Gandharva Emergency
FLOATER’S BLOG: Emergency Beer Float Date, June 24th 2025
What the frack is a Gandharva Emergency?
I’m so glad you asked.
If you have read my very recent blog regarding resorting to an Emergency Beer Float you will know that a heat wave has hit us here in Toronto and I had to break out my kit. My brother’s pool is closed for a fix up, many of our local beaches are closed due to e-coli counts and the public pools for some reason shun me floating in them with a beer in hand – it seems, vinyl floats are just not accepted at all.
Well, it is day two of this heat wave, and I should point out the humidex is up around 40 Celsius - that’s over 100 Fahrenheit for you imperialists, so I am back on my upper deck on a float in my kiddie pool. Today’s music of choice is a 1994 album, A Soap Bubble and Inertia, by a fairly obscure Canadian band from London, Ontario named The Gandharvas.
A Gandharva, which the band takes its name from, is a member of a class of celestial beings in Indian religions such as Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism.
So, a Gandharva Emergency is actually pretty straight forward for those who float and blog about it, I’m listening to a band named after Hindu divine musicians while in my Emergency Float pool. Obvi!
For those unfamiliar with the band, their sound is not easy to describe as one specific type but one could draw immediate parallels to Jane’s Addiction, with lead singer Paul Jago resonating in a similar manner as Perry Farrell. The music takes forays into such diverse realms as Alice in Chains, Terrence Trent D’Arby, Paul Simon and Marc Bolan.
The album title, A Soap Bubble and Inertia, is derived from a Dostoevsky novel ‘Notes from Underground’ and is the first of three L.P.s the band produced before their split up in 2000.
Why am I relating so much info about this album? Well, I thought with my limited options for floating in this vicinity at the moment, I might as well write about something else I love to do – listening to music.
So, here you are reading the first ever Beer Float Blog Music Review.
The album opens with The Gandharavas’ signature track, “The First Day of Spring”, a slow building, dreamy track featuring Jago’s distinctive often double-tracked falsetto. This esoteric melody starts with vocals over a soft bass beat. A rhythm guitar and brushed snare drum add to the tranquility oozing from your sound system until it picks up in the chorus to a more rounded pop track.
Jago’s lyrics are poignant as he describes exactly how one might feel on that first day when the winter weather is behind you and how you should take advantage of it because a cold spell might come back tomorrow. An apt way to refer to the first day of spring.
Little did the band know at the time of this release that this would be their most successful number and what a song it is. It sets a very high bar for the rest of the album to follow, and you can hear that in the last few tracks but in between are some other great pieces.
Producer, Dan Brodbeck’s work shines again on Saturn Quits Fasting pushing Tim McDonald’s pounding drums to the forefront to drive this rocking track while leaving room for the piano to be heard clearly throughout. Jago roughens up his voice a bit more in the tone of Blind Melon’s Shannon Hoon.
On the third track, The Coffee Song, I believe guitarist Brian ward pulls an E-Bow out of his bag of tricks turning his licks into a sound similar to what one might get playing a Farfisa organ through a bouncy jaunt. As the title suggests it’s a pick-me-up song.
Next is a hard rocking grungy track, Bundle, which reminds me of Alice In Chains, once again building up from a gentle beginning.
Beakfulls of Heroine combines the funk rock sound of Spin Doctors with the shrill vocals of Porno for Pyros and features some mean guitar riffs.
From here the next 4 tracks slow down tremendously, the first being Shadow, a very quiet number all about the vocals with harmonics reminiscent of another obscure Canadian band from a generation earlier A Foot In Cold Water.
Supreme Personality with its rhythm guitar and percussive presence could easily be a Paul Simon track like Me & Julio Down By The School Yard or something from Graceland.
Dallying is a light lilt replete with chirping birds and electric piano solo. Except for Jago’s conspicuous vocals you would never think it was the same band power rocking through previous tracks.
After the short quirky instrumental Cans comes the title track which is another slow building piece with heavy guitar and pounding drums but it just misses the mark which I suspect is why it was placed late in the track listing.
Elevator Bugs could have been left off the album which is completed with Circus Song. As the name implies, this is one, with an eastern European gypsy-esque flare. Meh.
As a Beer Float album to review it actually works out quite well. The first 8 tracks are all very listenable provided you can handle falsetto vocals, I know some can’t. The last 4 tracks are for getting off your float going to the bathroom, then the fridge for a replacement cerveza and finally to your audio source to change up the tunes.
And with that I do recommend listening to this album, at least the first two thirds, and at the very least give the First Day of Spring a shot.
Floating and listening,
Corliss
beer float.calm = beerfloat.net not beerfloat.com
