a store.
