“O loathsome crawling thing
Be done with your miniscule affairs
O hungry creeping speck
I release you from your cares Be gone Roach!
You live on carrion That's outrageous
You're probably contagious
Blind crippled and half-squashed
and yet you carry on
Your persistence is disgusting
I could never find myself trusting
A creature that would rather live in the trash than in the lawn
Cockroach your problems are not mine
I love life but with you I draw the line
Not to flaunt my superior design
But next to you I'm practically divine
Cockroach your problems are not mine”

What a truly spectacular event it was that took place on this sixteenth day of April 2009. A raucous affair that shook some people’s worlds upside-down and put others back into their right places. If everything is relative, than it must be relative to something right? I humbly submit that everything is relative to Sleepytime Gorilla Museum, whose music shakes the very fabric of reality and shapes matter into being all around us.

But that’s ridiculous.

In all seriousness, though, SGM is one of those bands that have a ravenous following, and mostly because their music evokes a primal, animalistic response while still maintaining an extremely high level of technicality and thought provoking lyrics. This level of duality cannot be found in many other modern bands and SGM seems to have reached a point in their career where they are more than just a group of people that play music together. Creating a new genre of music is something that is usually just beyond the grasp of even the most unique musicians, but Sleepytime seems to have easily crafted a new hallway within the annals of music itself. Fucked up and twisted, maybe – but also well thought out, I’m sure.

Three bands performed at the Bottom Lounge in Chicago: (an impressive bar/venue/restaurant that deserves its own review later) Cheer Accident, Dub Trio and Sleepytime Gorilla Museum. Cheer Accident was an innovative act featuring veterans of the progressive music scene and was certainly a pleasure to see perform (they’ve actually opened up for SGM before at the former Bottom Lounge location several years ago). Dub Trio was a younger band attempting to mix reggae roots with modern day rock. Though somewhat successful at mixing those genres together, Dub Trio mostly sounded like re-hashed, instrumental versions of songs you’ve already heard 20 or 30 times. These guys have a lot of potential, but would do well do pick a side of the argument – either tone down their sound and hire a singer, or develop crazier, more spiraling riff ideas to keep the listener on their toes.

When Sleepytime Gorilla Museum took the stage near the end of the night, the crowd was ready for them. All dressed in a sort-of “amusing gothic farmer” motif, they told stories of people on their deathbeds being harassed by sweaty, bald men and expounded in song on the Salamander and the Cockroach. It’s very surreal to see people waltzing to bone-crushing metal songs about small insects, but all rational thoughts should be thrown out before attending a Sleepytime show.

Attempting to make every concert a unique experience, SGM changes the entire theme of the show at almost every stop along the tour. Where one night they may be wearing ripped, white gowns and clawing at their eyes, the next they will be dressed as donkeys, pigs and other farm animals while a contortionist wanders around on stage bending limbs to the rhythm of their music. It would be impossible to accurately describe what Sleepytime Gorilla Museum sounds like except to say that you can find fans of bands ranging from King Crimson to The Beatles, to Lamb of God at one of their concerts. While the music is undeniably technically oriented most of the time, often the music itself will melt away while watching this intense group perform – revealing the musicians inherent goal here.. to make people think.

Every song vastly different in tone and mood, SGM relies on the strengths of their members: Matthias Bossi (drums, mallet, percussion, oration, voice), Nils Frykdahl (guitar, lead singer), Carla Kihlstedt (violinist, vocalist – trained at many conservatories of music and works as a session musician as well), Michael Mellender (percussion – plays mostly random metal objects like trash can lids and old restaurant equipment) and Dan Rathbun (bass, guitar, percussion, random instruments – created many of the off-the-wall and sometimes disturbing instruments that SGM uses both in the studio and in concert to complete their sound, such as the Viking Rowboat and the Sledgehammer Dulcimer).