There’s something happening on the west coast. Whether it’s in the air, the water, or the drugs, a pool of talent has formed around the notion that you can have your pop and eat it too, with brainy, prog-influenced weird-beards like Bend Sinister and arcane psycho-confectioners Mother Mother demonstrating that musical complexity can still be hummable. Commercial, even.
Throw the Zolas into the picture and dammit – you might even call it a scene! Not that it’s ever been a concern to long-term musical partners Zach Gray and Tom Dobrzanski, who established their gifts for intricate songcraft three years ago under the name Lotus Child.
Since then, the duo has finessed its formula into something even busier yet no less direct, filling their new album Tic Toc Tic with hairpin turns, schizoid tonal shifts, multiple parts, and a sort of cabaret strut.
Miraculously, between New Pornographers vet Howard Redekopp’s unfinicky production and the clarity of Gray and Dobrzanski’s vision, Tic Toc Tic works like a charm. Complex without being alienating, it aims equally and with dead-eyed precision for the head, heart, and groin.
Guitarist-vocalist Gray hits on the twin poles that define Tic Toc Tic when he reveals an equal passion for the visceral Scandinavian dream pop of Mew, whose influence is obvious, and the classic music hall rag of the Kinks, whose influence is anything but. Not on first listen, anyway, though the presence of Ray Davies is felt in Gray’s lyrics. Particularly when he turns his attention to the mundane, like the character in “You’re Too Cool” who wrestles with his vulnerability at Vancouver’s hipster HQ the Biltmore. Or the confessional “Body Ash”, which documents a relationship on the ropes. The directness of its sentiment echoes what Gray describes as Davies’ “populism”.
“The first words in ‘Body Ash’ are ‘my balls’,” he laughs. “Literally. I’m not hiding behind any metaphors.” Soundwise, Gray says he was aiming for “self-conscious Jeff Buckley”, which also goes some way towards describing a lot of the music on Tic Toc Tic.
Boxing the listener with their virtuosity right off the top, opener “You’re Too Cool” is six minutes of fortified waltz-time piano dissolving into what Gray characterizes as an “anti-chorus”. “The Great Collapse” is swaggering and deceptively sunny power-pop for apocalyptic future scenarios. “Marlaina Kamikaze” bounces between big band stickwork from drummer Ali Siadat, braying trumpet, and a decadent stride-piano breakdown.
Meanwhile, “You Better Watch Out” has Gray anguishing over a cute girl on a bus while cascading piano arpeggios and Aidan Knight’s hyperactive bass push his suffering to operatic levels of high drama. “Queen of Relax” is featherlite prog, and “Cab Driver” somehow contrives to be both the most straightforward number on Tic Toc Tic, and the most demanding. “It’s the most fun to play,” says Dobrzanski, who caps the song with a libidinous boogie-woogie throwdown sizzling enough to give “Honky Cat” era Elton a case of pianist envy. “It’s a rock-out,” he continues. “I like the athleticism involved in parts of it. It’s actually work.”
If “Cab Driver” finds the Zolas in an almost conventional mood, “I’ve Got Leeches” and album closer “Pyramid Scheme” both explore the fringes of the songwriting team’s expanding universe. Gray describes the first as “baroque” and “Bowie-esque”, while the latter, he admits perhaps a little freely, “is the track where we don’t care if anyone ever listens to it.” As such, it includes what Gray calls “a vaguely Maori, haunted house, war chant section.” Deadpans Dobrzanski, “That moment might come across as a bit out there.”
In truth, Tic Toc Tic is a little out there from bar one to its closing outburst of unbound inspiration. Perhaps it has something to do with the duo’s seasoned friendship – they met as choirboys in Grade 9 – or a working relationship that begins with Gray broadstroking ideas and passing them along to Dobrzanski, his classical musically inclined “details guy”.
Whatever alchemical thing lies beneath the sparkling progressive pop of Tic Toc Tic, the partnership has made its great leap forward. It’s our job to catch up. And we should consider it a pleasure.
Knot In My Heart
The Zolas Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
How winter loves wear thin
They’re cut to kindling
When summer hits our skin
We’re like a seedling
Suck tears out of a vase
A forest fire knows
So why do I need
Something more
You’ve got that secret knock to my door
I wake up some days with a knot in my heart
Where oh where, where are you?
It’s hard and weird not to know how your day begins
Though I’m lying next to someone new
Calm and collected
I’m feeling nothing in the world can shake my bones
These new distractions like growing grasses
Hide the path between our homes
The lyrics of Knot In My Heart by The Zolas describe a sense of disconnection and uncertainty that comes with changing seasons and changing relationships. The opening lines paint a picture of friends going wild and the ephemerality of winter love that fades away as summer approaches. The imagery of being cut to kindling suggests that these loves are fragile and easily shattered.
The next few lines introduce the image of a seedling and the idea that something will always take the place of what has been lost. This speaks to the cyclical nature of life and how the end of one thing always leads to the beginning of another. The singer then begins to question why they need something more, perhaps implying that they should be content with what they already have.
The chorus then comes in, expressing the singer's sense of loneliness and longing despite being with someone new. The line "It's hard and weird not to know how your day begins" suggests a longing for intimacy and connection, and the knot in their heart represents the emotional pain that comes with this disconnect. The final lines of the song suggest that the distractions and changes in life may be hiding the path between the singer and the person they truly want to be with, further emphasizing their feelings of uncertainty and confusion.
Line by Line Meaning
My friends are wilding
My companions are being reckless and impulsive
How winter loves wear thin
Our relationships grow weak as time passes
They’re cut to kindling
These fading connections become easier to break
When summer hits our skin
But when new experiences arise, we feel alive again
We’re like a seedling
We are young and vulnerable
Suck tears out of a vase
We are trying to extract meaning from things that are no longer fulfilling
A forest fire knows
Destruction is always followed by new growth
Something will take its place
Change is inevitable
So why do I need
Something more
You’ve got that secret knock to my door
Despite knowing that change is inevitable, I still hold onto this relationship because you have a special way of connecting with me
I wake up some days with a knot in my heart
Where oh where, where are you?
It’s hard and weird not to know how your day begins
Though I’m lying next to someone new
Even though I am with someone else, there are moments when I can't help but wonder where you are and how you're doing
Calm and collected
I’m feeling nothing in the world can shake my bones
These new distractions like growing grasses
Hide the path between our homes
Although I may seem composed, something deep inside me knows that our physical distance and our new experiences are creating a gulf between us
Contributed by Mason B. Suggest a correction in the comments below.
Hxleemxh
My friends are wilding
How winter loves wear thin
They’re cut to kindling
When summer hits our skin
We’re like a seedling
Suck tears out of a vase
A forest fire knows
Something will take its place
So why do I need Something more You’ve got that secret knock to my door
I wake up some days with a knot in my heart
Where oh where, where are you?
It’s hard and weird not to know how your day begins
Though I’m lying next to someone new
Calm and collected
I’m feeling nothing in the world can shake my bones
These new distractions like growing grasses Hide the path between our homes
Hxleemxh
My friends are wilding
How winter loves wear thin
They’re cut to kindling
When summer hits our skin
We’re like a seedling
Suck tears out of a vase
A forest fire knows
Something will take its place
So why do I need Something more You’ve got that secret knock to my door
I wake up some days with a knot in my heart
Where oh where, where are you?
It’s hard and weird not to know how your day begins
Though I’m lying next to someone new
Calm and collected
I’m feeling nothing in the world can shake my bones
These new distractions like growing grasses Hide the path between our homes
Michelangelina
you're the real mvp
Jim jeanes
I love hearing bands of today taking those drum machines and keyboards of the 80's and reworking it into something new! I can hear that flare right away and I just love it! I had to hear this song once to be hooked; nice sound.
MrMarbles
I've had "ancient mars" on my mp3 player for like 4 years, always been a personal favourite. Only now am i realizing i might have a genuine liking for The Zolas and am checking their stuff out.
RεAηimatοr
This song is the definition of amazing, fkn love it!
Lauren Byrne
Loved this song since I heard it at Khatsahlano this summer. Amazing! :)
Sleepy Burr
I've never seen Hemlock Grove. I'm here because I like the Zolas.
Torakiwhite
A song this good pretty much writes itself, beautiful!
Charles Perreault
Such a catchy tune. It's a sad number yet makes me want to dance. Love you guys!
Ryan Roberts
I wake up some days with a knot in my heart Where oh where, where are you? It’s hard and weird not to know how your day begins though I’m lying next to someone new. such a great chorus