We're Late For Class - 2008 - Trippin' In A Plymouth Belvedere

Hi, everyone. My posts will be a bit sporatic as I just moved and my internet connection is a little dodgy right now. For now though, let me point you back in the direction of We're Late For Class, who have recently posted their latest opus. It's sort off a mini odds-and-sods collection, and is a nice primer to their particular brand of improvised psychedelia. Click on the link below to voyage onto their site and download the thing!


We're Late For Class - 2008 - Trippin' In A Plymouth Belvedere

Steve Reich - 2001 - Triple Quartet

Quality: 4.5 out of 5
Trip-O-Meter: 4.5 out of 5

Steve Reich is an acknowledged master of modern classical music and his music has no lack of class, but if repetition is not your thing, if repetition is not your thing, if repetition is not your thing, then he may not be your cup of tea. Or his magical music powers may lull you into a trance and convince you that you do love repetition, you do love repetition, you do love repetition. Don't knock it until you've tried it.

This isn't so much a fully conceived album as an anthology of works contemporary to its release. I suppose the main event is the titular suite performed by the renown Kronos Quartet. The varying string parts work quite well on their own in the Reich mold. It's a very different flavor than what they achieve when working with Philip Glass, but no less important. My favorite performance here, however, is the relentless "Electric Guitar Phase." The modus operandi of a phase is that several players of the same instrument repeat the same phrase over and over at slightly different speeds, so that the phase eventually disintigrates, oscillates, and recombines in a myriad of different ways (of course recording overdubs make this far easier). Here we get that for 15 minutes with an absurdly rockin' guitar. At least I see that as a good thing. Following that is the "Music For Large Ensemble,' which on this album by far most recalls Reich's seminal Music For 18 Musicians with its more fleshed out, orchestrated sound. Capping things off is the "Tokyo-Vermont Counterpoint;" basically the same idea as "Electric Guitar Phase" but with marimbas or something like that.

This is a fine release, and probably the best introduction to the sonic world of Reich other than the aforementioned Music For 18 Musicians. If you're a Reich fan already, this one is candy for your Halloween pumpkin, and if you're not familiar with Reich, your musical sensibility requires that you at least give him a try. Those of you that don't like Reich can go to hell (wait,no - that's way too harsh).

Buy Me:
Steve Reich - 2001 - Triple Quartet

Flying Karpets - 1968 - Flying Karpets

Quality: 2 out of 5
Trip-O-Meter: 3.5 out of 5

OK, lets start off here by being plain-out nasty. This is a pretty terrible album. The band can't play particularly well, the lead vocalist is even worse, and that puts the harmony vocals at some exponential kind of vile growth. On top of that, the band's songwriting chops are negligible as they are pretty much just working in terrible covers of stuff like "White Rabbit," "Twentieth Century Fox," and "Mercy Mercy Mercy" (that last one represents their trend to do even worse soul covers). Yet, I'm feeling charitable today.

You see, I just had a viewing of the timeless epic film, "Ghetto Freaks" (aka Love Commune, aka Sign of Aquarius). The film follows the blissed-out trials and travails of flower children weathering out a particularly frigid Ohio winter. Through their stoned apathy is a glimmer of productivity that results in a trickle of terrible art, you know, the kind of thing that all the earth mamas cheer for. I guess it's the only time all parties involved deliriously manage to get off the floor. So the Flying Karpets make me think of that kind of creation, except that they're from the significantly warmer Mexico. I'm really just giving these lovable stoners the equivalent of a cheek pinch as they do their best, which isn't nearly good enough. At least, I hope they were really, really stoned. Otherwise, there's absolutely no excuse for this.

If this kind of extroverted loathing sounds appealing, then this is indeed the album for you. But if you're goal is to hear adeptly-played artistic triumph then you might want to stay away from this one. I doubt this will see another proper reissue, so you could want this as a rarity (no you won't).

Damaged Tape - 2008 - Ship of Lights

I've been abusing my analog synthesizers as of late, and these are the results. Maybe I haven't been looking so much to the future as the late 1970's, but I'll let you be the judge of that. There's a pretty liberal sprinkling of Moog here, so if you have a soft spot for those sounds, then you might like what I've done here. You'll also hear a bit of the very groovy TB-303 recreation that Future Retro produces. I would definitely give that piece of equipment a thumbs-up for any of you electronic-minded musicians out there. With the first track, you'll get a sample of the incredible Criswell, whose amazing predictions have yet to become true. The rest of the first half of the album is sort of my attempt at Neptunian disco, while I give in to my strange obsessions with Mayan history on the second half. That concept is that from 'Boneyard' on, we hear the warriors and captives enter the city, and the king makes a bloodletting offering that takes his mind on a psychedelic trip to meet the gods and see the fabled ballgame at the core of Mayan mythology. Two tracks here, "Boneyard" and "Lords of Xilbalba" are about three years old. I really dig the tracks, I just never really had a proper home for them until now. It's not that there aren't more recent tracks, the older ones just edged them out. As always, please share the music, leave some comments for me here, and repost elsewhere. Thanks for listening!

Tracklisting:
1. A Push Button World (5:20)
2. Wet Candy (5:17)
3. Hot Dog Jets (8:03)
4. Tell Me Your Secret (5:01)
5. Boneyard (2:25)
6. Offering (3:50)
7. The Crystal Sphere (3:03)
8. Thin Air (6:15)
9. Lords of Xilbalba (4:24)
10. Hunahpu and Xbalanque (5:22)
Total Time: (48:55)
89.9 MB

Listen to Me:
Damaged Tape - 2008 - Ship of Lights

Creation Rebel - 1980 - Starship Africa

Quality: 4 out of 5
Trip-O-Meter: 4.5 out of 5

Dub is the wildly psychedelic offshoot of reggae that I have thus far pretty much ignored in my reviews. Of course if you're unfamiliar with the genre it wouldn't hurt to head for the better works of Lee 'Scratch' Perry or King Tubby. For now though we'll blast out of the Caribbean to find a pretty rare album from British dub producer Adrian Sherwood with his Creation Rebel project. Now, this band had several fine albums (some others of which we may eventually see here), but this is the one that got me hooked onto these guys and is a pretty wild trip into the reggae stratosphere.

Dub is synonymous with weird echoing sound and deformed proto-samples, but Starship Africa seems to take everything one additional step out there. As it should, the tracks rest on a rock solid rhythm, but all the audio effects and sounds drifting around here are fair game for an interstellar interpretation. The original album was arranged into two side-long groupings, Starship Africa and Space Moment. As far as the bedrock of the LP is concerned, most of the tracks are pretty similar. The layering of sounds on top of that is the main bit of creativity at work here, and it's some of the best I've heard in this sort of setting. Spaced-out alien voices, bubbling synths, and ringing percussion are combined and recombined in some pretty mind bending ways.

If you have yet to enter the world of dub, this isn't the worst introduction and this album serves as a fine litmus test for the genre. For anyone, you'll get to hear the best of a practically unheralded master of the form. If you have any love for dub, I think it's worth giving this a spin or three.

Subway - 1972 - Subway

Quality: 3.75 out of 5
Trip-O-Meter: 3.75 out of 5

Here's some French acid folk that just begs comparison with the Incredible String Band. Now, I have to admit that I've never really "got" the renowned ISB, so my comparison should probably come with a grain of salt. Technically, I suppose that this is inferior to the ISB at their best, but it's far less oblique and I have to admit that I enjoy it more. As the cover emphatically enjoins, Subway is a duo and their name apparently stems from their regular gig location. Fortunately for this somewhat downtrodden duo, they were signed to Epic Records, and this recording has some nice production values, although I would imagine that sales wise it must be somewhere in that companies bottom 10 sales list.

There's not a ton of diversity on this album, but the general tone is quite enjoyable. The crux of the music is very ISB-sounding vocals, finger picked guitar, psychedelic gypsy violin runs, and usually an interesting production trick or two per song. For example, "Warm You Are" gains some color from shimmering, phased cymbals and a knock or two on a bongo, while "Rosanna of the Roses," "Enturbulston-Free Form," and "All the Good Things" actually end up with a full rhythm section backing up the song and inch much closer to actually being psych rock. Philistine I am, those are my favorites on the disc. "Enturbulston-Free Form" is a freak out that almost seems to meld acid folk with some krautrock, while "Roasanna" comes across as a damn fine and rough-around-the-edges psych-pop number.

Although Subway borrows quite a bit, they've got a few chops that manage to get them to stand out. Those of you out there who consider yourself full-blow acid folk and/or freak folk fans need to hear this, while the rest of us should remain at least mildly entertained. The subtly tripped-out, minstrels-on-acid cover art doesn't hurt either.

The Aeolian String Ensemble - 1998 - Lassithi/Elysium

Quality: 4 out of 5

Trip-O-Meter: 4.75 out of 5

This is a disc that it's almost impossible to pay attention to, but that is among its prime advantages as a swirling whirlpool of ambient sound. The Aeolian String Ensemble is a group that portents to create all of their sound through the use and electronic modification of the ancient Aeolian harp. I suppose that through said electronic modification you can get anything you want, but I swear there are a few underpinning synths here and there, or perhaps we're hearing masterfully controlled wooden echoes from the wooden box of the instrument. Regardless, the star of the show is the harp and this album takes it to some strange and very meditative places.

There are only two tracks making up this release, and the title of the disc includes both of them. "Lassithi" runs at a mind-boggling 58 minutes, and I guess it would be the kind of thing you'd actually want to hear as you're chilling out at the spa (although I must admit that I have little experience with spas beyond the Japanese hot spring variety). The sound is slowly shifting, and is extremely fluid, with the listener just barely discerning the slow changes. I think that last statement is going to help define if you're going to be interested in this one or not. Next up is the brief (at 14 minutes!) "Elysium," which runs on the same basic modus operandi, but spews forth a much darker and clausterphobic sound. If the first track is intended for relaxation, "Elysium" is more for intense contemplation. I suppose that the mood shift is quite welcome after 58 minutes.

There are no melodies and little to grasp onto with the Aeolian String Quartet. What they do present is an ocean of tones that will influence the deeper parts of your brain. This is hard-core ambient music, if you will. I find this disc to be a perfect background setting and I hope that you may also find this useful in that regard.

Lucifer - 1971 - Black Mass

Quality: 4 out of 5

Trip-O-Meter: 4 out of 5

Lucifer is a psudonym for Mort Garson, the electronic madman behind freaky early electronic works such as "The Wozard of Iz." This purely instrumental album isn't quite as strange, but the wall of Moog synth that makes up the instrumentation is still something impressive to behold. It's chock full of that awesome analog clunky sound that so many musicians still strive for.

When I've strolled through Disneyland's Tomorrowland (at least the Tokyo version), they're usually setting the future-retro mood with stuff like the wacky pop interpretations of the Moog Cookbook. Some of this could fit in that mold, but with minor keys abound, the tracks here would probably serve better in the hellish variety of Disneyland; y'know, the one where Donald Duck is creeping behind you with a butcher's knife. That's pretty much where this disc is at.

Trackwise, there are a lot of goodies here. "Solomon's Ring" launches with a soaring yet creepy Moog melody, while "Incubus" dementedly contorts basic synthesizer sounds into a kind of electronic warning system. "The Evil Eye" almost gives us a soothing break, but let's keep in mind that it is quickly underpinned by electronic evil. Later on, we are presented with the sound lab of "Philosopher's Stone," while "ESP" closes the album with what sounds like an alien armada landing (maybe Garson was going for the opening of the gates of Hell).

While not necessarily the best of primitive electronic music, Lucifer does press most of the right buttons for those of us wanting to hear this sort of thing. It's trying to conjure the ghost in the machine using the darkest of magic, and for the most part it succeeds. You can merrily join along for this particular black mass.

Pierre Henry & Michel Colombier - 1968 - Les Yper Sound

Quality: 3.75 out of 5
Trip-O-Meter: 3.75 out of 5

This EP is an amusing concoction, lounging in the easy listening section of your soul but containing a pretty groovy blur of psychedelic synthesis to stir your mind. The "Psyche Rock" track will probably seem pretty familiar to you, even if you've never heard it. The theme song of the cartoon "Futurama" is a direct homage/rip-off of the track, depending on how you feel about the situation. The chord structure and rhythm are about the same, but we do get the jolly noises of early synthesis ripping through the track. Sounding even more psych-rock like than that titular track are the grooving "Jericho Jerk" and the full-thrust "Too Fortiche," in which an acid rock guitar battles with a sawtooth wave. You might also note that Stereolab nicked a song title from the title of this EP. This does make an impact as one of the more notable 'hipster' influences on that band's sound. There's a lot of droning noise here juxtaposed with dancin'-down-Carnaby Street sort of groove jazz. Take that for what it's worth. More reviews soon. Too many martinis right now. Mix the martinis with some psychedelic substance and you'll end up with this disc.

Homemade Lo-Fi Psych Compilations

I tend to shy aware from compilations, but this one deserves your psychedelic attention. Mike Floyd over at the Homemade Lo-fi Psych blog just got together another fine collection of tripped out sounds from an international constituent of musicians. In fact, there's a previously unreleased Glaze of Cathexis track there waiting for your ear. Give it a listen here:

Embryo Thoughts





If you dig it, check out the first volume (featuring a track from Damaged Tape's "Electric Ocean"), available here:

Relax and Float Downstream

Sun Ra - 1978 - Space Probe

Quality: 3.75 out of 5
Trip-O-Meter: 4.25 out of 5
(both 5's for the title track)

After all that talk about Sun Ra back in the Brother Ahh review, I feel like we need to take a look at some of Mr. Ra's music on its own terms. This album is not really one of his best, but as far as I know it's extraordinarily rare. I don't even know what the cover looks like for this one. That's part of the mystique, though. Although Sun Ra left for Saturn (i.e. died) almost 15 years ago, there's at least two or three of his recordings that are reissued every year, and most of them had absurdly low production runs on their original release, so they might as well be new. Space Probe is one that's still waiting to be properly unearthed.

The title track is by far the star of the show here. The 18-minute track features Sun Ra alone except for an arsenal of Minimoogs. If you're familiar with his 70's work, you will understand that this is a good thing. Ra coaxes sounds out of these machines that really do seem to plunge into the depths of interstellar space and sound positively ahead of its time even thirty years later. If you want to consider this track on its own, feel free to crank up both the quality and trip-o-meter ratings to a 5.

The other tracks here don't suck, but I'd rank them as a typical Sun Ra holding pattern. "Primitive" is a short percussive overture with a touch of clarinet bouncing off the walls. This leads into "The Conversion of J.P.," which is pretty much more of the same percussive template, except five times as long, and featuring some abstract, almost R&B sounding, acoustic piano playing from the Sun one.

This album is far from entry level Sun Ra. For that, I'd advise you to search for the still in print Space is the Place (Impulse) or maybe We Travel the Spaceways. Granted those two albums are already worlds apart in sound. However, if you've already been indoctrinated into Sun Ra's spaceship, you know that 18 minutes of Moog-ing Ra is an absolute necessity, and you'll need to hear this.

Bit 'A Sweet - 1968 - Hypnotic 1

Quality: 3.75 out of 5
Trip-O-Meter: 4 out of 5

Although saddled with a terrible name, Bit 'A Sweet turns out to be a fine psychedelic band. These guys get a gold star for psychedelic diversity, managing to stuff raga rock, straight up psych-pop, twee, bubblegum, and futurist Moog squiggles into a 40 minute album. I doubt you'll like everything here, but I find that the batting average is pretty high.


Really, it's difficult not to make this review simply a category of style, and I'm not going to try too hard to do otherwise. We'll get the negatives straight out of the way. The 'happy days toy town' vibe of "Monday-Tuesday" doesn't do it for me, nor does the watered-down Procol Harem organ soul of "A Second Time." Unfortunately, the latter goes on for 8:38 and typically convinces me to end the album early (it's the last track). The rest is much better. Bit 'A Sweet acknowledges the East in typical hippy-fied manner on the great opening raga rock of "Speak Softly," and the Indian-influenced folk rocker "Travel." Yeah, I know sitars are a cliche, but I still dig it when they show up anyway. "2086" is a gleefully stupid futurist track which builds stock with me through it's primitive Moog sounds and the pure mindless optimism of the lyrics (In 1983 we banished sad). The squiggly synth sounds also appear on the bubblegummy "Diamond Studded Eyes." "How Can I Make You See" is a decent enough rave up and the band even manages a worthwhile Beatles cover with "If I Needed Someone."


This should satisfy your hunger for psychedelic sound for at least a few days. The great thing here is that if you don't dig a track, just go to the next one and you'll get something completely different.

Brother Ahh - 1972 - Sound Awareness

Quality: 4 out of 5
Trip-O-Meter: 4.5 out of 5

This is a little more on the jazz side than what we typically see in the Garage, but it's definitely one of the more psychedelic offerings from that genre. Brother Ahh was an acolyte of the truly tripped-out Sun Ra (not tripped-out on any substances mind you, he was just gloriously nuts). Of course Sun Ra has no short supply of psychedelic obscurities, and we'll see a few of them here eventually. But before I get off on too much of a tangent, let's focus on the Brother in question. While this album probably doesn't touch the heights of Sun Ra's Arkestra at its best, Sound Awareness is far from a pale imitation.

The crux of this recording takes some of the percussive and echoing innovations from Sun Ra's best 60's albums such as Cosmic Tones For Mental Therapy and Atlantis, and finds a few new mis-en-scenes to place them into. We hear some very exotica-style female vocals on "Beyond Yourself," which expands to a full 90-member chorus for "Love Piece." I'd say that this recording shows an evolution into classical, ambient, and fusion styles that the laser-focused Sun Ra typically didn't mess with. The sound is more nebulous, but no less appealing. Also, while the Arkestra's percussion ensembles are nothing to sneeze at, Brother Ahh brings in the big guns here with Max Roach and some of his drummers appearing as guests. The spoken piece of "Love Piece" is a fine rant mixing black power and religious imagery before shifting to call-and-response new age philosophy on the power of love.

Overall, this worthwhile album provides us with a worthwhile different flavor of the innovations made by Sun Ra and his cohorts. Fortunately, the albums holds up very well on its own, but as a contrast tool with the sound of the Arkestra, Sound Awareness is educationally invaluable.

Boris with Michio Kurihara - 2006 - Rainbow

Quality: 4.5 out of 5
Trip-O-Meter: 4.5 out of 5

Boris is a top rate Japanese metal band with some pronounced noise rock, drone rock, and psychedelic flourishes. Michio Kurihara is the amazing, spaced-out guitarist from Japan's premier psych-proggers Ghost. Together, these two forces create some psychedelic nirvana. Boris gets the chance to aim their wall-of-noise at some top flight songs and cathedrals of sound while Kurihara-san end up with some musicians that promote the best out of his infinitely oscillating torrents of guitar noise without feeling the need to jam pedantically.

"Rafflesia" starts things out extremely strong with almost pained vocals placed upon a stately rhythm while Kurihara slowly but surely launches the song into orbit far above the outer reaches of your mind. "Starship Narrator" brings in the noise and ends up hitting right on an acid-rock sweet spot. Nevermind that the lyrics are all in Japanese. The understanding and appreciation of this music resides between the lines. Soon the album floats through the lattice of clouds that must be near the titular rainbow before slamming into the full-scale powerhouse "Sweet #1." Finally, we get the music box-esque lullaby of "..And I Want" to send us off calmly.

As far as neo-psych goes, this is some of the best we've gotten this decade. I caught the band with Michio Kurihara in tow a few weeks ago in Atlanta, and their stage show is not to be missed. As good as this, and some of the choicer other Boris albums are, the live rendition is a true narcotic. Still, Rainbow will get you most of the way there and it doesn't fail to shine with the light of true psychedelic creativity.

Buy Me:
Boris with Michio Kurihara - 2006 - Rainbow

Ghost - 2004 - Hypnotic Underworld

Quality: 3.75 out of 5
Trip-O-Meter: 4.25 out of 5

Not to be confused with the late 60's psychedelic obscurity of the same name, Ghost is part of Japan's psychedelic underground. Let me be straight with you. I lived in Japan for three years and found a good 90% of Japanese pop to be derivative crap. The upswing of this is that those who actually want to rebel do so extravagantly, and end up with some pretty wildly extreme music. Ghost does so with a quiet concentration for the most part, but the end result shows them to be pros at the sonic warping of reality.

This LP, which is among their best, splits not so evenly into two parts. The first, superior part is the four part title track. Starting with subtle percussion and delayed horns, the music really seems to take the plunge into the underworld, building up with intensity. "Escape and Lost Down in Medina" ups the voltage with relentlessly crescendoing drums and a repetitive plunk of the piano keys. Finally we reach bottom with the distorting guitars and choral vocals of "Aramaic Barbarous Dawn. It's a fine psych rocker that more than earns its keep.

The second part of the album is a lot more conventional, and is a touch disappointing to me. It still stocks up plenty of creativity, even if it lacks the white hot focus of the "Hypnotic Underground" suite. "Hazy Paradise" lives up to its name while "Piper" starts of drinking Japanese tea with Donovan (not a guest appearance) before making a fly-by a little closer to jam band territory without quite succumbing to that sound. The ten minute "Ganagmanag" lands right smack in the middle of jam band land, which they do as tastefully as possible, but for me is still quite a comedown from the better parts of the album. Those tendencies do tend to slightly mar the second half of the album in general, even though the root songwriting and performances remain generally strong.

Although cursed with a need to stretch things out a touch longer than necessary, Ghost's high points on Hypnotic Underground are worth the trouble. The musicianship creates a sonic tapestry where no one musician ends up as the star of the show, but instead shows us a united front of psychedelic weirdos. Some of the music here is the best psychedelia that modern Japan has to offer.

Buy Me:
Ghost - 2004 - Hypnotic Underworld