Mario Lalli & the Rubber Snake Charmers Premiere “Swamp Cooler Reality” from Folklore From the Other Desert Cities
Mario Lalli and the Rubber Snake Charmers hit Australia in the company of Stöner in Fall 2022, and their debut full-length, Folklore From the Other Desert Cities, was recorded on Sunday, Nov. 5 at Mo’s Desert Clubhouse. The show was featured on a streaming series called ‘Desert TV’ the audio issued on notably-limited cassette through Northern Haze before the band — spearheaded of course by namesake Mario Lalli, of Fatso Jetson, Yawning Man, etc. — signed on to release it March 29 through Heavy Psych Sounds. There are differences from the set video/live tape to the four-song/38-minute Folklore — some editing to let it flow as an album and shape songs, the mix/master from Mathias Schneeberger, etc. — and the result is an engrossing, sometimes lush, sometimes spacious, exploration of desert psychedelics. Lalli himself holds down bass in place of Nick Oliveri, who’d have been on the tour as part of Stöner but for visa issues as frontman/lead-poet Sean Wheeler informs at one point while introducing the band, and Brant Bjork and Ryan Güt, both also of Stöner, rounded out the lineup on guitar and drums, respectively.
I was lucky enough to see the semi-conjoined outfits together in Sept. 2022 (review here) before they headed Down Under, and the setup was much the same. That night, it was Lalli, Wheeler and all three members of Stöner on stage to jam, hypnotize, reach into the ether and give Wheeler‘s desert-punk bohème proclamations the textural setting they deserve. The Rubber Snake Charmers took the stage first and Stöner closed out. Super-casual. And the who-knows-where-we-might-end-up-but-let’s-go approach of the project that was so vivid that night in Jersey resonates in the loose sway and swing throughout Folklore From the Other Desert Cities, which transitions mid-jam between “Creosote Breeze” and “Swamp Cooler Reality” (note the video for the latter premiering below), mid-lyric between “Other Desert Cities” and “The Devil Waits for Me,” and puts its side flip between two standalone spoken lines from Wheeler. Clearly the intention is that the album should be taken as a whole — said the dude premiering a single track; I take what I can get — and it has more than enough fluidity between its two sides to support that experience. You can get lost in it, and I’m not about to tell you that you shouldn’t.
Some crowd noise at the outset of “Creosote Breeze” places you in the room, but a humming e-bow guitar and underlying drone silence most of the conversation. Güt gives a quick cymbal wash and they shift to a meditative riff laid out by Lalli as their true launch point. What unfurls from there does so with a chemistry that shouldn’t shock anyone familiar with the players involved — Bjork and Lalli‘s storied history in the Californian desert scene, Güt‘s near-decade drumming with Bjork between Stöner and Bjork‘s solo band, and Wheeler‘s long involvement with the Palm Springs weirdo underground in fronting Throw Rag, and so on — but they’re not so much riding pedigree here as they are pushing themselves outward, and that’s the whole point. This record, this amorphous band, wouldn’t exist without the creative passion that so clearly fuels it. The chance to tap something not yet known and see what you can make. That first riff in “Creosote Breeze” is almost surprising with a kind of brooding vibe, but they open it up cosmic and are funky long before the eight-plus minutes allotted to the track are done.
Schneeberger is credited with keys, and as the band settles into a roll before the guitar steps back circa 6:40 to let Wheeler start his next spoken recitation — he weaves back and forth between singing and spoken word, and it’s not always perfect and that’s why it works — they seem indeed to be dubbed in as part of the molten wash, but that feels fair enough for Folklore From the Other Desert Cities being based on a live set and presented as the band’s debut album. It’s not supposed to be easy to categorize outside of itself. You might say that’s how ‘desert rock’ happened in the first place; it wasn’t already another thing. “Creosote Breeze” entrances and “Swamp Cooler Reality,” mid-groove at its outset, finds its own way to build on that movement. Standout lines from Wheeler give impressionistic visions in rhythm as Bjork clicks on the wah and the drive gets accordingly funkier. They’ll mellow out a few minutes later, as one would expect, but that’s fleshed out with synth or other effects and some self-gathering-style meander comes together around the bass and drums to an open but satisfying finish of its own, “Other Desert Cities” kicking in either immediately or after the platter flip, depending how you’re listening.
But the vibe is set and the this-night incarnation of Mario Lalli and the Rubber Snake Charmers carry it through to the finish of “The Devil Waits for Me,” Wheeler steering them into a desert-themed take on the blues classic “In the Pines” that allows for no sleep whatsoever. The longer-form trip they’re on in terms of the whole set has plenty of space for that kind of thing, but it’s not like they’re doing a cover or something — it’s the immediate pursuit of inspiration and the moment captured in the recording. A thing that happened that day. A short while later, in “The Devil Waits for Me,” they seem to purposefully submerge in volume, fuzz and the underlying earthy groove, but not before the whole Gold Coast crowd gets invited back to L.A. for what one assumes would be a party worth the requisite travel.
If you didn’t see them on the tour that produced Folklore From the Other Desert Cities, the recording represents well the untethered spirit that seems to be at heart in Mario Lalli and the Rubber Snake Charmers and expands on it in how the material is delivered structurally and sonically. At the same time it’s their debut, it’s also right in its moment, and by it’s very nature, whatever Lalli and not-necessarily-the-same-company do next will likewise stand on its own. What one wonders is if how much Mario Lalli and the Rubber Snake Charmers appreciate that they themselves are part of the folklore they’re portraying, even in this new form and modus, just by getting together and weirding out. Hasn’t that always been the idea?
Enjoy the video for “Swamp Cooler Reality” below, followed by more info from the PR wire:
Mario Lalli and the Rubber Snake Charmers, “Swamp Cooler Reality” premiere
The first release from this band of pioneering Desert rock musicians captures the band and its purest form exercising the desert born ethic and approach of rock improvisation, psychedelic and flowing, heavy and explorative.
Tracklisting:
1. Creosote Breeze
2. Swamp Cooler Reality
3. Other Desert Cities
4. The Devil Waits For Me
Recorded live at Mo’s Desert Clubhouse, Gold Coast Australia by Guy Cooper and mixed and mastered by Mathias Schneeberger at Donner & Blitzen Studios, California. The band’s first release features BRANT BJORK, SEAN WHEELER, RYAN GUT and MARIO LALLI, capturing the band in a engaging special performance in Gold Coast Australia.
The album will be issued on March 29th on vinyl, CD and digital via Heavy Psych Sounds. Enjoy!
MARIO LALLI & THE RUBBER SNAKE CHARMERS is:
Mario Lalli – bass and vocal
Sean Wheeler – vocals and poetry
Brant Bjork – Guitar
Ryan Güt – Drums
Mathias Schneeberger – keys
Mario Lalli and the Rubber Snake Charmers, Folklore From the Other Desert Cities (2024)
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Heavy Psych Sounds on Bandcamp
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