The Big Story

Everyone needs a creation myth. Here’s ours…

IN THE BEGINNING.

Big Green’s story spans the eons, defying all notion of what is possible or even desirable in the realm of pop music mythology. It begins with an entirely insignificant pool of brownish muck somewhere in the southern hemisphere of the young earth.

For thousands of centuries…perhaps millions (but really more like thousands) the pool stagnated until it was stirred by the strong Miocene sun. More centuries passed. A countless number. Limestone began to form in the vicinity.

Hey…geologic time takes some patience. Are you still there? Okay…I’ll skip a bit, then.

GO WEST, YOUNG MAN.

Well, it seems that sometime around when the continents of Africa and South America were a stone’s throw apart, the more ambulatory elements of the pond’s murky contents decided to hop over to the western shore of the new Atlantic Ocean, then only a bit wider than an Olympic-sized swimming pool. The sun shone darkly above the ancient world for another meaningless stretch of centuries…until one day, the dull and haggard members of the group Big Green rose to the surface of the puddle and crawled out onto dry land for the first time.

The new world was full of dangers, and they were sore amazed…particularly by the rather statuesque stands of deciduous angiosperm, about which the primordial Matt aptly remarked, “Hmmm…Big green hair. Bark suits.” It was their towering moment.

NAT’RAL SELECTION.

Or it might have been, had these been more congenial times. But they were not. Anyone who’s done it can tell you: evolution is a nasty business. Sure, it’s okay for a hobby, but think hard before you try to make a living at it. The competition is brutal, for one thing. And if you happen to get stuck on a dead-end branch, well…don’t even ask.

At any rate, this immutable fact was beginning to dawn on our heroes sometime in the early Pleistocene. Let’s face it — in the race for survival, they were mere items on the concessions stand menu, competing with other snacks over who could appear the most vile and unappetizing to the ubiquitous allosaurs. That’s when John, Matt, and Joe decided to form Big Green. Frankly, it seemed the most practical decision at the time. A new wave of vertebrates was just hitting the charts. The Atlantic was nearly the size of Lake Michigan and well on its way to becoming a major record label. The time seemed right for a group that had its vestigial wing on the pulse of the epoch. And that group was Big Green.

PRIMITIVE, TOO.

Through the subsequent ages, the members of Big Green gradually developed not only their own style, but their own separate branch of evolutionary progression. This was not entirely a matter of design. Big Green’s geographic isolation on the now fully-detached South American landmass had a bit to do with it. As they gradually migrated north, their music collected influences from the developing civilizations they passed along the way. Odd rhythms, primitive themes, and oblique harmonies clung to them like lint to a forgotten Lifesaver. But little in these early experiences would prepare them for what was to come. A whole new era of transition would soon overtake them…one they would attempt to claim as their own.

LITTLE GREEN.

A bit later, during the Renaissance, Matt, Joe & John performed at a party thrown by Leonardo Da Vinci. The bash was attended by a few cardinals, two heretics, and a De Medici who tried to talk Leo into inventing the pizza. They got a lot of cheap advice, no dough, and little green painting of somebody’s sister, which they sold for 17 lire the next morning.

The experience had a dampening effect on the boys’ enthusiasm. Big Green was going nowhere, they felt. And Joe was an idiot for selling that painting! (Matt maintained it was the perfect size to cover the hole in his bedroom wall at their seedy sublet in Florence.) After three-quarters of a billion years, live performing was growing intolerable. It was plain to all that another phase of accelerated evolution was needed. Big Green sought to return to its murky roots, and develop beyond the need to tour incessantly.

AIN’T GOT NO BODY.

And so it was (sometime in early 1993) that Matt, Joe, and John abandoned their ponderous physical bodies and became the etheric pop dropouts they are today. It is in this manner that Big Green achieved its present status as the world’s original dis-corporate pop group. So prepare yourself for the ultimate out-of-body experience. Hey…it’s been a long time coming.