Friday Film and Music – Spies of the Accidental Sea
I finally got around to watching this short film (via Ransom Riggs over at Mental Floss) on the Salton Sea. Fittingly, the web page had been lost in a sea of browser tabs for months; have I mentioned that I have a never-ending tabbed browsing problem? Anyway, I first heard about the Salton Sea in a song back in the ’90s (I’ll come back to that), but, before watching this film, I knew nothing of the fascinating story behind this ‘accidental sea’ in the California desert. I’ll let the brief, compelling film tell the story (there’s also a photo essay here if you’re interested).
The Salton Sea ©trryan 2009
Watching the film, I was promptly reminding of the aforementioned song by the band The Prayer Chain, from their 1995 album Mercury. The song is ‘Sky High’, a 9 minute sprawling anthem, reminiscent of The Verve or Siamese Dream-era Smashing Pumpkins. The direct lyrical references to the Salton Sea (‘take a breath by the Salton Sea’) and mention of ‘Salton Spies’ speaking of ‘rolling skies’ always put in my mind a majestic and spiritual place – an actual oasis in the desert of sorts.
Here comes the rust indeed
But I never would’ve guessed that would-be oasis has long been a toxic sea surrounded by ghost towns and abandoned tourist attractions. But of course, the repeated line in the song, ‘here comes the rust’, might have served as a little clue.
