Sendelica - Streamedelica She Sighed As She Hit Rewind on the Dream Mangler Remote (R.A.I.G. 2010, R052)
Sendelica - Streamedelica She Sighed As She Hit Rewind on the Dream Mangler Remote (R.A.I.G. 2010, R052)
From Aural Innovations #41 (October 2010)
This is one of those albums that requires a lot of listens to explore its depths. Whether conjuring up the ancient countryside of Wales or the farthest reaches of the cosmos, Sendelica plays a brand of heavy psychedelia infused with jazz, Krautrock, ambient and space rock notions that is both intense and yet intriguingly mysterious.
I like how the band can completely rock out on tracks like the blues drenched space rock of Dream Mangler and the searing, almost motorik, Hawkwind-like psychedelic blaze of Spacehopper Blues, and then turn around and do a completely ambient piece like the mysterious, chaotically orchestral opening track, Song Of The Seidr or the otherworldly Carningli (Hill of Angels). I like when a band can do such varied types of music, but still always sound like themselves, and Sendelica achieve that. They've got their own unique sonic signature.
Occasionally, I have to admit, some of the guitar riffs sound a little on the familiar side, but it all works in the end as the band shifts from what is familiar to what is strange and alien, like stepping off the map, as the sounds get warped and mutated and delayed in varying ways. This certainly happens in the soaring 9-minute long Screaming and Streaming Into the Starlit Night. This time the lead is taken up on clarinet, with a jazzy, late night solo. But by the end of the piece we've gone from a smoky little jazz club to some place on the other side of reality where none of the rules apply anymore.
But it's on the grand 25-minute long centerpiece of the album, Day of the Locust that the band takes its playing to the furthest extremes. From its quietly unassuming beginning, it builds slowly into a harrowing freeform jam that could be the soundtrack to a nightmare. Mangled dreams indeed! Onward from quieter, but no less spine tingling passages, the band shifts gears into hyperdrive and takes us to the far side of the sun with some swirling noise soaked Acid Mothers style freaking out. Awesome stuff!
There is a limited edition version of the album that comes with a DVD that includes a trippy half-hour video called Trillian Eight, featuring a continuous ambient journey that is quite excellent, as well as a video for Screaming and Streaming Into the Starlit Nite and a live performance of a Krautrock-style track called Dark Disco. It's worth getting and, at least at the time of writing this review, is still available according to the band's Myspace page.
Whether you opt for the regular CD or the limited edition CD/DVD, you are in for a fantastical trip into the mysterious realms of instrumental psychedelia. Highly recommended!
For more info, visit the Sendelica web site at: http://www.myspace.com/sendelicapsyche
Visit the R.A.I.G. label web site at: http://www.raig.ru
Reviewed by Jeff Fitzgerald