Grand Opening and Closing is the debut album by the American avant-garde metal group Sleepytime Gorilla Museum. It was recorded at Polymorph Recording, Oakland, CA, and was recorded, mixed, mastered by bassist Dan Rathbun. The album was produced by Dan Rathbun and Sleepytime Gorilla Museum.
The album was originally released as a CD on October 30, 2001, by Seeland Records in conjunction with Chaosophy Records. When the band signed to The End Records in 2006, the album was re-released on September 5, 2006, with three previously unreleased tracks.[2]
Grand Opening and Closing features David Shamrock on drums, the only SGM album to do so. He was replaced by Frank Grau, who plays drums on "The Stain" for this album.
Like with Of Natural History, some of the album's lyrics are inspired by different authors and poets. For example, the track "Sleep is Wrong" quotes a section of a poem by Dylan Thomas,[3] while "Sleepytime (Spirit is a Bone)" is inspired by William T. Vollmann'sThe Rainbow Stories and phrenology.[4]
Track listing
No.
Title
Lyrics
Music
Song
Length
1.
"Sleep Is Wrong"
Nils Frykdahl
Sleepytime Gorilla Museum
Nils Frykdahl
6:35
2.
"Ambugaton"
Hank Williams
David Shamrock
5:38
3.
"Ablutions"
Carla Kihlstedt
Carla Kihlstedt
6:05
4.
"1997 (Tonight We're Gonna Party Like It's...)"
Nils Frykdahl
Sleepytime Gorilla Museum
Nils Frykdahl
4:48
5.
"The Miniature"
David Shamrock and Nancy Elliot
0:59
6.
"Powerless"
Nils Frykdahl
Sleepytime Gorilla Museum
Nils Frykdahl
9:30
7.
"The Stain"
Dan Rathbun
Dan Rathbun
6:46
8.
"Sleepytime (Spirit Is a Bone)"
Nils Frykdahl
Sleepytime Gorilla Museum
Nils Frykdahl
10:16
9.
"Sunflower"
David Shamrock
7:52
End Records re-release
No.
Title
Lyrics
Music
Song
Length
10.
"More Time"
Carla Kihlstedt
Carla Kihlstedt/SGM
2:48
11.
"Flinch"
Carla Kihlstedt
Carla Kihlstedt
4:46
12.
"Powerless (live 01/06/06)" (Recorded at Great American Music Hall, San Francisco.)
↑ "From a poem by Dylan Thomas, used by at least one mother to taunt sleep-resistant children" (Grand Opening and Closing, liner notes, p. 112, note 5).
↑ "Hospital color-lines inspired in part by William T. Vollmann's The Rainbow Stories" & "Spirit is a bone is the motto of the phrenologists, 18th century skull-readers." (Ibid., notes 6 & 7, respectively.)
↑ If some of these instruments seem unusual, the reason is that SGM uses a lot of homemade instruments. See the main article about the band for more information.
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