Øresund Space Collective - "The Black Tomato"
(Transubstans 2007, trans032)
Øresund Space Collective - "The Black Tomato"
(Transubstans 2007, trans032)
From Aural Innovations #37 (September 2007)
Wow, these guys are really on a roll. Hot on the heels of their outstanding 2-CD "It's All About Delay" album, Øresund Space Collective (OSC) are back with a brand new set of space jams. The Black Tomato consists of three tracks, totalling nearly 80 minutes of all instrumental improvisational space rocking bliss.
The CD kicks off with the nearly 40 minute "RumBle", which begins with a stoned jamming cosmic hard rocking space groove. There's some ripping trip guitar, freaked out alien electronics, and the whole atmosphere is like a deep space stoner acid jam. This is some of the heaviest music I've heard from OSC yet. And as you can imagine on a 40 minute improv jam, the music twists and turns through a multitude of moods and themes, though of course the key to real appreciation is to just sit back and surrender yourself to wherever the band wants to take you. It's a guided tour with the focus on the voyage and destination is the least of your concerns. OSC have a fluid cast of participants but everyone has more or less played with each other enough that it's no surprise that they continue to crank out ass kicking space jams that you can groove to endlessly! Some of it brings to mind a cross between Ozric Tentacles and Alien Planetscapes.
Next up is the 32 minute "The Black Tomato", another space rocking excursion. It's got some killer melodic development that really hooked me, while retaining the driving jam quality throughout. The organ and heavy keyboards give the music a 70s hard prog-psych edge that I really liked, and combined with the electronics, guitars and pounding rhythm section makes for an absolutely awesome space rock journey. Lots of cool Gong/Hillage elements and I even detected some moments of Frippertronic styled guitar, but mostly this is searing acidic mucho cosmic heavy jamming space rock. OSC have cultivated a real knack for taking off and exploring while keeping these loooooong jams comprehensible and consistently seductive throughout. Finally, rounding out the set is the relatively short (6 minutes) "Viking Cleaner", a quirky, playful, but totally spaced out rhythmic groove tune that makes for an appropriate finale to this outstanding set. These guys gotta start making the rounds of the festival circuit.
For more information you can visit the Øresund Space Collective web site at: http://www.oresundspacecollective.com.
There are STILL many hours of jams you can download from their site!
Reviewed by Jerry Kranitz