This aptly titled last epic, Lost Time, perfectly defines and captures how great this band was and how truly ahead of their time it’s members were. For Minneapolis, a city fueled on such great music, both 12 Rods and Lost Time have gone down as some of its finest.
When musicians that I know gather, sit and talk about the greats, Ryan Olcott always comes up. It’s very hard to try and calculate how deep Olcott’s genius goes, when at the time, it felt as if the music 12 Rods was making was in fact from the future. There is the ‘Pop’ music that is defined by pay-to-play radio, and the corporate avenues of selling music as a commodity instead of culture. But then there is the ‘Pop’ music that seems handed down, majestically, true, whole and unifying. There’s little music and even fewer complete albums that live up to such ‘Pop’ majesty. Lost Time is one.
At the time of it’s release, 12 Rods was in its final form, which included Ryan Olcott and his brilliant brother/engineer/producer Ev Olcott, sought after bassist Bill Shaw, and one of the best living drummers in the world today, Dave King. Lost Time was 12 Rods fifth studio album but their first after being dropped from the deathly heights of mainstream music’s claws.
The band signed to V2 records in the late ’90s, poised to be the next big ‘Rock’ band. When you think back to 2002, the year Lost Time was released, or even two years prior when 12 Rods released its fourth studio album, the Todd Rungren-produced, V2-boched Separation Anxieties, you must consider the landscape of ‘Rock’ music, and the bands that populated MTV. For example, Lit was one of those hugely popular rock bands that wrote catchy songs about putting hearts in zip-lock bags and had a logo identical to Miller Lite with just the “e” taken off. Though, regardless of aesthetic choices, this goes to show the disparity between what 12 Rods actually was and what the industry wanted them to be. It’s not that they openly defied their calling. No, it’s just that the music was simply too advanced to be contained in the industry’s ‘Rock ‘n Roll’ zip-lock.
Lost Time is one my most listened to albums of all time. It’s one of the only records I know of that is so full of hooks, yet never feels recycled or fake; it’s just so fucking enjoyable from stem to stern. And now with its first ever vinyl pressing, I hope that this album can be as much a companion to you as it has for me. Solo listen, party listen, how can it be both? It just is.
With this reissue, it means that Lost Time won’t be lost at all – that great things always make their way through, it takes time.
– Justin Vernon
