Nik Turner - Space Fusion Odyssey, album review

Spaced Out 

If the band Farout and its 1979 album Further Out were definitely not Far Out [previous post], Nic Turner, founding member of Hawkwind, and his album Space Fusion Odyssey of 2015 is without question the encapsulation of all that is Out in the Farness of musical jazz fusion and space rock.

With his Interplanetary Arkestra of various members from bands Gong, Amon Dull II and Soft Machine as well as individuals like Steve Hillage, Billy Cobham and Robby Krieger, the spaced-out lineage is legendary.

Second and third tracks Hypernova and Spiritual Machines feature respectively Nick on saxophone and flute, the first played through faroutting effects and the second more conventional within the fuzzing guitar and pounding Cobham drums. All of the tracks are instrumental trajectories to familiar if distant planets and solar systems, but the flights there are hypersleep-smooth or electrifying when looking out of the portals at the passing psychedelic patterns and spatial distortions. 

Hands and Feet Music, Literally

Farout - Further Out [1979], album review

Not Quite

I had hoped the band's name would speak for itself....

Alas, album title is more apt: not drowning, but waving, a jazz mix - funk at one end [Muppet Dance, strangely]; twee prettiness at the other [Daybreak] - and the title track is heavy on the synths but with some nice enough sax. Walrus Jump is neatly percussive, if a little silly. Brainwash is bass-funky.

Could be had under the Trades Description Act, but I set a high bar on the accolade, and this isn't awful by any means. Just dated.

Dog Music 3

The Zombies - Live In Concert At Metropolis Studios London, album review

The Lucky 120

Watched The Zombies [Colin Blunstone and Rod Argent] on a recent Later.....with Jools and these two were outstanding: Blunstone in superb voice and Argent great on keys. This live recording of a 2011 live concert at the Metropolis Studio, London, is equally outstanding: the band are hot throughout, and the accompanying vocals in support of Blundstone are studio-superb.

All the songs are performed to perfection - the excellent cover of Ruffin's What Becomes of a Broken Heart; Argent's new song I Do Believe, which later appeared on their 2011 album Breathe Out, Breathe In, is vocally sublime from Blunstone and accompanying singers - but its quite natural to listen especially for the rendition of the 'hits', songs from long ago and variously from bands The Zombies and Argent as well as the solo career of Blunstone, so Time of the Season takes me back to The Rock Machine Turns You On from 1968 when I first heard this, and the echo is perfect - that cool exhalation - with Argent on fine organ swirls; whilst wonderful performances of Say You Don't Mind and I Don't Believe in Miracles, which are sung with glorious clarity up to his falsetto from Blunstone, are punctuated by a rousing presentation of the Argent classic Hold You Head Up.

This will have been an astonishing gig for the 120 people who saw it. The recording has captured it brilliantly.

Eye Music 3

Ashley Monroe - The Blade, album review

Enough is Enough

A little bit of drawl, a little tremolo, pop inflections, clarity over affectation [opener On to Something Good], generic Country themes and metaphor [I Buried Your Love Alive], tight harmonies, rising chorus, pedal steel [Bombshell], strong production [Weight of the Load].

This is New Country in its polish and perfection, that pop sensibility shaping it to airwaves over adventurous allusion and abstraction – anathema to Country, I know, but reinforcing its simple preoccupations – and if this is easy enough listening for you, than this is for you. I am happy enough myself with its genuine grasp of the steady ground, safe in the honesty of its shine. 

Other Vehicular Music 11

The Orphan Brigade - Soundtrack to a Ghost Story

Haunting Irony

The video clip below is the first single from a fine album by a group of Nashville musicians and others [including Gretchen Peters] who lived in a haunted house over various periods as inspiration for the songs on this album and a documentary about the experience. At the moment I am  simply experiencing the wonderful songcraft, Trouble My Heart... one of the more upbeat, and I like in particular the beautiful Pale Horse and Last June Light, sweet melodies and vocal harmonies. There are even more upbeat tracks like Whistling Walk that point to an occasional playfulness in the writing, though this too is swelled with gorgeous harmony; Good Old Flag is consummate americana; Cursed Be the Wanderer has a great celtic-in-a-church folk aura to it; Paddy's Lamentation is an old celtic song, and Goodnight Mary is blissful in its harmonies. If the lyrics turn out to convey quite dark and sinister meanings, much of the music is heavily ironic in conveying this with such loveliness.

Lips Music 10

Sexwitch - Sexwitch, album review

Trance Chant Echoed

Sexwitch is Natasha Khan of Bat for Lashes, and this quick reference to her fine recent release is in tandem with my review of Eartheater here because Sexwitch also revels in vocal exploration and experimentation, Khan's songs having their roots in 'rare psychedelic tracks from other countries' like Iran and Thailand as well as Skip Spence's War and Peace, a song bathed in echo and Khan singing at her most elegant and rock-operatic in the conventional sense on this album. Elsewhere, opener Ha Howa Ha Howa is a trance chant with screams and rolling percussion, the Iranian Helelyos is a wonderful multi-layered amalgam of repeated sound and spoken lyrics [all the songs translated into English], and Kassidal El Hakka is again chant-like - when I die I'll go back to where I was - echoed, percussive and hypnotic.

Hands No Feet Music 3

Kristian - Kristian [1972], album review

Finnish Feelgood Funk and Other

Two tracks below from a fine Finnish album from 1972. Hit Him Hard is the second track on the album, and has a clear echo of a Kossoff riff in its wah-wah, funky guitar. It is a slow blues funk with excellent vocal harmony from Irina Milan and Timo Lindstrom. The sudden wild organ burst is superb, played either by Esa Kotilainen or Kaj Westerlund. Afterwards is the eighth track, and this is pop folk, Irina in beautiful voice, leading into soaring harmonies and some requisite folk-jazz flute. Other solid tracks are opener King of the World with its soulful chorus and organ surges, third Sit Down and Laugh with its wah-wah again, fourth Sleepful Night which returns to some groovy funk in its rhythm a la Dr Feelgood [slowed down], and sixth, the ballad My Love Song with its West Coast harmonies and organ core. All songs are written by Bengt Huhta, and the English lyrics are at times quite complex/developed, just out of interest.