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Shows Are Standing Room OnlyThere are numbers so vast they exceed the scope of human reckoning, concepts so immeasurable they surpass our capacity to understand. On their radiant new album, 100s of 1000s, Millions of Billions, Blitzen Trapper make peace with the unknowable, surrendering themselves to forces beyond their control as they explore the infinite with a broad mind and an open heart. Inspired by singer/songwriter Eric Earleys fascination with Buddhist texts and meditation (the title comes from a phrase that appears over and over in the Mahayana sutras), the album offers a captivating take on rebirth and transcendence, and the circularity of existence, navigating its way through the space beyond dreams and reality, beyond gods and mortals, beyond life and death. The songs here are as sincere as they are surreal, rooted in rich character studies and deep reflection, and unfolding like a riddle-filled journey that asks many questions and offers no answers. The production is intoxicating to match, blending lo-fi intimacy and trippy psychedelia into a mesmerizing swirl of analog and electronic sounds. Add it all together and the result is a gorgeous, sprawling collection wrapped in lush layers of synthesizers and washed out electric guitarsa poignant, expansive exploration of perception and purpose that manages to look both forwards and backwards all at once. This whole project grew out of a box of old four-track tapes from the 90s that I found recently, Earley explains of 100s of 1000s, Millions of Billions. The tapes were full of songs Id written and recorded back when I was 19 or 20 years old, and the sound and the spirit of those recordings got me excited to start writing music again, to go back to working the way I did when I was first starting out. Launched roughly two decades ago in Portland, OR, Blitzen Trapper garnered early attention with a series of self-released albums before breaking out internationally with a pair of critically acclaimed LPs (2007s Wild Mountain Nation and 2008s Furr) that would cement their status at the forefront of the modern indie folk revival. Rolling Stone hailed the bands hazy, psychedelic Americana, while NPR praised their explosive live performances and infectious roots-rock swagger, and The New York Times compared their songs to Tom Petty, Bruce Springsteen, and Neil Young. Dates with Fleet Foxes, Wilco, and Dawes followed, as did festival appearances at Bonnaroo, Lollapalooza, Newport Folk, and Coachella, among others. In the years to come, the band would go on to release six more similarly lauded studio albums, culminating with 2020s Holy Smokes Future Jokes, which Mojo proclaimed sound[s] like the Beatles at Big Pink.
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