Electrick Sages - 2021 - Cave at the End

I may not get out the psychedelic reviews these days, but I do try and pump out those sounds.  Seven sages, seven stones, seventh album here.  You'll get aural references to Bowie, Gang of Four, and weird krautrock, and we've got a crack drummer in tow for this one.  He and I used to punk rock it out in the 90's.  Have a listen for free and throw a tip this way if it's warranted.  I make this stuff because I simply must - I'd otherwise go absolutely unhinged.

https://rovingsagemedia.bandcamp.com/album/cave-at-the-end

If you would like to hear the Doc speak from week to week, I do it about sci-fi films, podcast style, these days.  Get into that here:

https://mlsfs.transistor.fm/

Electrick Sages - 2020 - Party Season of the Sun

Your very own universe becomes Technicolour as time, fear, and Samsara fade away.  Dig our trip, playing away in this weird pocket of Japan that remains Shinshu - "the Pure Land."  We're reverberating off the vibrations of Joy Division, Can, Underworld, the Pink Floyd, and trying to translate Lenin into Lennon, and vice versa.  Bach too - Matt had a cello practically forced back into his hands in 2019 after 11 years of not touching one, and decided the only thing to do was to become obsessed with it.

Electrick Sages - 2019 - Aterui (Lord of the Bad Road)

Ending out the year with a slice of the Electrick Sages.  Aterui was an aboriginal chief in northern Japan who stood his ground against the encroaching rose of "civilization."  It's got a good thought or two to thunk about.  We're doing our art rock think, with notable sprinkings of Philly Soul, electronica, and a whole new bass rumble with a recently acquired copy of the Bass of Doom (think Jaco Pastorius)  Have a listen and support us a bit at Bandcamp if you're feeling that holiday spirit:



Meanwhile, we're dropping f-bombs with the ultimate boy band, Psychedelically Violent.  This is all of my raging Id, and it seems to have funneled down into my own personal Ween album.  For this one, listen if you dare:

Electrick Sages - "Heat and Light" Video

 
Our last album's picking up some momentum.  Why not this one as well?  Experience our HEAT, and our LIGHT with this video.  Then light a candle and stare into it for an hour.

Electrick Sages - The "Unknown" Reality Video

While I don't review much these day, people seem to dig it when I follow my own musical tangents.  I've got a new iPad and dove headfirst into doing the video creation myself.  So do have a look at my psychedelic dive though the energy vibrations of some temples in Japan.  It sort of doubles as my book review for Jane Roberts' book, The "Unknown" Reality, which you should have a read into.



And get into the full album here.  I can be a free-for-all, but if you want to contribute to the cause, even that single dollar brings a smile to my starving artist heart.

Electrick Sages - 2018 - Weapons of Mass Instruction

Cranking out some sounds from the Garage:

Putin's got his missiles and we have a different sort of sonic weapon to unleash today. Dig into these twelve tracks of warped psychedelic chrome and plastic soul concocted deep in the mountains of central Japan.

As the world's getting weirder, many more of us are seeing the dream for what it is.  Break on through the illusions on this cosmic exploration of dimensional jumps, colonization, those pesky conspiracies, and inner lights.

Head on over to Bandcamp to induce the engroovied vibes.  While we do dig your support, the price is whatever.



Or head to this link.  If you are into it, maybe have a re-visit at the Bandcamp, where we added on some videos to the package:

Electrick Sages - 2018 - Weapons of Mass Instruction

Electrick Sages - Telepathine Video

We're always busy making music here at the garage, and here's a fun sized bit to gnaw on.  My eight-year-old daughter always want me to play Prince in the car, and working with Curtis Mayfield's keyboardist a few months ago had me binging on Curtis.  Pour in some 8-bit psychedelia, throw in a dash of mystical politics, and you've got "Telepathine."  The album, now titled "Weapons of Mass Instruction," is due to drop on March 2nd.

Glaze of Cathexis - 2018 - Grooviest Glaze (2012 - 2016)

For better or for worse, the delirious psychedelic rocking of the Glaze of Cathexis is now in our past while we continue as the plastic soul weirdos of the Electrick Sages.  These are the tunes that folks played the most as we were "glazing" and bowing at the shines of Sonic Youth, My Bloody Valentine, and Husker Du while thinking about John Lennon and R.E.M.    The results skew a bit towards the live-wire noise rock edge of the band, but head on over to the albums at http://glazeofcathexis.bandcamp.com if you need some more baladeering and ambient instrumentals.  This release does give you a full glance at our DNA, though.  The band ran for ten years, so this is the second half of the journey.  We'll hit up some of the preliminaries at another time.  "High Desert Prophecies" video is included with this download.

Electrick Sages - 2018 - The Cowboy of Free Market Capitalism

Where have I been?  Listening to crateloads of funk, soul, and electric jazz.  My daughter only accepts Prince playing in the car.  So here we are - joined by Buzz Amato - a keyboard extraordinaire who played with and was musical director for Curtis Mayfield's band in the late 80's, and who has also played with groovy acts like Slave and The Three Degrees.  We've got his services on a vintage Fender Rhodes electric keyboard and Hammond organ sending the title tune into the absolute stratosphere.

"Voyage of the Celeste" is an electronic journey through digital nodes taking you to the words of our Roving Sage, Australian mystic Scott Atkinson on "Cloudland Cloudscape Vast."  Then, if you're missing the psychedelic rock tones of the Glaze of Cathexis, your desires shall be satisfied on "Cosmologic Medicine."  It was never an outtake - it just took me forever to get the guitar and vocals right, but now they are.

We're here to send Atlantean vibrational tones through your skull as we all reach for immaculate tomorrows.  Deep dive with us here as we explore the subconscious infinite with this EP and video.  Our plastic soul LP will drop down to you on February 13th.

Burn Down the Golden Idol (2016)

Gonna serialize our next project a bit.  The Glaze of Cathexis has peered beyond the curtain of reality and we are ready to report our findings.  Are we enlightened enough to do this properly?  Probably not.  Are we talented enough to pull this off?  We hope so, but you can been the judge of that.  We have glimpsed at the magick that stands through the textured vail.  We may not understand it, but wish to hold a musical communion with you to consider it.  Burn down the Golden Idol.

Meridians : A Short Film by Scott Atkinson and Matt Comegys

The only way to hear the music we really want to hear is to make it ourselves.  And the only way to see the (art) films we really want to see is to make them ourselves.  We made this for ourselves, but maybe you'll dig it a little too.

Astral Soothsayer : A Film by Scott Atkinson and Matt Comegys

As you could see on a few recent posts, we’ve been busy cooking up a more multimedia angle for our homegrown psychedelic excursion.  This is a journey of the passage between the conscious and unconscious hovering over a multicoloured lava flow of electronic sound.  We’re not throwing a band name on it – it’s simply a film called Astral Soothsayer.  That said, Glaze fans may find the quickest connection with “Offering to the Water God.”  If you’ve got 19 minutes to spare, groove to the whole thing:

And here are some links to dig them one at a time:

Endless Cosmic Rope Revolving:

https://youtu.be/roRNvgLXJgA

Protostar:

https://youtu.be/IIzTEH8wDKA

Blueshifter:

https://youtu.be/kUmljgpHlpc

Offering to the Water God

https://youtu.be/UwLgTPbnSAY

The Cenote Pilgrimage Acolyte

https://youtu.be/OWYz0pWjgcY

We’re not abandoning the musical angle, so if you like it, support us a bit with the soundtrack here:

Merry Christmas and a groovy New Year.  We’re gonna take you on a trip.

Dr. Schluss' Best of 2011

I never got around to publishing my best of last year, but I've heard a pretty wide abundance of tunes this year and feel like I need to take a crack at it. For whatever reason, I've gravitated towards dreamy, ambient sounds even more than usual this year, so you'll hear a fair amount of that wafting around on these tracks. Anyway, here's the rundown for you:

10. Tom Waits - Bad as Me: The Man doesn't do anything new here. but it's a perfect iteration of his bone-clanging, skid row poet vibe.

9. Jonas Reinhardt - Music for the Tactile Dome: I definitely dig Reinhardt's Berlin school vibes vibrating through this release. Will zone you out for the most part but wake you up every now and again as well.

8. Yuck - Yuck: This UK band sounds like Kevin Shields fronting Dinosaur Jr., or My Bloody Valentine covering Dinosaur Jr.'s tunes. It doesn't really matter as we've got the modern shoegazer stance perfected on this disc.

7. Dementia and Hope Trails - Parts of the Sea: Although not quite Manuel Gottsching at his best, this ambient freakfest has had my undivided attention for the past few months.

6. Paul Simon - So Beautiful or So What: Melding his sonic experiments of the past 30 years with the best of his 70's songwriting, Simon manages a classic album pretty late in the game. Dylan's the only other who could pull this off, but Simon's got the added draw that his voice isn't shot.

5. Atlas Sound - Parallax: Bradford Cox keeps pulling direct punches with his solo prokect and his main gig, Deerhunter. He's got it down to a science now, and Parallax continues to perfect his dream-rock sound.

4. Mohave Triangles - Eternal Light of the Desert Plateau: This is the grooviest ambient music I;ve heard this year. Although we'll always reserve a spot at the table for Philip Glass, this takes the yearly cup for a sonic Koyaniisqatsi.

3. Real Estate - Days: The best straight-up rock I heard this year walks a fine tightrope between early R.E.M. and Joy Division with some great songwriting keeping the balance.

2. Fleet Foxes - Helplessness Blues: I didn't buy into the hype on their first album, but the Simon & Garfunkel and Crosby, Stills, and Nash grooves shine through this disc. This mayvery well be your hillbilly Smile.

1. Panda Bear - Tomboy: Keeping Brian Wilson in mind, I'll be damned if anyone else manages to better fill the vocal space of that man in his 1966 prime than Panda Bear. Although the computerized trippiness of his last solo album is largely missing here, the stellar songwriting and insular production more than makes up for it.

Here's a sampler of some of the sounds that I've been talking about. You find the full releases of Dementia and Hope Trails and Mohave Triangles elsewhere on this site. As usual, I threw in a few previews of my new Glaze of Cathexis and Damaged Tape projects, not because I think my music is the best, just because it seems like a good excuse to run them by your ear.

1. Tom Waits - Raised Right Men

2. Panda Bear - You Can Count on Me

3. Jonas Reinhardt - To Lord Eminence

4. Atlas Sound - Te Amo

5. Glaze of Cathexis - Dream's Visions

6. Mohave Triangles - Eternal Light (edit)

7. Paul Simon - Getting Ready for Christmas Day

8. Fleet Foxes - Lorelai

9. Damaged Tape - Melted Into Angel Form

10. Real Estate - Kinder Blumen

11. Yuck - Holing Out

12. Dementia and Hope Trails - It Rung in My Ears and Still Does

Listen to Me:

Dr. Schluss' Best of 2011

Dr. Schluss - 2011 - Reprograms Your Mind

This is the music that I tend to listen to while hanging around on my balcony, waiting for inspiration. Quite a bit of it is sort of ambient and drone filled, but it's the kind of stuff that I really dig. I often hang around listening to the sounds around me and looking for glimmers of light while listening to this stuff, predicting the chance that a train will soon pass by. I don't live quite as close to the train tracks as Elwood Blues, but I'm plenty close. Since I'm lazy, I never got around to making a compilation of my favorite albums from 2010, but if you read into this tracklist, you'll get a good idea about what I got into. For the record, Tame Impala's "Innerspeaker" was my number one album last year. There's plenty of other tunes milling about here as well - most of it can qualify as psychedelic, but I've got to give space for musical dieties like Charlie Parker as well. Give it a listen - I hope you'll find it as groovy as I do.

Track List:
1. Desire Be Desire Go - Tame Impala
2. Double Helix - Emeralds
3. Divergent Paths - Panabrite
4. One With the Sun - Santana
5. In Motion - Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross
6. Please Take - Wire
7. Counting Sevens - White Hills
8. Synesthesia - The Electric Flag
9. Fireflies on the Water - Arp
10. Wasting Time - This Love is Deadly
11. Same Dream China - Gold Panda
12. Bongo Bop - Charlie Parker
13. The Game Has Changed - Daft Punk
14. Chariot of the God - Deodato
15. We Got the System to Fight the System - Maserati
16. Alice et Simon - Sonic Youth
17. Sun Demon - Stereolab

Dr. Schluss' Best of 2009

Sorry for the long absence from posting. It may be a day late and a dollar short, but here are my top ten albums of 2009. There were certainly some tripped out albums appearing this year, with many bands looking to the dark side of psych and sporting a tripped-out buzz. As I did last year, I stuck a few of my own tracks on (Damaged Tape and Glaze of Cathexis) at the end of this compilation, although I wouldn't have the presumption to actually consider them the best of the year. Anyway, here goes the list:

10. Neon Indian - Psychic Chasms: This promising debut sounds like a tape of top forty radio circa 1986 that has been left out in the sun on a summer's day far too long. Although it is annoyingly short, the key tracks are some of the best warped pop songs that reared their musical heads in 2009.

9. Super Furry Animals - Dark Days/Light Years: After a few albums that left me lukewarm, this psychedelic welsh institution managed to deliver another winner. Although "Crazy Naked Girls" is a poor opening track which pays tribute to Grand Funk Railroad for some reason, "Cardiff in the Sun" may be my favorite track this year and "The Very Best of Neil Diamond" will not gt out of my head.

8. Sonic Youth - The Eternal: The band was finally reunited with their long-lost guitars (apparently they were stolen more than 10 years ago) and managed an album that is practically a guide to their musical DNA. If I had to get super specific, I'd say the basic flow of this album is a "Goo" sound with "Dirty" songwriting. The band may be comprised of folks around 50 years old, but their playing is still very youthful.

7. Prefuse 73 - Everything She Touched Turned Ampexian: The ultimate short attention span record. Prefuse 73 continues to make compelling sound sculptures with lots of samples and wild electronic sound. Compared with previous Prefuse 73 albums, there isn't as much hip-hop stuff present, but I think the current paradigm is better for zoning out.

6. Tortoise - Beacons of Ancestorship: Tortoise continues to stand out at the vanguard of the 'post-rock' heap, whatever that means. Although the album eventually evens out into some enjoyable and quintessential Tortoise jazzy grooves, the album is at its best with the innovative first half where the band finds new ways to electronically mangle their music.

5. Thee Oh Sees - Help!: Fun, scrappy, sort of lo-fi Nuggets style rock. The playing and the songwriting are both spirited enough to put this one a cut above the rest of the garage rock heap.



4. Oneida - Rated O: Practically unclassifiable triple album opus. I sort of feel like this is a modern sort of 'Tago Mago' by Can. There's a disc of experimental insanity, a more conventional indie rock one and the middle, and a fine drone-rock album closing out the set. This is one of those records that you can move into for a few weeks.

3. Atlas Sound - Logos: Bradford Cox continues to hit them out of the park both with Deerhunter and with this solo project. The psychedelic grooves of his dreamlike work tend to grab hold of your brain and not let go.


2. Animal Collective - Merriweather Post Pavillion: The folk/psych gurus released their best LP this year and managed to accrue all the acclaim they deserve (and probably a little more). Panda Bear's vocals continue to be a perfect channeling of 1966 Brian Wilson and Avey Tare's singing is far smoother than usual. These fine vocal would be nothing, however, without the awesome soundscapes and hypnotic songwriting that these guys have worked up to perfection on this disc.

1. The Flaming Lips - Embryonic: Just when everyone had pretty much written off the Flaming Lips to 'dad' band status, they show up with their most out there album of the past twenty years. This is mostly dark, trance-inducing psych that brings in some of the best of both kraut-rock and fusion-era Miles Davis. Not everything here is great, but like the best double albums, it's always interesting. For some extra fun, download their cover of the entire Dark Side of the Moon (also released last year), where they manage to top pretty much every song from the original. Granted, I've probably heard the original 762 too many times due to radio overplaying the damn thing.

Listen to Me:
Dr. Schluss' Best of 2009

Dr. Schluss' Groovy Mix Tape, Vol. 1

While most of this probably falls under the psychedelic umbrella, there are a few deviations. You'll find some of these albums in the psychedelic garage, but we've also got stuff like a little 70's jazz-funk lurking about, along with a touch of rawk. There's also a fewer newer releases represented here which are too recent for me to feel ok posting the entire album. I made this little compilation to illustrate to Scott, the other fellow involved with Damaged Tape and Glaze of Cathexis, where my musical headspace is currently residing. This is the kind of stuff that I end up playing everyday. It's certainly influenced the new Glaze of Cathexis album (which will be posted in the next few days) and a few even more recent recordings. Hopefully you'll dig at least some of the music that's been catching my ear.


1. Agoraphobia - Deerhunter
2. Rainbow - Thee Oh Sees
3. Half Up Front - Prefuse 73
4. For Our Elegant Caste - Of Montreal
5. Spirit Molecule - Zoroaster
6. ZAP!...That's Witchcraft - Michael Flower
7. Heeding the Call - Bear McCreary
8. Mind Gardens (mono) - The Byrds
9. You Make Me Feel So Good - Bobbi Humphrey
10. Title Music From A Clockwork Orange - Wendy Carlos
11. Motorbike - Wooden Shjips
12. Cardiff in the Sun - Super Furry Animals
13. Wrathchild - Iron Maiden
14. Flower Sun Rain (Japan version) - Boris
15. Zauberburg 5 - Gas
16. It Feels So Good - Grover Washington, Jr.
17. Hold a Desert, Feel Its Hand - Grouper
18. Do You Close Your Eyes? - Rainbow
19. Illusions Disappear - Glaze of Cathexis

Listen to Me:
Dr. Schluss' Groovy Mix Tape, Vol. 1

Dr. Schluss' Best of 2008

Here are my top ten albums for 2008. Pretty much all of them have at least some kind of psychedelic flourish, but I do run a psychedelic blog. With all the older music I review on this sight, I think it's important to keep in mind all the great music that's being released in the present. I've included a few of my own recent compositions, too. It's not that I think they're the best of the year as I do with the other tracks, it's just my shameless ploy to get more listeners.


Here's a rundown (in order) of my favorites from 2008:


10. Alegranza by El Guincho - With the electronic freak-folk of Panda Bear's already classic "Person Pitch" as a starting point, El Guincho turns psychedelic atmospherics into a wild, percussive party in the pulsing heart of Barcelona.




9. Real Emotional Trash by Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks - Malkmus seems to be comfortably settling into some kind of indie jam band mode. I'm not typically one for jam bands, but his songwriting is top-notch and I have to admit that I prefer this to Malkmus' former band, Pavement.



8. Smile by Boris - Boris continues to be the best current metal band out there, and the psychedelic accents, especially on the tracks with Ghost's guitarist Michio Kurihara, really make this the thinking man's metallic noise. While this album is exceptional, it still doesn't compare to their live barrage of sound. See them if you get the chance.

7. Preteen Weaponry by Oneida - These in-your-face walls of mostly instrumental sound produces an intensity that no one else quite matched this year. Bury your mind under these sheets of guitar and pounding percussion. It ends up in a sweet spot between post-rock and noise band aesthetics.



6. High Places by High Places - With plunking production and cute-in-a-good-way female vocals, High Places' debut LP comes across as island music transmitted from Neptune.



5. Let the Blind Lead Those Who Can See But Cannot Feel by Atlas Sound - Brandon Cox (of Deerhunter) shifted his main band's guitar driven atmospherics into the world of electronics and managed to create what may be the trippiest album that showed up this year.



4. That Lucky Old Sun by Brian Wilson - Brian Wilson may never again scale the heights of "Pet Sounds" again, but at age 66 he has managed to make music that matches the Beach Boys' 1965 pop prime, and that's more than good enough. This is the best sunshine pop you'll hear in the 21 century.


3. Microcastle/Weird Era Cont. by Deerhunter - Deerhunter takes their hazy guitarscapes and blends them well with 60's AM pop sensibilities. It's like being stuck between two amazing radio stations. See them live for an even more mindbending experience.



2. Skeletal Lamping by Of Montreal - Kevin Barnes' stumbles into uncharted territory as he melds his trademark psych-pop and electro-pop with his deranged alter-ego of a middle aged, transsexual, black funk singer. The disturbing thing is it works really well. The music changes often and drifts through about every possible pop genre, so hold on tight.


1. Just a Souvenir by Squarepusher - These are the electronic results of a wild and trippy dream about a surreal 'ultragig.' The results do not disappoint, nor do Squarepusher's phenomenal string bass skills. How could you go wrong when your concept revolves around a giant, glowing coathanger?



This are new releases, so I will not be treating you to the full albums, but you're more than welcome to the following sampling:

Track Listing:
1. The Release Will Come Soon - Glaze of Cathexis (3:02)
2. An Eluardian Instance - Of Montreal (4:35)
3. Vision's the First - High Places (3:37)
4. Operation - Deerhunter (4:04)
5. Antillas - El Guincho (5:28)
6. Planet Gear - Squarepusher (4:02)
7. Gardenia - Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks (2:53)
8. Live Let Live/That Lucky Old Sun (reprise) - Brian Wilson (2:34)
9. Paradise Drone - Damaged Tape (4:19)
10. Cold as Ice - Atlas Sound (3:33)
11. Flower Sun Rain - Boris (5:35)
12. Preteen Weaponry Part 2 - Oneida (11:26)
Total Time: (55:08)
97.3 MB

Listen To Me:
Dr. Schluss' Best of 2008

Dr. Schluss' Psychedelic Pop Explosion!!!

Howdy, folks! I'm not really a big compilation guy on this blog, but I wanted to get together a primer that might help folks become more familiar with the stuff they'll find here. Of course, I've been doing this blog for almost two years and I quickly realized that I couldn't really get an accurate statistical analysis of the entire thing. Thus, I invite you to unleash the more psychedelically poppy sorts of sounds upon your ear. Well, by poppy I guess I mean catchy tracks that generally fit into a pop music structure, but the sounds are certainly demented. Most of the tracks you'll find here are straight from the prime late 60's era of psychedelic weirdness. I've tried to avoid the folks that you've heard on the Nuggets' compilations, although I can't vouch about Pebbles (never really listened to those much). Anyway, give these tracks a listen and then fearlessly plunge into the Psychedelic Garage archives if you dare.

Track Listing:
1. Sweet December - The David (3:07)
2. (We Are) Dream Vendors - The Merchants of Dream (3:42)
3. Psyche Rock - Pierre Henry & Michel Colombier (2:38)
4. Jolly Mary - July (2:20)
5. Cancer (The Moon Child) - The Zodiac (3:29)
6. Whole Earth Rhythm - Saddhu Brand (3:22)
7. Wild Bill Hickock Rides Again - The Open Window (2:50)
8. Quem Twm Medo de Brincar de Amor - Os Mutantes (3:44)
9. 2086 - Bit' A Sweet (3:15)
10. At the Third Stroke - Picadilly Line (3:01)
11. Land of Sensations & Delights - J.K. and Co. (1:46)
12. Walking in the Forest (Of My Mind) - Paul Perrish (2:43)
13. Girl on a Swing - Kevin Ayers (2:49)
14. Cardboard Watch - The End (2:54)
15. Black Sunshine - Kennelmus (2:50)
16. Baby, Let Me Show You Where I Live - Chrysalis (2:35)
17. The Island - The Millennium (3:21)
18. Gas Board Under - Skip Bifferty (2:19)
19. My Sorrow - Chico Magnetic Band (3:07)
20. No - Rainbow Ffolly (2:58)
21. Blue Poppy - Mort Garson & Jacques Wilson (6:51)
22. A Little Star - The Orient Express (2:21)
23. End of the World - Aphrodite's Child (3:19)
Total Time - (1:11:21)
121 MB

Listen to Me:
Dr. Schluss' Psychedelic Pop Explosion!!! (Part One)
Dr. Schluss' Psychedelic Pop Explosion!!! (Part Two)

Paper Fences (2006) and Zonohedra (2007)

This is admittedly a bit of a "conflict of interest" post. Paper Fences and Zonohedra are projects ring-led by my old college roommate Andrew Bland. That's why you see no quality or trip-o-meters present. The Dr. spends plenty of time recording music too, and I'm all over Paper Fences playing guitar, bass, drums and synth. In fact, I'll apologize in advance for my somewhat spastic drumming. Anyway, these recordings are mostly psychedelic, and most certainly obscure, so I feel that they fit here.

Paper Fences started as a project in October 2005 as Andrew and I wanted to try making music together for the first time in a few years. He'd just converted his basement into a nice music space. I started with the impression that we'd be making a psych-folk sort of disc, although work eventually shifted to a more instrumental collection after a few creative difference fistfights (I never pick fights unless it regards recording music). Hearing the finished product, I actually wish that we'd completely dispensed with lyrics as a few tracks still have conventional vocals ("Dry Window," "Tectonic Glance," "The Inner Light").

Although we weren't completely sure about our plotting out musical course (or at least I wasn't), the best tracks here do sound unified. I hadn't heard the bands at the time, but in retrospect I feel like a lot of these tracks have a similar atmosphere to the band Arica or A Cid Symphony. There's a lot of color shining through the low-fi (but properly mic'ed) haze.

I often complain about the double album curse, and the same holds true here. To my objective ear, much of this sounds like some drunk folks screwing around, because it was. There's a few tracks (like "Polymorphic Sunrise" or "Garbanzo") where I assumed that we were just warming up or waiting for the buzz to dissapate. Andrew tied these jams together with an extra overdub or two and placed it on the final product. You might like it better without the window of experience.

By the time of the final recordings and mixing the Dr. was off to Japan again, but I might have done a little more editing if I were Andrew. Of course, we're not professionals and I'm sure he just didn't want to cut anyone's contributions. That said, here are the tracks that I'd put on one disc for a smoother listening experience: Invocation (Widening and Closing The Circle), Rainy Straw Hat, Fingertips Of Dreams, Confusciasm, Bamboo Gallery, Blue Glass, Paper Clip Button, Smoke, Snake Charmer, Penguin Stomp, Pantomime, Faces On The Ceiling, Glen Song, Cobblestone Kiosk, Refraction

I've added some bonus tracks of rejected early mixes that I had tried to mold into poppier psych-folk. They wouldn't have fit well on the finished album, and I wasn't completely successful at melding the analog recordings to my laptop based overdubs (compression is not the answer). But since I put a fair amount of work into them, I stuck them here.

Zonohedra is a more recent project from Andrew and a fellow I don't know named Steve Logel. With more of a battle plan (as opposed to aimless experimentation) and less egos to bruise, Zonohedra is a much more unified project. It makes for fine background music on a rainy afternoon or late at night. Andrew apparently liked the use of the MicroKorg from Paper Fences and brought in a few vintage synths to flesh out the all-instrumental disc. I tend to enjoy the more percussive tracks like "Alkaline," "Solstice," and "Whisper Forth" most.

At some point I'll probably post some of my own, somewhat technologically shinier music here (these recordings are more about organic sound). I guess that depends on your response to this (please leave comments! non-anonymous constructive criticism is welcome). Anyway, next up will likely be Pierre Moerlen's Gong.