Phosphene River
(Prestidigitation PRST 002)
Phosphene River
(Prestidigitation PRST 002)
From Aural Innovations #39 (May 2008)
Dan McGuire is back with his follow up to the amazing Jamnation CD. This CD
follows the same concept with bands providing him with unique jams over which
he reads his own unique poetry and spoken word pieces. The tracks are shorter
(2-18 minutes) and not as jam oriented as the first CD, but still a lot of great
bands contribute and Dan works his magic, mostly to great effect. The CD starts
off with Fuzzhead and a track called Her Kind. The Fuzzhead track is a bit like
old school Funkadelic and just perfect for Dan’s stuff… Red Hills
is next by Residual Echoes (almost 12 minutes). These guys have a total early
70’s vibe going down before the band starts just going a bit mad at 2½
minutes with over the top and out of control guitar soloing…the band finds
a noisy groove that is more or less maintained allowing Dan his space…
Plastic Crimewave Sound is next with Are you a Dragon? Noisy, Psychedelic acid
rock…and Dan gives a religious sermon of sorts. Wild stuff… Kawabata
Makoto (from Acid Mothers Temple) is next. This track starts very spacey and
slowly builds up with some great glissando guitar. Dan does not come in until
3½ minutes as the track is still floating out in space. It is just two
u layers of gitars and voice. A nice change. Catacomb do a really short piece
(2½ minutes). White Hills follow with Potter’s Field. A heavy Hawkwind
like wall of sound kicks in right away as the band jam out into space for 9½
minutes leaving plenty of space…. Killer track. Mammatus is up next with
Sire. With Mammatus, it is of course huge! Awesome track.
The Heads are next with a hard driving track for 15 minutes. Starts with intense
bass playing and then the very psychedelic acid drenched guitar and layers of
raw feedback take over and leave little space for Dan but he manages to find
his place during the psychedelic holocaust of sound…. Phew… Dave
Mitchell provides the short and spaced out Memoratíon (remix) to end
the 73 minute CD. Another great successful merging of heavy music and cool spoken
words.. Must get for psych fans.
Check out the record label web site at: http://www.facemop.com
Reviewed by Scott Heller