Ambient, spacey music first came to my attention when WABE used to play New Age stuff on Sunday nights. I liked it, but I wasn't sure what CD's to buy, and...would I lose my rock credentials listening to that stuff?

Then one night about a decade ago I was getting out of my car at 2 a.m. when Album 88 started playing something that nailed me to my seat. I ran inside and called the DJ to ask who that was. Cyrus Rego was the answer.

Thanks to the "customers who bought this" links on Amazon I found out Cyrus Rego was a side project of a Austin, Texas band called Stars Of the Lid. Reading about Stars of the Lid taught me about a tiny, nearly invisible universe of similar bands on a Austin label called Kranky. These bands practiced a genre called "ambient" or "drone" that was pioneered by the European group Tangerine Dream back in the `70's. I ordered Stars Of the Lid's debut CD, Gravitational Pull vs. the Desire for an Aquatic Life, along with the Cyrus Rego. Those discs together with incense created the perfect ambience for all the jam band articles I wrote in the early 2000's.

So Saturday night a couple of months ago I was tuned into Austin City Limits not expecting much, as has become rational when turning on ACL. Gone are the guests like Willie Nelson and Omar & the Howlers; instead we get the latest college rock dreck. However in a replay of the Death Cab for Cutie appearance, a quartet of upstarts I'd never heard of called Explosions in the Sky brought me erect in my chair.

Explosions in the Sky is also from Austin. Their music is sort of a cross between Stars Of the Lid and something more mainstream like Interpol or very early U2. There are no vocals whatsoever, as their goal seems to be to bring a symphonic approach to rock n' roll, moving from gentle, repetitive triplets to crushing mountains of distortion and back again.

A poster for a upcoming show at the Variety Playhouse caught my eye at a local music store, but by the time I checked the site the night show was sold out. But good news -- a matinée had been added! I grabbed tickets for Scott and I and waited to find out how this style of music came across in a concert hall.

When I arrived an hour before showtime there were only about 50 people in the Variety. That quickly changed, and soon every seat was filled and people were even filling the aisles. Would the fire marshal have approved? It became clear to me that while others have done this style before (most notably Mogwai), what is striking about Explosions in the Sky is that they are popularizing it like no one could have imagined.

They had an opening act, Eluvium, who played all by himself. He picked up a microphone and started whistling like a bird. I thought, "Is this the guy from the Police Academy movies showing us his bird calls?" But then he looped it, and then picked up a guitar and started doing volume swells over the bird sounds, then I think he picked up a bass and added some notes, then sang and harmonized with himself. This all went on over 30 minutes. I couldn't believe the audience was actually quiet and attentive. A few idiots shouted out, but for the most part the crowd really paid attention like they were at the symphony.

Then Explosions in the Sky came out. Atlanta's #1 musical gadfly Rob Turner was there and summed it up well: "It's the intelligent side of the druggie culture. The Phish shit is over, the Dead shit is way over, so this is the new thing that the kids have found." He also said he'd just seen them on Austin City Limits like I did and was blown away.

More than anything I couldn't believe how they packed the place. I mean, entirely instrumental music filling the Variety Playhouse TWICE?! It's not stuff you dance to; there are no choruses; there's no shredding. You can get a mass audience into that? Apparently so, because they're touring the world. A recent opening slot with the Smashing Pumpkins must've helped tremendously, as well as the ACL appearance.

But what's the need for so many words from me, when you can hear them right here?