OM AH RA PA TSA NA DHIH

OM! O you glorious Manjushri, you who possess the Eye of Transcendent Wisdom, you who see past, present and future without limit, please hear me!

Psychedelic Sangha’s Bardo Bath: Deep Dive was a night of immense spiritual and musical highs, and possibly the organization’s most defining and ambitious event yet.

With six distinct sets that all bled into one another, plus a constant backing of ambient sounds and other sonic wizardry from Jesse Jarnow and Scott Williams (billed as ‘dis-organizers’), we were treated to five uninterrupted hours of continuous music. This event was intended to be a full, complete trip, but it became a total tune up to recharge our spirits and our minds.

I began my evening by paying a visit to Louise Mittelman’s booth for a tarot reading. Mittelman was one of several astrologists stationed at the vendor tables that lined the entrance of the grand Weylin building, and they all seemed right at home amongst the other esoteric pop-up shops. My reading happened to be extremely illuminating, so it set a mystical and optimistic tone for the event, opening my mind even further to new and exciting opportunities.

As I received my reading, curious laidback folks in tie-dye, silk shirts and yes, even just regular jeans and t-shirts filtered in around me with awe in their eyes, yoga mats and blankets under their arms and adventure in their hearts. The audience packed the great round hall and camped out on the cold marble floor in all directions as per usual.

The audience came prepared for a long haul. Each person had their own little home base carved out on the floor filled with everything from snacks and pillows to burning incense sticks and art supplies. Everyone got cozy with their neighbors, and all looked quite comfortable and talkative.

Some people chilled the whole night while laying out on their foam mats, while others got up and grooved to the music or took up various forms of meditation and yoga. Regardless of what they got up to during those five hours, they all appeared to be in a very good, blissed-out place. The world outside might have been full of strife and madness, but inside Brooklyn’s Weylin building, everything was just copacetic.

The Bardo Bath began with a guided meditation by organizer and Psychedelic Sangha co-founder, Doc Kelley, spoken over an aural tapestry woven by Jarnow, Williams and vibraphonist Chris Dingman. This gave way to the first set of music, which featured Dingman playing with just his mallets and a cello bow, as the always jaw-dropping kaleidoscopic light show by Macrodose began to manifest overhead. The vibraphone’s dreamy, soft tones rippled around us in a full 360º pattern, proving to be the best launching pad for drifting out of your body.

After baptizing the Deep Dive with his superbly healing vibes (sorry) for a full set, Garcia Peoples gradually joined Dingman on stage, and jammed along with him one band member at a time. GP never sounded so serene as they shifted into a more interstellar Popol Vuh mode.

Garcia Peoples

Eventually, the Peoples took control and Dingman left the stage, officially marking the start of set two. The band slowly built up their sound into a racing galactic charge that damn near levitated the whole building. Their astral free-form rock came at us in a rushing river of ecstatic sound that made you feel like you were crashing headfirst through the doors of perception and straight on into an elevated state of being. Barely two hours in, and we were already hitting euphoric peaks.

Meanwhile, scribbly lines, vague shapes and what looked like shamanistic cave paintings formed slowly on the ceiling above us. Near the stage, artist Arik Moonhawk Roper sat in a regal green armchair strewn with chrysanthemum garlands. He was drawing on a screen that was connected to a projector that shot his drawings onto the curves of the great rotunda in real time. If you were unaware of Roper’s presence, you’d swear you were tripping (or tripping harder than expected).

Arik Moonhawk Roper

After some time, a sweeping twangy cry of pedal steel swooped in from behind us. J.R. Bohannon and Ryley Walker coasted into set three from across the hall, as GP eased their own set to a close.

Bohannon’s steely undulations of liquid sunshine took over the whole space, sliding from a quiet reverberating whimper to a slick roar. Walker sat next to him, first adding angular guitar weirdness and agitated textures, then later progressing into some Sir Richard Bishop-meets-Sandy Bull-like meditations.

The pair’s set would eventually end up in rather discordant and exhilarating zones, making way for Kendra Amalie’s contemplative gothic organ drones at the front stage.

Kendra Amalie

All cloaked in shadow and dark blue light, Amalie laid out dreamy electro pulsations and looping samples, while sonic misfits, Williams and Jarnow, added their own sounds and audio tweaks from across the room. This served as the soundtrack to a guided breathing meditation, which was very much needed, as some of us definitely needed to catch our breath after the previous two sets.

From here, Amalie and the dis-organizers continued to churn out a beautifully ruminative soundscape that featured plenty of button pushing and knob twisting. With pitches shifting and cycling samples of voices, chants and other sounds wobbling and bending at will, this was indeed the most surreal and introspective set of the night.

Once again, after a while, Garcia Peoples trickled into the jam. Once the full band had completely returned to the stage behind Amalie, they together submerged the building into a hovering sea of celestial rock.

After GP and Amalie jettisoned us back into space, Bohannon’s pedal steel dove in for a sneak attack from the rear side of the dome.

Amalie then appeared next to Bohannon and plugged in a floppy, down-tuned guitar, and then things became very interesting.

The two teams of musicians faced off from across the huge marble temple, interweaving around each other entirely by ear. This feat was impressive all on its own, but it was especially thrilling to hear these artists stretch out and explore all of the many different directions and possibilities that existed within this unique assemblage of sounds.

We were floating deep into the weeds of the cosmos as the impromptu jam roared us back into our bodies, inspiring many people in the audience to leap up off their yoga mats and dance their hearts out.

The combined disparate sounds all twisted up into a singular harmonious cyclone of mind-blowing cosmic music that spun wildly across the space, striking each person with awe and excitement. Meanwhile, the dis-organizer’s sounds still filtered through the great jam, sounding like auditory flashbacks booming out from the speakers.

Then, Dingman hopped back into the fray and brought some peaceful tones to the mix. After the ferocious energy began to die down, the other musicians slowly bowed out of the jam until we were back to hearing just the tranquil bell-like sounds of his echoing vibraphone and the ever present backing of ambient soundscapes. 

Doc Kelley

We were back to where we started the evening, but in a lighter state. Kelley then closed the night out with a final meditation, centering us all. The energy of the room had shifted to an elated joy over the last five hours. The feeling I had and saw in all of the faces around me was almost childlike in its refreshed purity. 

Smiles packed the hall and filed back through the front door, and out into the damp June night air, spreading jubilation and peace in every direction. Namaste.

Were you there? Drop your memories down in the comments.

Big thanks to Psychedelic Sangha for inviting us out to the Bardo Bath. Please be sure to follow them on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

I’d like to also give a big thank you to Christopher Bruno for taking such incredible shots for this post. Please check out his other work!

Please also follow Chris Dingman, Garcia Peoples, J.R. Bohannon, Ryley Walker and Kendra Amalie, and be sure to support them by buying their music on Bandcamp.