His Name Is Codeine/The Only Truth Is Music

I have to admit, on an initial spin I wouldn’t have pegged His Name Is Codeine as Scottish. Their full-length debut, The Only Truth Is Music, has the requisite fuzz and reverb, but there is a rootsy, rustic spine that is as hard as oak that veers into a hazy, thick and often amorphous Americana fog. The Elgin-based 6-piece readily acknowledge outfits like Spiritualized and The Black Angels, as well as reaching further back to VU, Gram Parsons, Neil Young…well, hit me with that piece of oak, Young isn’t American…It doesn’t take long to realize that earlier line of thinking is what got us into trouble to begin with…but I digress. And so do His Name Is Codeine, without taking their hands off the wheel and running rampant over more than just their hometown. They cut a big swath and deliver the heft, but they also appreciate the lure, and allure, of a big sky or at least the need to pull over every now and then, take a breath, and look up. Especially when you’re feeling down. For as much as they love the rolling wall of fuzzy sound, His Name Is Codeine keep things on the human scale, approaching their ‘tales of darkness’ as storytellers. That’s made perfectly clear through the haze on the VU-ish Measure Of Your Misery and many points in between on their ‘sleazy bedsit Bible of Scottish hope.’ Needless to say, where there’s a Bible, there’s sin. You can take a bite with the first single Before The Apple Fell, mixing swagger, sexy and menace in equal parts. Slow-boil lament Magdalena mixes in blood, pavement, drugs and sailors for an added kick of the gothic that gnarls that oak even more. It’s not all a crawl in any way either, with the focus on songs over effect and a pulsing heart (check Shoot to Kill) rather than an over-revved engine. It’s a tasty mix, with some thick ingredients, but His Name Is Codeine never let it get muddy. Viscous and stout for sure, and not afraid to embrace a pop sensibility without selling out the (wide) screenwriter’s story. Or forsaking where you came from…no matter where that is, even if it caused you some troubles. His Name Is Codeine is here to tell you a story about that…

The Only Truth Is Music is out May 30th via Dead Book Records.

The Flaming Lips/The Terror

There’s been a lot of roiling over The Terror, pro and con. Love it or hate it (and part of me hopes many people do hate it), in the context of the cultural wasteland, and in the context of the Lips’ canon of work, it’s an album to be reckoned with. It’s nigh on impossible to talk about the Lips (and many others with this kind of longevity and circuitiousness) without talking about them. To a point, that’s OK and fully expected. That aspect is part of the package, part of the escape plan they offer. If you don’t buy into a fraction of their damaged technicolor schtick—and I use that in a neutral way—you miss out on a lot, or at least bonus tracks. That’s nothing exclusive to the Lips. On the other end of the spectrum(s), so far it all comes back around, if you don’t sink your teeth into some of Hawkwind’s interstellar lunacy, or Sabbath’s lumbering persona, or even the detached clammy glam of Roxy Music, there’s still a staggering amount to get off on, but you do miss out on a little bit more. Consequently, it’s all about the same things…whether you think putting on a meat dress is something new, wrap yourself in a gold lamé cape or don a leather jack for some kind of credibility. One thing it doesn’t do, when you’re like the above, is hide the music. They can do it because they have the chops to back it up. One thing it does do, is add an element of fun. Everybody’s still trying to remember laughter, but no one remembers fun. And the Lips are fun. In their own way. And what is fun if not escape, or at the very least the illusion of it? Fun comes in many forms…Hell, I think Trainspotting is a fun movie…and in the Lips’ own inimitable way, The Terror is too. Thankfully not in the way the meat dress wearing crowd wants. There’s been a lot made of how bleak The Terror is. Well friends, welcome to the machine. The Lips don’t do much more than point out some of the facets of the human condition…again. Which is the real terror…the good and the bad, the fun and the not so fun. Strip out the sonic wizardy, the corrupted and interrupted alien transmissions and you can draw a line (not a straight one) back to the simple and effective Godzilla Flick, or the lush beautiful poignancy of Feeling Yourself Disintegrate, the masked aching heartbreak of They Punctured My Yolk…the inevitability of Do You Realize? is actually a downer by standard conventions. In that sense, The Terror is really a logical step, sonically another mutation in a long line of many, and a glorious culmination. Reveling in a wide open sonic palette, it’s still open season on interpretation. The Terror can be molded into whatever you really want it to mean. Couple that with a pulse that sounds like a transmission from a dying star…or a plea for help from a dying star…it becomes escape, or an attempt. The point might very well be that you can’t escape, and if that’s the case, then we need goods like The Terror for a valve. Wallow in the layering of sounds, slather on some meaning or just enjoy some damn cool sounds, and you can find release. Here is some of the disjointed fractures of Embryonic perfected and applied to maximum effect; not the only effect, just one of many. More importantly, in the framework of the Lips evolving/mutating with each record or at the least every other one, it’s the tense latent energy in much of Embryonic finally set free, breaking some remaining shackles and spreading out. It’s the sound of motion. Whether it’s the Lips moving forward is a whole other animal, and truthfully a pointless one to hunt. Part of the appeal of the Lips is that with each record they either are or they aren’t the Lips. If you don’t listen to the Lips, do they really exist? More fascinating is that when it all fires at the right time, they’re both at the same time. That might be hard to latch on to, but part of The Terror is about drift, about things out of hand, especially sonically. Lyrically it may be insular, and the initial sheen of the music may seem claustrophobic when married with that, but the pulses, buzzes, and throbs are in such abundance that it actually flies in the face of some the apparent intent of the record by being so alive. The Terror, for all its supposed impenetrability, isn’t really that dense. Be Free, A Way is in a constant state of flux, and where there’s movement there’s escape, there’s breath. It may breathe with an alien sounding life, but life is life. There are songs in here, elusive ones. If it was straight up noodling, there wouldn’t be anything at all to hang onto. But there is if you pay attention. The vocals of Try to Explain lead you through, and give form and core to the vibrations and undulations. The vocals are vital even if they seem buried, subdued or squelched. In the context of all the broken signal to noise ratio and half-transmissions, it’s not only elemental to the song, but highlights just how human of a record this is, despite all the knob twiddling. You Lust, the arguable centerpiece…that warped toy-sounding opening is the hook, maybe not the kind we’re used to, but it sinks in and drags you right through a prog rock tour de force. Lyrically, like most of The Terror, the opening salvo of ‘You’ve got a lot of nerve, a lot of nerve to fuck with me…’ doesn’t come across as belligerent or confrontational. If anything, it has a weary weight of wisdom—a personal wisdom to be sure—that’s been earned. A band, a viable band, that’s been around this long has earned the right to flash some of that. Always There… In Our Hearts might be the most concrete song in here, and that’s not by accident. It’s the period, or rather ellipsis, to a long snake sentence that may be hard to decipher, but is decipherable nonetheless…with your input. When compared to the opener Look … The Sun Is Rising, it becomes a conceptual and musical bookend to contain, but not constrain, the stories in between. When The Terror ends, you know what it means, and more importantly you know what it means to you, even if you can’t quite say it. Just because the Lips are ‘rock stars,’ and darlings, doesn’t mean they should be held up to another set of rules that demand clarity. If we put them in that position, that’s not only trapping them in a hamster ball, it’s nothing more than bending over to be spoon fed. The Terror isn’t meant to go down easy. It’s challenging, changing, malleable and what you make of it. That sounds like life to me, however maudlin and trite that comes across. In all it’s terrifying bone-crushing weight. If they had gone for a happy ending that would have been avoidance. And irresponsible in my book. The Lips are in a position to make a record like this—or at least try. If they hadn’t they would have been irresponsible with all the leeway they have been given, and earned. Love it or hate, enjoy it or loathe it as a piece of art or simply as wonderful trippy ear candy (you can have your cake and eat it, too…they do…) the fact that a band as non-linear and yet identifiable—in all forms—as the Lips have twisted and turned for 30 years and released an album like The Terror, through a major label conduit no less, is really something that should be celebrated. Because most of the time, it’s terrifying out here…we better take what we can get, and be thankful when we get something as lavish and fierce as The Terror.

Telstar Sound Drone/Comedown

Copenhagen’s Telstar Sound Drone went through some hoops and shot over some hurdles to get their new full-length up and out. Mads Saaby (guitar) and Hans Beck (drums) have another enviable job doing their bit with Baby Woodrose and spent a good deal of time on the road shoring up that venerable enterprise while keeping TSD a viable entity. While that kept TSD somewhat on a back burner, they did move forward getting their self-titled EP out in ’09 and made a showing at Roskilde Festival. There were also some internal wranglings with the band dynamic pressure cooker that whittled them down to a core of just Beck for a time, making the future of TSD seem grim. To title their album Comedown is either a misnomer or a sigh of relief for a band that’s been through somewhat of a wringer. Either way, the sigh of relief should come from those waiting for this and those that are getting introduced to TSD’s swirling psychedelic gyrations with Comedown. Packed with an abrasive, vibrating grind that’s both liquid hot and surprisingly clean, Comedown passes by way too quick, more due to their confidence and assured delivery than to a somewhat brief running time (34 minutes). All the torrid whooshes and vortexes driving through Comedown, the molten tumbling guitars and hefty fluid bottom end feed about any psych devotee’s hunger for those details and flourishes. TSD are keenly aware that those filigrees can both make or break a psych rock’s punch by sloppy application or mindless—and useless—overuse. That’s not to say there isn’t plenty of that frosting to spread around. What Comedown has working for it is that the songs and fractured hooks don’t get over-coated until it’s nothing but ornate sprinkles that don’t stick to the ribs and end up covering up a lack of substance. You do need food, and fuel, for the trip otherwise it’s just window shopping, and tepid window dressing. Opening salvo Through The Back Of Your Head does what it says, corkscrewing in backwards with an oscillating drill bit that burrows in with patience for a little backside trephination. It moves with purpose, riding a rubbery thickness spiked with chrome burrs that shoot out sparks that add a heavy gleam that permeates the rest of Comedown. Satellited, the first single, picks up the pace moderately with a lurching gallop that edges it onwards through some delicious repetition that escalates in tandem with the buzz-saw guitar. Like most of Comedown, there’s plenty of room to breathe in the hot air. The thickness and pockets of popping space create a push-pull that accent the shuddering scrape and play off it at the same time. Feels Like A Ride opens that more with an atmospheric vacuum that’s in a constant state of backflow, making it hard to nail down if it’s coming or going. It’s a cosmic wash that really finds a technicolor stasis somewhere between, quivering and hovering out of the corner of your third eye. It’s got form, but you have to want to find it. Instructional Now See How offers a helping hand if you can’t, or better yet decided not too. Bleeding right in, Now See How emerges with an acoustic backbone coupled with drone that might seem initially seem out of place but quickly reveals not so much itself, but what is working the core of Comedown. Intangible in an exotic vibe, it stands on its own showing a different dynamic of TSD, but is also employed as an extension of Feels Like A Ride, and even more effectively, as a mellower set-up to the outstanding Evaporation. A barn burner that doesn’t surrender its innate drive and momentum to speed. Evaporation not only flat-out rocks, but highlights how well Comedown is paced, and sequenced. It gets maximum effect from falling right where it should in the energy flow and consequently, does its job perfectly. It’s tempting to say Evaporation is the centerpiece, but fulcrum might be a better a better job description. It also signals a gradual ride-out, picked up on by Lost Your Love. Falling somewhere between the openness of Feels Like A Ride and the patience of Through The Back Of Your Head, Lost Your Love rides TSD’s shiver, working a gradual mushrooming that is escalating without you knowing it. They bleed in, they bleed out…and so does the real eventual comedown. Cabin Fever winds the pace back down without any of the title’s insular innuendo, but hanging onto Comedown’s psych jitteriness dragging it effortlessly right to the close, swelling to a bubble that doesn’t pop, but doesn’t deflate either. For something that delivers the grind and elevation in equal parts, Comedown isn’t ever at odds with itself. TSD find a natural flow from cut to cut, rise and fall, that’s often missing in like-minded outings. With all the obstacles TSD overcame to get Comedown birthed, it’s not piecemeal, jerky in transition or skimpy on the heavy psych wholesomeness. TSD might argue otherwise considering the hiccups and hangups, but all that comes across as gestation. Time well spent is never a let down. Neither is Comedown.

Evaporation :: Telstar Sound Drone :: Comedown (2013, Bad Afro Records)

The Smoking Trees/Acetates

There’s something about saying that a release is a ‘gem’ that makes me cringe. It conjures up a feeling of slightness and whiffs of the dreaded twee tag. It’s unfair baggage for a term that’s probably lost its own substance. Well, The Smoking Trees‘ (Los Angeles denizens Sir Psych and L.A AL) new one, Acetates, is a gem. It sparkles in multi-color and is, unlike the above, free of baggage. The Smoking Trees have crafted a flowing and ultra-catchy psych pop/rock record that is deceptive in its stripped down frame, putting every layer and detail in the right place rather than all over the place. Acetates achieves maximum effect with an uncanny knack for exploiting the minimum without watering down any of the grooviness of the songs. Acetates does have a feeling of lightness that transcends any fleeting vibe and goes straight into being nimble. 21 cuts blend together seamlessly, the ones hovering around the 2-3 minute mark using every second to weave a tapestry of 60s psych threads that entwine with garage, folk and other trace elementals that wraps around your ears and third eye like a second skin. The stand-out (among many) ‘Close Your Eyes’ sums up much of Acetates mission and gives great instructions to ‘listen with closed eyes’ that apply across the board. Return of the Morning, On An Afternoon, Here She Come…about the whole damn thing in one form or another…urges that closed eye ether gaze, reveling in a sunshine warmth that goes beyond golden to take in the whole spectrum. With such a wide and far-reaching luminescence, Acetates is incredibly accessible; to lovers of psychedelia, lo-fi, garage rock, pop and anyone who simply digs a good song. And it’s blatantly fun without being disposable or inconsequential. Sir Psych and L.A. Al (along with mastering by Patrick Haight of Spot On Sound) construct a production that is immediate, but doesn’t give away—or fill—every nook and cranny out of the gate. The light-handed layering can, and does, reveal more with each spin, tweaking the aura of each song without giving up a firm hand on the core tune. If 21 tunes sounds overwhelming (it’s not), there is an ‘intermission’ with ‘Things That You Don’t See’ that does more than provide a smoke-break. It’s not overt, but there is a slight shift after that where Acetates feels like it starts a very, very gradual and gentle winding down that quickly turns cyclical with ‘Eyes Closed’…cue baby…“Life begins the same way that it ends…with your eyes closed…” Concept record? If it is, it’s so easy-going and subtle that the requisite gold lamé cape is woven from smoke…smoke that feels good in your closed eyes. Clocking in at 9+ minutes, the closing title cut arrives faster than you think (you’re eyes have been closed), and back to start, collapsing much of the detail, effect and feeling of Acetates into a drawn out coda that is far more nuance than noodling. By the time the aged ‘seal of good practice’ spirit guide appears to inform you that this record has been designed to ‘entertain and inform you,’ you’ll already be fully aware of that, and then some. It’s a perfect way to draw it all to a close, even though it really leads you right back to the start, where it begins with a younger guide ushering you in with the lysergic cadence of ‘Entrance.’ Which, by the way, is a gem of a track…

Acetates sees a May release with Ample Play Records.

More info and music from the world of Sir Psych can be found at sirpsych.com

Bed Rugs/Rapids

With hooks a-plenty, Belgian quartet Bed Rugs have rural whiffs and accents of  ’60s pop stirring in with a fuzzy, modern pop that lifts like a breeze and gets you floating downstream. It all gels into a universal locale mapped out in the brief intro Daydream that sets the tone for Rapids while it sends the tube downriver. Yawn takes that pin drop and begins the blossom under a golden haze, with a slightly shambolic and bucolic vibe highlighted by the refrain, “There is some dusk in this dawn.” That there about sums up Rapids in a crunchy nutshell. Rapids conjures up the perfect companion for a lazy day by the water’s edge, cat-stretching yawns under the sun and the inevitable sunset fade in, and fade out. Once you’re in the water, Waves carries you further on with a watery psych sheen that refracts the sun into a lilting sparkle. With the sounds of your dangling arm trailing out a wake, Rapids captures an insect purr that turns into full on buzzing stridulation with the buoyant Blinds. A slight shoegaze warble wafts in and out of the vocals and guitar bustle, wrapped around a nugget that works up to its own pop rapids before another fluid filled ride out. Bed Rugs’ psych leanings, in line and mind with outfits like Tame Impala to Kiki Pau, come full circle and into full bloom for an unhurried, and unharried, flow that’s spiked by some ramped up eddies that punctuate Blinds, but don’t overwhelm the relaxed vibration. When Bed Rugs turn up the glow on Rapids the whole ride gets more joyful, which seems to be a big part of the mission. It’s not a full-bore good time party by any means, but it feels good. And guilt free. They know their pop, and they don’t abandon it by slathering on the excess. Nor do they keep it simple, or worse yet, simple-minded. It’s tempting to call it a ‘feel good’ record, but that usually carries a stench of gloss that turns to syrup out in the sun. For sure there’s a honeyed taste, and color, to Rapids, but it keeps the crunch of good rock candy.

Rapids is out this May on Ample Play Records.

Dead Leaf Echo/Thought & Language

Brooklyn’s Dead Leaf Echo spread the Thought & Language on their new full-length. Going more for the wash and sway of shoegaze than the squall, Dead Leaf Echo couple it with their dreamy pop songs working up a sensual, melancholy and romantic shimmer that has popping sparks on the edges. Sparklers might be more like it since Thought & Language has a hazy glow that makes this a great summer spin, or one to remind you of that time’s aura when you need it. Mixed by John Fryer (Lush, NIN, Depeche Mode), there’s an obvious classicist vibe that permeates Thought & Language that blows out like a gust of fresh air. There’s a crispness Dead Leaf Echo inject through their song-craft and execution that you might think would be at odds with the glistening lushness they layer and elevate up with, but it all folds in on itself into a gentle eddy of colors and sounds…and of course, thought and language. With an opener called Conception, offerings labeled Birth, Memorytraces and Child, the crowning Thought isn’t out of reach. A concept rooted outing, Thought & Language follows that conception through the birth of a child and the discovery of thought and language. Though some of the vocals revel in an ethereal indecipherability, at least on the maiden voyage, the narrative unfolds in ripples that follow our new voyager forward, but also allows for a back flow that makes it all clearer the further your toe goes into the water. Along with the chiming reverb and snaky smooth bottom end, Dead Leaf Echo leave enough open to listener participation that you can graft on your own narrative. The concept of the record doesn’t hit you over the head, and certainly isn’t needed to achieve the goal. It works up into a circular and cyclical billow that carries you along with it allowing as many of your own side-trips as you want without making Dead Leaf Echo’s soft edges crystallize.

This Other Kingdom/Sunlight

Dublin’s neo-psychsters This Other Kingdom debut April 13th with their new self-released EP, Sunlight. Mixing indie rock, space rock and psych, Sunlight is a modern outing sharing kinship with outfits like The Black Angels and B.R.M.C, but also lays down with other past bedfellows like Joy Division made obvious with an insistent chug and vocal stylings. They create a big sound that is also pretty straightforward without lessening their punch. Stripped of overly ornate effects, Sunlight goes for a more direct approach in creating an atmospheric wall of sound with plenty of grit and throbbing bottom-end. Vocalist Del Kerton fits the vibe perfectly, projecting out with a droney sneer that has more dynamics than might seem obvious. Some keyboard touches shore that up even more, adding another level of detail that reaches back, and forward. Folding in the post-punk touches, from JD to Interpol, gives Sunlight and interesting twist that makes their insular psych that much more approachable, even to others that might shy away from where psych or space rock light shines.

Fine Line :: This Other Kingdom :: Sunlight (2013, This Other Kingdom)

Flavor Crystals/Three

Minneapolis-based Flavor Crystals released a whopper of a record, triple wax set, last year aptly titled Three. That’s about the only linear thing about it. A veritable definition of the word haze, Three imbibes space rock, psych, shoegaze and krautrock and deliciously spits out a nebulous euphoric blanket than swirls around your head and into your ears. It’s a lot to take in, and certainly can’t be done in one dose (ok, it can) even though prolonged exposure is the way to go for a ricocheting experience. Three is one of those records that insidiously corkscrews into your brain, leaving you looking around wondering how you got to Point B, not caring where Point A was and hungry for the thousands points beyond your reach. Flavor Crystals have nailed a wavering and shimmering vibe that on the surface may seem almost phlegmatic and detached, but Three deceptively burrows in deep, layering on fuzzy waves that ripple into themselves and expand into the outer reaches at the same time. Something that oozes towards ‘epic’ can often get cold, but Three exudes a warmth that is inescapable as it snakily warps around your ears and tunnels into your cortex setting off a whole new set of sensual synaptic sparks. It may wobble and swerve, but Flavor Crystals know how to pilot the ship, and more importantly when to let it steer itself to horizons that never, thankfully, completely materialize.

Fuzz Clubbed

Fuzz Club Records, who’ve already laid out some great sounds (The Lucid Dream’s Eribstock Mill and Sonic Jesus’ s/t two big faves from ’12) along with curating the annual The Reverb Conspiracy with the The Reverberation Appreciation Society/Austin Psych Fest, continue ‘capturing the essence of the underground scene’ with the some new sonics in the pike and into your ears.

The Third Sound

Berlin-based The Third Sound have their second platter, The Third Sound of Destruction & Creation, landing this July. First out of the gate is the single, For a While. Formed by Singapore Sling’s vet Hákon Aðalsteinsson and self-proclaimed ’60s fanatic Francesco D’onofrio, The Third Sound weave a hazy web of atmosphere and elevation that captures a vibe that is both easy to bite into and elusive. For a While snares both with a dark tinged psychedelia that’s rolling, warm and moody—in the best kind of way.

Dead Rabbits

Southampton’s Dead Rabbits long-gestating first LP, The Ticket That Exploded, finally comes alive. It’s a scorched mix of abrasion and grind with a deceptive subtext of pop savvy. It’s a blistering culmination of a run of EPs they released via Black Market Karma’s Flower Power Records that ratchets their modern psych to the next logical, and tasty, level. Equally adept at handling the barn-burners and more languid, watery rides like closer Keep Me Warm, Dead Rabbits make a bigger punch by focusing on dynamics as much as the reverb and squall. Frontman Thomas Hays manages to sneer and sing in equal measure over a rumbling bottom-end and caustic guitars that never forget the songs underneath all the unburnished chrome plating.

Electric Eye

Fuzz Club handles the international distribution for the full-length debut of  Norway’s Electric Eye, released on their own Klangkollektivet Records. Pickup, Lift Off, Space, Time eschews the obvious (and often narrow) tangents taken by many psych bands and goes instead for a heady blend of krautrock, space rock, some blues tinges, drone and more, without giving song craft the shaft. Electric Eye give Pickup, Lift Off, Space, Time a span and depth that approaches progressive not only in the music, but in the approach. Their first single, Tangerine, is a krautrocked engine that hits the road with a heavy heartbeat, covering some serious terrain that highlights not only how much they take in and return, but an expanse they take full advantage of. Cuts like 6 am, Lake Geneva and Morning Light put them firmly in the here and now, along with one foot and some extra toes well into the future by taking in so much from more than just one well. It’s a creeper of a record in some ways; engaging out of the gate, Pickup, Lift Off, Space, Time reveals more of exactly what’s in that title with each spin.

Günter Schickert/Samtvogel

German born Günter Schickert, whose ‘name barely registers among most of the Krautrock intelligentsia,‘ was an active devotee of the Berlin jazz scene in the 60s who didn’t make his first solo album until 1974. Initially, it was a small-batch private release, later picked up by the venerable Brain label, the outfit responsible for getting out Neu!, Guru Guru, Embryo and even the Scorpions (undoubtedly when it was still fun). Between June and September of ’74 with what he had on hand, Schickert put his own brain and fingers to work and the result of that flurry of activity was Samtvogel.

‘When I was recording Samtvogel in 1974 I had only 2 Taperecorders. I played one track and while listening I added the second one. And so on. Four times. When I mixed all together I borrowed a 3rd taperecorder. And still added the last track to the master. I had a small mixer with 2 stereo and 1 mono but it was possible to pan tracks. No equalization. It all came out of my still living G2000 Dynacord guitar amplifier, of course valve, with no master, even the voice recorded through it. If I made a mistake in 1 track I had to repeat it from the beginning. And if while mixing I was not fast enough in changing the tape I had to start again. So it took me more than 3 months to get ready.’

Schickert, whose main instrument was the guitar, had made some sessions of ‘echo-guitar’ before Samtvogel (not dissimilar to Achim Reichel of A.R. & The Machines fame), but here is where it apparently all came together in classic form. Samtvogel is not only a prime serving of early Krautrock pioneering with acid flares, but a gem of experimental, as well as personal, music. With echo-guitar in hand, Schickert laid down 3 cuts that go exponentially beyond that small number. The 6 minute Apricot Brandy eases in, minimally and deceptively, laying down more than one path that Samtvogel will expand down with the lengthier Kriegsmaschinen, Fahrt Zur Holle and Walde. Kriegsmaschinen, Fahrt Zur Holle builds slowly, layering up on itself until it becomes a vibrating push that doesn’t just cut through the air–here and up there—but infuses itself with it. It’s a chiming, shimmering and, at times delicate, loopy vortex that has as much going on outside it as it does inside…like a soundtrack to a chemical reaction, randomly choreographed particles bouncing and ricocheting off of each other generating new energy. Schickert weaves in some vocals that resonate with what’s generating sonically, giving Kriegsmaschinen, Fahrt Zur Holle even more lift, but also a tether to the human factor of the trip, as alien as it all feels. Walde moves the flurry to the front end, thickening the pulse and flattening the curve a bit as sounds and proddings push in from all sides, exploratory fingers testing the flexibility of the force field Schickert is provoking out of thin air. Walde has the feeling of being broken into sections, but the demarcations are so fluid and bleeding into each other, drawing a line in the sand is pointless. Not being able to put your finger on it, or deciding if the trip is inner or interstellar is a huge part of Walde’s pull, and Samtvogel’s gravity.

Samtvogel was also hard to put your hands on so you could get your brain around it. In another example of forward thinking by looking back, April sees a re-issue of this personal and seminal gem from Important Records.

Kriegsmaschinen, Fahrt Zur Holle :: Günter Schickert :: Samtvogel (2013, Important Records)