Bahrain - s/t
(Blue Circle 2004, GI 74)
Bahrain - s/t
(Blue Circle 2004, GI 74)
Uploaded to Aural Innovations: July 2004
Attention ST 37 fans. Bahrain are an Austin, Texas quartet consisting of ST 37's Scott Telles on bass, synths and vocals, Doug Boone on guitar and vocals, Colleen Gugan on bass, synth and vocals, and Melissa Johanningsmeier on drums and vocals. Though this is their debut CD the band have actually been together since 2000.
The CD opens with "Yukon", a steady paced rocker led by a haunting bass melody. A nice dreamy intro before launching into the more aggressive attack of "Trapped In The Ice Floes", with it's crashing wall of guitar/bass sound and Scott's unmistakable vocals. But this is a solid song and Bahrain do an excellent job of creating an ethereal quality out of the hard rocking guitar and double bass combination. Ditto for "TV Stinks". A really good song. "Bloody Wheel" is one of the highlights, being a much chunkier, ballsier rocker, with a very cool rhythmic drive. "Let Them Win" is an excellent rockin' space-punk tune. "I'm Not Who I'm Supposed To Be" is a Stoner space song with lots of fun alien efx. "Metaphysical Freak Out" is the pure monster space rocker of the set and my hands down favorite song on the album. Kick ass cosmic heavy space rock á la Farflung and (of course) ST 37, along with fun lyrics. "I Know Nothing Good" is a cool rocker that is a little different, being colored by new wavey keys that make a nice contrast to the crashing guitar and bass, and has some great little acid freakout guitar bits. Finally, "Celine, Poet Of Disgust" reads as being 21 minutes. But what we get is the song itself, which is about 7 minutes. Then after about 5 minutes of silence a stoned spacey jamming stoner groove kicks in and we get a hidden track that is among the most intense, spaced out music of the set. Very cool.
In summary, Bahrain rock hard and excel at producing raw but solidly played and creatively constructed rock music. And the songs are damn good too. There's definitely some space rock to be heard and lots of psychedelic elements, but it mostly stands out as being a damn good shit kickin' set of rock music.
For more information you can visit the Bahrain web site at:
http://www.geocities.com/bahrainrock.
Email at: bahrainrock@yahoo.com.
Contact via snail mail c/o Blue Circle; PO Box 4962; Austin, TX 78765.
Reviewed by Jerry Kranitz