Molecules

Sorry, I was fick and didn't read the moon safari post, just the date attributed to it, indeed it sounds like the perfect antidote to the poison that ails neo-prog. I am going to get the album tomorrow. My album acquisitions of late have slowed to mainly incorporate the updates made to this and Cellartapes' blog, so I have the time to listen, and I know I be getting quality music. Where's Comus lately? There are a lot of albums cropping up and he's missing them!
The Pazop album is pretty immense, Belgian mentalist prog with fiddles and everything. Each song is a concentrated blast of progressiveness and they're all surprisingly short... like Gentle Giant with ADD. Couple of songs fall short of the mark but on a 16 track album it's makes no odds.
Also Anteater see what you think of the last album I reviewed in the 60's psych thread (it's a 1971 release), hopefully you'd like that, link's included.

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[SIZE="1"]Eff em
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Anteater

Haven't seen Comus in nearly a week and a half now, but I assume he'll return in a triumphant fashion at some point soon.

Definitely getting Luv Machine btw, and I enjoyed the review.

Today's review, coincidentally, is a very obscure psychedelic album of the highest calibur:


Garden of the Elks, which is the English translation of the name Algarnas Tradgard, is not your grandad's psychedelic rock band. In fact, as their moniker might give you an indication of, this one-shot album band is, to me, a living example of just how grand it is when you DO manage to find something a bit offbeat that doesn't sound singular and unique for the sake of it. Or, to put this in a different way, how many groups at that point in time would have thought to fuse Psychedelic Rock, Space Rock, Krautrock and Nordic folk music into a single, cohesive sound that doesn't rely on bass to send your mind to the skies?

Not many I'd say, which is why Framtiden ar ett Svavande Skepp, Forankrat I Forntiden (English translation: The Future Is A Hovering Ship, Achored In The Past) is simply so interesting when you actually sit down and listen through it the first time. You are struck that it doesn't strive to be different, it simply IS by the combination of the styles involved, and that's a rare quality indeed considering how easy it is, for the most part, to figure out which X band influenced Y band's sound in today's music world.

Not that I can't give you guys a few comparison bands to Algarnas Tradgard, because there are a few. The dread-folk atmosphere that pervades this album feel like a cousin to parts of Comus's First Utterance in some ways, while the lighter passages are sibling to Jan Dukes de Grey or Pentagle without sounding like either of those bands.

However, perhaps the best thing about this record is that certain aspects of their sound are emphasized on different tracks to various degrees, hence appealing to a variety of audiences without losing the core sound or style. Rings of Saturn, for instance, is driven entirelly by some serious psychedelic guitar grooving, while There Is A Time For Everything, There Is A Time When Even Time Will Meet has lots of sitar, Nordic flutes and enough spaceyness to make even Hawkwind fans cream their jeans. The female vocals, while sung in Swedish, are rather nice and don't distract from the mind-expansive sound at all.

So in conclusion...Honestly, this is an outstanding effort. Their sound is unique and stands alone for the most part, which is always a plus for obscure albums. For you fans of the psychedelic, the depths of space, or even folk music...this could very well be your Holy Grail of the month. No joke.


Also, here's an excerpt from Track #2 of the album for your listening pleasures. Enjoy!

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Stephen

Am really loving their follow up released years later when it was rescued from the archives in 2001 titled appropriately Delayed.



Really just amazing stuff.

Terrible Lizard

Don't worry about it, I'll send him some african psych-rock for good measure. And some very obscure krautrock and no-wave.

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Guybrush

Because I'm in the arctic at the moment and don't have much time/chance to listen to music, I've been purposely avoiding your thread for a while, thinking I would check up on the your new stuff when I got back to my apartment on the mainland.

However, I'm just wondering .. what's up with all the swedish stuff? Pain of Salvation, Älgarnas Trädgård, Moon Safari, some of the members of The Tangent .. Is it coincidence or have you been getting into swedish bands on purpose?

Looking forward to listen to the elkboys when I get back!

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Something Completely Different

jacklovezhimself

Hey guess what!
I'm a hipster and I love the thread!
I got Lucifer's Friend and it's great and I guess I have to catch up with the rest.

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Anteater

Sweden have been at the forefront of progressive rock output for a long while now, though like most things the assertion is debateable.

jacklovezhimself: Hipster or not, welcome to the Anthill. Enjoy Lucifer's Friend and check out whatever else you find interesting!

Today's obscure album may not be prog., but its an unusual beast to be sure...with extra funk included.



For anyone who remembers (or has ever read) my old Screaming Headless Torsos review, I raved a bit on how David Fiuczynski, known in musical circles by the moniker "Fuze", can play guitar like a mother****er. His style, to put it generically, is very distinctive regardless of the project he plays on; haphazard and textural, yet at the same time he has the capability to shred with the best of 'em on a whim. You never really know where he'll take his sound from one second to the next, and as a result Fuze possesses an unusual charisma in a time when technical proficiency seems to have devoured the original goal of many great guitarists: to be unique.

But enough about him and more about the record in question that he's involved with. This particular project, the album Black Cherry Acid Lab, makes full use of Fiuczynski's unique style, along with his good friend Dean Bowman (Screaming Headless Torsos's vocalist) and hence results in lots of punk-jazz antics crammed with funk and rythm up the wazoo. But guess what? It also has a certain infamous voice-actor providing his talents as a rapper to go with an already lethal musical duo, a man by the name of Ahmed Best.

But who is Ahmed Best you peeps may ask? The pic. below should explain everything:



Yes, its the truth. We have Jar Jar Binks rapping like a crazy mofo' here on Black Cherry Acid Lab. And BOYYYYY is he on the game here, adding an unusual element to an already unpredictable funk album with some interesting results. His performance here, in fact, makes this one of the most diverse and interesting albums to come out at ANY point in time, much less the 21st century. Rap+funk+punk+jazz+hard rock has never sounded so fun!!

Describing the tracks one by one is no easy task, partly because the songs themselves sometimes change randomly, veering off in odd designs that somehow seem crazy, yet held together by Fuze's playing like some variant of sonic superglue that prevents the building's foundations from caving in. Another plus, the instrumentation, is intracite to say the least; simply put, its heavily bass, guitar and sax driven with heavy drumming and the occasional turntable for good measure. Very danceable material in some ways, which is always nice once in a while.

So, for those who love jazz and fusion, this album will please you. To those who love their jazz fusion with rap and a sense of humour, you'll love it even more. And to the folks who take in avant-garde like gatorade at football practice, you'll probably enjoy this album most of all because its both inviting and challenging to the mind and ear the way a great album needs to be.

I suppose if Mr. Bungle had been just a mite jazzier and were still around today, this is how it would have been. Three thumbs way way way up for this classic in the making!!

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jackhammer

Got an up for this at all? I like the sound of it!

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Demonoid

You should definitely give Algarnas Tradgard a listen Jack although I find that their release drags on a bit at times, but that shouldn't deter anyone . It does feel kind of weird at first, but it's definitely a grower. Great review too, although I tend to find that generally, you're a bit lenient when it comes to album ratings.

Anteater

Meh; all that means is I have to revamp my grading scale some, which I'll go ahead and try out on this upcoming review.

1: Excrement
2: Trash, but there is the potential of promise in an area or two.
3: Average
4: One or two great tracks, but otherwise unexceptional.
5: Very good. Anything at this grade or higher is worthy of recommendation.
6: Classic status/exceptional. Not quite flawless, but milestones nevertheless.
7: Perfection. Transcends the genre to become something of potential universal meaning.

I'll be re-evaluating all my past reviews with this scale, and will also be posting this back on my first post.

Anyway....all that aside, I've got an album today that gives Leaf Hound's Growers of Mushroom a run for its money. Sorry Comus!! xD


T2 was a hard-rock band trio with a remarkable, if rather brief, resume to go with before the recording of their one and only record It'll All Work Out In Boomland back in 1970. Keith Cross, only 17 years old and fresh out of playing at the Isle of Wight Festival with Hendrix himself, had proven that despite his young age that he was a cunning wizard with the guitar, and together with bandmates vocalist Peter Dunton and bassist Bernard Jinks managed to land a recording session with the influential Decca Records (who, interestingly enough, own the recording studios where Wishbone Ash did most of their studio work).

The result of Keith Cross's efforts, an almagation of Cream, Hendrix and the sort of looseness you'd expect from some jazz outfit of the era, is an album that rings powerful and full of weight while still being remarkable in it's seamless ability to shift tone on a dime into acoustic psychedelia. Each track turns in on themselves a number of times, possessing the rare quality of smooth transition from one movement to the next. Take the 21 minute side-long 'Morning' for instance; it rises from an acousting dream over the first few minutes, gradually picking up the pace as the guitar's wailing shreds nicely, slows, shreds. But then, suddenly around the 10 minute mark, the drums and guitar have switched roles, with fantastic rythyms a'la Santana at the forefront of your mind while the guitar and bass morph spacily in the background. It's awesome!

An album like Boomland is interesting for several reasons. It approaches things more experimentally at times than the usual hard rock album of the late 60's, but never forgets its roots while pursuing these tendencies. It remains fun, heavy and head-banging even with longer than 4-minute songs and a 21-minute suite. T2 were a band, that even if it was only for one album, knew exactly what they were doing and what they wanted to do; they wanted to take the kind of rock n' roll Cream, Hendrix and the rest had pioneered and make it a bit more interesting.

Whether or not they succeeded, Keith Cross and company, is up to those who hear this album to decide. Could this have been among the most promising debuts of all time or a one-hit wonder that deserves it status in obscurity?

Either way, the awesomeness of Boomland is indisputable in my book, and hence I recommend it to lovers of all that is hard and rock in the years when it was done best. Thumbs up!

On a final note, here is Circles, the first track, for the curious on YouTube. Enjoy!

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