Amber was the English psychedelic folk duo of Keith “Mac” MacLeod and Julian McAllister, and these are the only recordings they made in 1970/1971. MacLeod (guitar) and McAllister (vocals) had known each other since the early 60’s, had met for jam sessions and traveled through the world independently of each other. MacLeod played second guitar with Donovan on his first national tour and the sitar used on this album was lent by Donovan who had been given the instrument by George Harrison.

SEA SHELL ROCK ME: I’m a 60’s music fanatic. If I could get in a time machine I’d go back to 1967 and do it all twice, so getting an opportunity to review a new CD of 60’s music is pretty cool and probably as close to the time machine as I’ll get. The CD starts with the three tracks produced by Keith Relf, who had been the Yardbirds lead singer and supposedly quite the super freak! Recorded at Olympic Studios February 14, 1971, happy hippie music that’s not commercial or ordinary but fresh and real with a production that makes it sound as if it was just recorded!…”dancing in the sun, like a child I ran back to you”…Julian McAllister doing some nice vocals. Of course you have to compare this to “The Incredible String Band” who admittedly were doing a more original and unique version of this sound. I guess that’s why they’re famous!! WHITE ANGEL: reminds me of the Michael Knust stuff on Fever Tree’s “Another Place, Another Time”. Lotsa tabla on this one. Not sure if it’s MacLeod or guest musician Ray Cooper?! As nice as these tracks are I can see why they didn’t get airplay or a proper release, they’re not trying to be a product, just being what they were, English hippies in 1971. SWAN IN THE EVENING: nice melody. Hey now, I could imagine this being played on English Pirate Radio!! Really tight uptempo with some nice cymbal flourishes! Consistently good vocals and lyrics thru these tracks though the sitar was probably a bit passé by 1971!?!? SING ON THE SUNLIGHT: another beautiful slice of 1970 England. These songs are so rockin’ you almost want to hear them with a full rock band!! This track begins the three songs recorded May 10, 1970 at Denmark Street. SEA SHELL ROCK ME (ALTERNATE VERSION): okay, this is an earlier version of track one! The vocals aren’t recorded as clear and the track seems a bit slower, quirkier, but also a beautiful track! EARLIE IN THE MORNING: the lyrics tell an interesting story of spending the night with “Earlie in the Morning”…funny without being goofy like a lot of 60’s bands! Well, that’s the last song and you just wish they had recorded about twenty more of this quality! Maybe when I get back to 1970 in the time machine I’ll get that done!!

For more info, visit: http://www.merlins-nose.com

Reviewed by Carlton Crutcher

Mawwal is Jim Matus, formerly “Paranoise” and Sight Up is the third Mawwal album of progressive world fusion. Jim Matus (I wonder if he’s related to Don Juan Matus?) has worked in the studio with Don Cherry and Steve Marcus and performed live with world class musicians Anthony Jackson, Percy Jones, Al Anderson, Gary Windo, and Hugh Hopper.

On to the review. BLOOM FOREST: hippie festival music done tastefully. The male vocals are done by Jim Matus and the female vocals by Jill O’Brien and Laila Salins… “much of the subject matter…was inspired by dreams”. JAJOUKA BETWEEN THE MOUNTAINS: a Jethro Tull vibe on the intro of this, then becomes something more African, Peter Gabriel…the Stephen Haynes trumpet solo. FUN DUU/VOODOO CHILE: more Tull vibeness. I love 60’s and psychedelic music but the bands I’ve been involved with have run in a completely parallel universe to bands like Mawwal, who are psychedelic without any of the post 1977 influences of alternate rock, punk, experimental etc. I always find that a little limiting but I know a lot of Aural Innovations people don’t feel that way. Nice respectful take on Jimi’s Voodoo Chile. SIGHT UP/VETETTEM VIOLAT: “Man is but a god, sight up, All in heaven be blind, ears to the ground” by Jim Matus. I don’t know what that means, I guess it doesn’t have to mean anything, but it sounds cool. Laila Salins vocals, violin by Rohan Gregory…nice groove, very Middle Eastern. My wife loves this album, very conducive to multiple listens…original and well done in every aspect. I MUTE THE BURNING RIVER: djembe intro by Tony Vacca. I’d love to see these guys live to see if they can get this rich and full of a sound!?!? Wish there a lyric sheet. Very dense and lovely…not a boring second. HAPPY ON YOUR FEET GO: some very inspired flute by Jay Gandhi and the two female vocals that complement one another perfectly. EARLY IN THE MORNING: more of the same, like 1974 with much better equipment and production etc…conjures up The Incredible String Band. RAG YAMEN: tabla and guitar…bass then flute…my punk rock friends would prolly sneer at this album but they sneer at my band too so F’em…hippie doesn’t have to mean retro or silly…it can also mean frightening, intense and real. Cool cover photo of the Eagle Nebula.

For more info, visit: http://www.jimmatus.com/iWeb/Site/MAWWAL.html

Reviewed by Carlton Crutcher

Zone Six was founded in 1997 by German multi-instrumentalist Sula Bassana (aka Dave Schmidt), surely a long-serving veteran of the psychic wars (having a spacerock career dating back to the mid-1980’s), and one of the busiest men in rock, with concurrent involvement in at least two other bands (Electric Moon and Weltraumstaunen), and curator of Sulatron records. The band’s original statement of intent was to play an improvised mix of psychedelic/space, trance and krautrock, something which they have held true to, despite the passage of 14 years and an almost complete change of line-up in that time (Schmidt being the sole survivor from the early days). Indeed, few of the members listed in their current Progarchives bio are still in the band. Nonetheless, they have delivered a stunning slice of instrumental spacerock which surely holds to their original vision.

The Zone Six line-up put together for what must have been a very memorable gig at the 2011 Sulatron Records Label Night employs the slightly unusual concept of having two basses, handled by Komet Lulu and Paul_Pott, respective members of Electric Moon and Vibravoid. Rainer Neef plays ripping psychedelic guitar throughout the album and Modulfix provides synth-noises, while Dave Schmidt opts for the drummer’s stool this time around. Just three long tracks are featured on the resultant live recording, which stretches to seventy minutes in length. Stoned Washed begins its 21 minute journey with menacing drones, which are gradually built up using the two basses (one distorted, the other clean) and effects-heavy guitar. The closest musical touchstones are perhaps a less-chaotic Acid Mothers Temple or heavier Spacious Mind. The even-longer Timmee (almost 34 minutes in length) goes through a number of phases according to the chemistry between the musicians, getting really wild around the twelve minute mark, and collapsing in on itself about five minutes later before re-entering the fray for another glorious freakout. The emphasis throughout is on guitars and bass, although the distorted sounds are so entwined that it can be disorienting trying to single out which instrument is playing what. At 22 minutes, the bass/basses start grinding out what could be the middle riff of Hawkwind’s Time We Left jam, with Neef’s guitar lines echoing those of Dave Brock circa 1973. Set-closer Isotoxick is comparatively short at “only” 14 minutes, and is probably the most restrained, with Schmidt focusing more on cymbal crashes than pounding beats, although the basses retain their heaviness throughout. All in all, a great come-down track at the end of a really intense album.

With fantastic cover-art taking its themes from classic ’60’s psychedelia (via Vibravoid), this live album is a limited edition of only 100 copies, so it will not be around for long. Fans of guitar-heavy improvised spacerock need to check it out quickly before it becomes lost in space.

Check out the bands website at http://www.zonesix.de
For information on more Sulatron releases, go to http://www.sulatron.com or e-mail info@sulatron.com

Reviewed by Pat Albertson

One could hardly imagine thrash-metal trio Guilty As Sin pandering to their audience or sticking to one genre. Who would have thought there would be a place for King Crimson-style Frippery and ambient keyboards on a thrash-metal album, or trumpets and eastern sounds lined up alongside hardcore punk?! Psychtronic, the U.S. band’s fourth album since coming together in 2008, contains material that is likely to alternately thrill and alienate almost any listener, regardless of their musical taste. The band consists of Zak Ovoian on drums and “vocals” (not even the most generous could refer to him as “singer”!), guitarist Dan McAdam and bassist Ryan Dilberian. Other credited contributers include a brass player, belly dancer and cigar supplier! Not your usual thrash/punk line-up, that’s for sure.

Psychotronic opens with one of those ambient synth passages so beloved of spacerock bands, and it’s given the self-explanatory title of Start Transmission. So far, so good one would think, until the following four tracks rip out of nowhere in the space of about one minute apiece (Into Dust, the shortest, is a scant 45 seconds in duration). They sound near-identical, although Destroyed Reptoid 1.0 does feature momentarily melodic guitar lines in between the “verses”, and will be either musical heaven or hell, depending on the listener’s liking of GBH-style hardcore punk or Anthrax-thrash. Those more in the market for psychedelic spacerock are best advised to skip ahead to the sixth track – Addicted To Cyanide – which, at seven minutes, is as long as all the preceding tracks combined. The change in style is almost absolute as the band morph into King Crimson/Toolesque math rock, with a hint of Rush at their proggiest. Godekli Tede makes use of Middle-Eastern scales (perhaps necessitating the employment of the belly dancer listed on the CD cover), albeit put together in metal fashion, before substituting guitars for a muted trumpet and hand drums, in an extended coda that manages to be both ambient and pounding. This is followed by the frantic high-speed instrumental When Machines Eat Flesh, calling to mind the progressive metal of Dream Theater and Arjen Lucassen. Album closer and title track Psychotronic lingers for twelve minutes (a third of the total album length) and consists of a spacey guitar jam referencing Hendrix’s Third Stone from the Sun and showing that these guys really can play when they have a mind to. This is overlaid with the sound of a 45rpm Dalek played at 33, before winding down into a bizarre three minute electronic outro unlike anything that precedes it, eventually fading out into nothing.

Psychotronic is a game of (at least) two halves, and is therefore extremely unlikely to please anyone in its entirety. Thrash metallers will love the first few tracks, everyone else will almost certainly run a mile. Those who enjoy mixing up prog-metal and mathrock will prefer the later tracks. Unfortunately, there is not enough material of either kind in the album’s 36 minutes to encourage most listeners to want to seek it out.

For further information, go to http://www.myspace.com/guiltymusic2008
Email at sasmokeshop@comcast.net and ovoianrocks@yahoo.com

Reviewed by Pat Albertson

This is the second album from this Dutch trio of Rutger Smeets (guitar and vocals), Hans Mulders (drums) and Sander Haagmans (bass and vocals). I gotta say, these guys have really perfected the “heavy/mellow” vibe. Combining floating vocal harmonies with slow grooves and heavy riffs, they create a sound reminiscent of Colour Haze and early Queens of the Stone Age, which is thoroughly in play in the laidback opener Wild Goose and the dreamy closer 34 & more… But in between, they take things in their own direction, whether it’s the bluesy plunder of Goldstrike or the blistering instrumental rock of Octo, their songs are filled with hypnotic rhythms and clever riffing.

They are not at all afraid of pushing the psych and space envelopes either. The epic 14-minute long Behind, in particular, is a tour-de-force with its languid, mesmerizing grooves, swirling psychedelic phrasing and druggy vocal harmonies; a slow burning voyage, metamorphosing into a trippy jam that spirals through spacey mellow outs to deliciously fuzzed out intense dream bliss. Tasty stuff!

The title track even veers into clear spacerock territory with its wild wooshes of guitar noise and the underlying spacey textures that permeate the distorted jamming. One of the things I really like about this band is their thorough willingness to pull things right back away from the stoner grooves and just get spacey for a bit. An excellent track for this is Sea, which dips into chilled waters throughout the middle of the piece.

While still retaining the strong Colour Haze influence from their first album, Sungrazer are maturing and starting to explore their own sonic realms, and it makes Mirador a potent, blissed out musical journey worth taking again and again.

For more info, visit: http://sungrazer.nl, http://www.myspace.com/sungrazerband, and http://www.elektrohasch.de

Reviewed by Jeff Fitzgerald

Sky Burial is essentially one musician – Michael Page – that looks to have at least a half a dozen other CD titles out, and after experiencing Aegri Somnia I realize that I will likely want to seek out more of his work. Movement I – The Synaesthete’s Lament (40:15) is a lengthy journey of post-industrial deep-space ambient that only improves as it progresses and Nik Turner shows up twice throughout this epic playing the sax as only the co-founder of Hawkwind can do. Movement II – Within And Without (16:01) is a good electronic/ambient track that fully evolves into some quite enjoyable experimental sound. Page is a true visual and sound artist (in every sense of the word) who is currently living on Cape Cod. What initially drew me to this CD was the fact that Nik Turner does step in to give Michael Page a hand in creating this wonderful piece of music. But what made me want to play this disc a couple of times before I penned out this review was the masterful talent as well as the majestic playing of Sky Burial – aka Michael Page. Call it ambient, industrial experimental, indie, electronic ambient – call it whatever you like but this genre definitely manages to fully captivate you.

The CD comes housed in a four-way fold-out and that is enclosed in a two-way fold-over piece of artwork. If you want to seek out a physical copy of this CD, simply remember what its cover looks like from the provided image in this review. Should appeal to fans of Tangerine Dream, Nik Turner solo, Liquid Visions, Amon Duul, Cluster, SubArachnoid Space, Kinski and possibly Throbbing Gristle.

For more info, visit: http://www.collectivexxiii.com/sky, http://www.myspace.com/skyburial23, and http://www.utechrecords.com

Reviewed by Mike Reed

Despite loving their first two albums, I can’t say I was as enamoured by The Future Kings of England’s third release, The Vanishing Point. Not sure why, but it just didn’t grab me. So it was with mild trepidation that I approached their latest disc, Who Is This Who Is Coming? But I was more than pleasantly surprised when listening to it; I was blown away by this terrific album.

Based on a creepy 1904 ghost story by M. R. James entitled “Oh, Whistle and I’ll Come to You My Lad”, Who Is This Who Is Coming? is a richly evocative tapestry of English folk balladry, ambient music, sound effects and of course, great progressive rock. Divided into parts, but intended to be listened to as one whole piece, the mostly instrumental album begins with a cheerful little folk melody set to the chirping of birds. However, it is quickly overwhelmed by the chugging roar and whistle of a rushing train as the band breaks into The Globe Inn, with its stately organ and intricate guitar melodies counterbalanced by ghostly passages of spooky wailing. Further, amidst the sounds of crickets and gentle night winds, soft acoustic guitar weaves a mesmerizing pattern in Finding the Whistle. The Watcher Part 1, one of two vocal tracks on the album is a poignant English folk ballad which leads the listener down the foggy path into the deeply ambient, swirling, sometimes disturbing textures of the nearly 10-minute long title track. This one’s a real tour-de-force as it whirls and spirals. It builds a slow and creeping tension till it all finally explodes with the shattering rock of Convinced Disbeliever. The Watcher Part 2 is hardly a reprise of Part 1, delving as it does into droning, psychedelic folk reminiscent of The Incredible String Band. What follows is another 10-minute epic, The Face of Crumpled Linen, this one covering many moods as it builds to a shattering revelation, before the denouement of Spectacle of a Scarecrow, filled with haunted memories and dreams.

The Future Kings of England capture the glory days of early 70’s progressive rock, but they manage to take it in entirely new, fresh and original directions. Within this context, Who Is This Who Is Coming? is a truly brilliant evocation of the M. R. James story, not only bringing the story to life, but bringing the landscape and folklore of the Suffolk region of England to life as well. This one is highly recommended!

For more information, visit: http://www.thefuturekingsofengland.com and http://www.backwaterrecords.com

Reviewed by Jeff Fitzgerald

Following closely in the footsteps of their first two archival releases, Space Debris return with a third volume of live recordings and bits and pieces. Starting off in an unusually subdued mood, with moody acoustic piano, the 10-minute opening cut Mary-Joe-Anna nonetheless gets going eventually into another heavy jam from the band. The shorter Reprise of the Sun features some nice electric piano. Off course, throughout is the sterling organ work that is something of a signature sound for Space Debris, provided on some tracks by current keyboardist Winnie Rimbach-Sator and on others by former keyboardist Tom Kunkel. But let’s not forget the tight rhythm section of Peter Brettel (bass) and Christian Jäger (drums) and the endlessly creative guitar playing of Tommy Gorny. Those looking for trippy or spacey music won’t find much here (maybe dashes here and there, like the opening of Anima and the spacey drumfest of Astronaut Versus Kosmonaut). But for those looking for some top-notch, 70’s style instrumental rock with some bluesy/jazzy touches (diggin’ the last few minutes here of the 21-minute epic title track) will find plenty to love on Vol. 3. The bluesy stuff really comes out in the appropriately titled Blues; there’s some groovin’ Santana-style Latin jamming on Latrino Mortadella II, and even a bit of moody midnight soul music on the lovely Mynona. The band throw in a few really short tracks too, some fun little fragments like the trippy drum patter of the 27-second Namber Nein and the funky jam of the minute and a half long MoJoMe III. And there’s even the 11-second closing cut, Jerrys Aural Innovations, featuring our own starship captain Jerry Kranitz giving a bit of commentary that, like this collection, really sums up everything that Space Debris is all about.

For more information you can visit the Space Debris web site at: http://www.spacedebrisprojekt.de/info.htm

Reviewed by Jeff Fitzgerald

I got this CD-R and listened to it once – then I attempted to touch base with the band itself. After I never did hear back from them, I decided to give the disc a second listen and to check out their Myspace page to hopefully be able to scrap together enough information to give this disc a proper review. You get seven tracks – with a running time 38:25. Best described as mid-to-slow tempo psychedelic with a touch of the blues worked in. Black Wyrm Seed is based in Chicago and I saw noted that this CD-R was initially put out on cassette. Songs I liked best were Shadows Of Time (has some good lyrics, I thought), Goodbye, Blue Monday – sort of maybe reminds me of Syd Barrett, the two-and-a-half minute Sleeping Sickness, the seven-minute Walls Of Sodom and Broken Windowpane. A bit too low-key compared to what I prefer – yet don’t get me wrong it’s all still good. Line-up: Nathan M. Dodge – electric & acoustic guitars & vocals, Matthew Dodge – bass and Kurt Long – drums. I am not sure of just who I might compare Black Wyrm Seed to. But after spending a certain amount of time on their Myspace page, I found some notable bands and artists that might be similar or even somewhat similar to their music which are Dark Fog, OM, Plastic Crimewave Sound, Sleep and Heavy Water Experiments. This CD-R tends to sound better with each spin. Really liked their Myspace page.

For more info, visit: http://www.plustapes.com and http://www.myspace.com/blackwyrmseed

Reviewed by Mike Reed

Formed in Belgrade as recently as 2010, Serbian band Temple of the Smoke have released their debut album … Against Human Race on the Russian Association of Independent Genres label in 2011 (following the free download EP Consecration & Temple of the Smoke Big Band released earlier the same year). Such a nihilistic title may have been a factor in one reviewer commenting that the (pretty much) all-instrumental album “… indicates just how screwed up the world is”, while the band name brings to mind pure stoner rock, both giving premature warning of a bleak listen ahead. True, there is a certain amount of dark energy to be found on “… Against …” but there are also lighter shades and colours, as well as a multitude of influences beyond mere stone-age jamming. Comprising Dragan Mirkovic (drums, percussion and most excellent nom de rock), Dusan Zica (guitar, synthesizers, samples), Marko Ilic (bass) and Janko Strojanovic (guitar, voice), the band have obviously got their obligatory Hawkwind, Black Sabbath and Ozric Tentacles credentials sorted, but have also had an ear for less obvious influences – for example the heavy dub rhythm track and chukka-chukka guitars of Unnatural Recession brings to mind The Clash’s Guns Of Brixton.

Opening track Illudium Q-36 Explosive Space Modulator (nice title) comes out storming like Queens of the Stone Age riffing on a razor blade, before breaking down to just bass overlaid with soaring Edge-style guitar and bubbling synths. Following the dub-plated Unnatural Recession, the ten minute Naked Sun brings to the table a high energy yet melodic spacerock jam that is a perfect example of how to bring about sonic mood changes without resorting to the rather clichéd “loud bit/quiet bit” formula. Deadly Skies has a rather funereal opening but for sheer menace it pales in comparison to South of Heaven with its doom-laden Iommi-style riffage. This contrasts in turn with the reggae beats of Into the Storm with its (ironic?) sampled message that “citizens need to be armed to protect themselves from a tyrannical government”. Closing track Tortoise Du Mars is perhaps the most obvious nod to the space fusion sounds of Ozric Tentacles, until the roaring and distorted guitars emerge from their protective shell. Beyond this is about eight minutes of void, as if nobody had quite remembered the tape was still rolling – strange and perhaps a little anticlimactic to be waiting for a hidden track which doesn’t exist.

Taking many varied styles, Temple of the Smoke have managed admirably to weld and weave them into a thoroughly cohesive whole. Each individual track on its own is great; together, they present an epic sonic experience not to be missed for fans of psychedelic spacerock. If you think you don’t need to hear yet another album of instrumental stoner rock, you most definitely do need to hear … Against Human Race while it is still smokin’!

Temple Of The Smoke’s web-page can be found at http://www.myspace.com/templeofthesmoke
For more information on R.A.I.G., go to http://www.raig.ru

Reviewed by Pat Albertson