Aural Innovations — November 2012
Aural Innovations was a magazine and website on space rock and related genres, offering reviews, interviews, and general articles. It ran from 1998 to January 2016. The website is no longer active, and all articles are being imported into DPRP, to keep everything available for everyone. Read Aural Innovations — A Brief History, written by AI founder Jerry Kranitz.
Roy and the Devil's Motorcycle — Forgotten Million Sellers
(Voodoo Rhythm Records 2012, VRCD01, originally released in 1997) 
Roy and the Devil's Motorcycle — Tell It To the People
(Voodoo Rhythm Records 2012, VRCD69)
Jeff Fitzgerald
What do you get when you combine country fried rock n' roll with the manic energy of cowpunk and add in touches of sound collage and generous amounts of mutant guitar noise? If you guessed Roy and the Devil's Motorcycle, you're right! And with a sound like that, you might expect these guys to come from some southwestern psych town like Austin, Texas, but these four guys (three of them brothers) come from Switzerland!
Forgotten Million Sellers was the very first release from Voodoo Rhythm Records back in 1997, and is here now, fifteen years later, re-issued in celebration of the release of the band's third and latest album, Tell It To the People. You know that Forgotten Million Sellers is no standard country rock record from the start, when it begins with what sounds like a needle scraping across a 33⅓ rpm record playing at 78 rpm, before distorted guitars, rampaging drumming, wailing feedback and hallucinatory voices assault the eardrums.
From that noisy beginning, we launch into a collection of raucous tunes that have the frenzied cowpunk energy of bands like Jason and the Scorchers and Chickasaw Mudd Puppies combined with the noise/sound experimentalism of Sonic Youth. Fitting in with the punk ethos, the songs are mostly short (1½ - 3 minutes), but can reach some very intense moments with the vocalist screaming and the instruments wailing away like there's no tomorrow.
It only slows down in the middle a bit for a few slightly longer songs (3 - 5 minutes) combining sound collage with some twisted hurtin' tunes and monstrous bursts of feedback. Crazy stuff! It's not totally my thing, but I can appreciate what the band was trying to do. I'm just more into the psychedelic trippy side of things than the wild punk kind of sound that imbues these tracks. Man, did I have a smile inducing surprise on the way.
After hearing Forgotten Million Sellers, I dove a little more tentatively into Tell It To the People. My ears were a bit overwhelmed by the relentless sonic battery and boisterous swagger of the previous album. When things on this album started out with noisy feedback squall I thought, 'here we go again', but I was totally astonished when Six Pink Cadillac proved to be a druggy acoustic tune, the feedback merely creating an ambient backdrop to the guitars and vocals. Fifteen years on, and things seemed to have changed a bit for the cowpunks from Switzerland! My attention was definitely caught!
Second tune, I'm Allright certainly brings back the manic electric energy of Million Sellers, but this time out (as with the entirety of Tell It To the People), the punk attitude has been replaced with more of a wasted hippie aesthetic. I'm Allright comes off sounding like Steve Earle fronting Chrome, and it's quite cool. But this tune proves to be the loudest song in the set, as the band quickly begins to delve into a unique sort of space/country/rock sound with a distinctly mellow vibe to it. Tunes like the trippy, spaced out Cristina and the droning, echo laden Tears on My Pillow are light years away from the rowdy country punk of Million Sellers.
In fact, one of the great standouts of this album is a version of the traditional spiritual Will the Circle Be Unbroken that sounds like Klaus Schulze playing with the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band; a deep space hymn for the spiritual hippie in all of us. Far out, man! And from the wasted granola munching freak folk of Water Air Food Love to the ambient psychedelic forest journey of Piggy Bank, to the 'spirit of the 60's' country psychedelia of Henry's Blues, Tell It To the People is an entirely different experience from Million Sellers, and it's an experience I have to say, I definitely dug.
Gram Parsons coined the term 'Cosmic American Music', which he used to describe the music on his GP and Grievous Angel albums. As innovative as his music was though, I never honestly got the 'cosmic' part of Parsons' sound. Here, however, on Tell It To the People, 'Cosmic American Music' is reborn. Who'd have thought it would come from a group of guys from Switzerland?
Some people may find both of these albums to their taste, and I did enjoy both of them, although the most recent one I enjoyed a lot more. So, if you enjoy your music loud and noisy, with lots of punk spirit, check out Forgotten Million Sellers. But for me, the space cowboy milieu of Tell It To the People is what really hit the spot, and I highly recommend it. Yee-haw!
For more info, visit Roy and the Devil's Motorcycle on Bandcamp and at Voodoo Rhythm Records.
Fuzz Manta — Opus II
(Gateway Music 2011) 
Mike Reed
Fuzz Manta comes from Copenhagen, Denmark and they describe their music as '70's hard rock with female vocals. Opus II is the band's second full length CD plus they also have two EP's out. Their influences vary from artists such as Yes, King Crimson, Led Zeppelin, Robin Trower, Deep Purple, Black Sabbath and Uriah Heep. It does sound tempting, doesn't it? Thoroughly enjoyed the impressive well-played opener Motumann; Man With No Face (definitely has a Uriah Heep-like feel and vibe to it); Quiet Monday that sort of maybe reminds me of, say, Heart.
The eight-minute Lithia's Box with its Black Sabbath-like guitar (Opus II only gets better with each play) and Turn Around. Then before this opus (no pun intended) draws to a close, I took in White And More, the powerful Corrosion and the eleven-minute Let Me Walk (very '70's-ish to say the least, as this track clearly displays the band's heavy Zeppelin influence when Robert Plant, Jimmy Page, John Paul Jones and John Bonham were having a blues moment). Very nice.
Wanted to be sure and mention that I did hear a couple of songs from their first self-titled CD Fuzz Manta ('09) and I thought from at least those two cuts, that debut offering was just as good as Opus II - plus they have a third CD just out now titled Vortex Memplex where I saw on their own site that the CD's last track runs over the thirty-minute mark.
Line-up: Lene Kjae Hvillum - vocals, Freddy Fuzz - guitar, Morten - bass and Pelle Fuzz Manta - drums. This was the personnel that I was able to find on the Internet, as I didn't get a physical copy of Opus II - but only a download. I did contact the band through Facebook and they informed me that similar bands would be Witchcraft, Siena Root and Horisont. I've never even remotely heard of either of those bands but now it makes me want to later at least look them up. Also, I dug watching some live fan videos of Fuzz Manta on You Tube.
Kellar — Beloved Dean of Magic
(self-released 2012)
Kellar — Smokescreen
(self-released 2012)
Alan Bragg
Kellar are a three-piece outfit from the south of England who class themselves as texture rock. Having struggled myself to find an easy means of classifying them, it is perhaps best to use their own definition to try and summarise the nebulous racket herein.
The album starts with a cacophony of noise, over which beats a manic drum rhythm similar to both Terry Ollis's tribal patterns on Hawkwind's first two albums and Robert Wyatt's punk-jazz hard hits on the Softs' first two albums. Musically there appears to be some bizarre skeletal structure at play, with some level of pre-planned arrangement hinted at here and there, glimpsed briefly through the walls of distortion pedal abuse. Riffs and looped passages are hinted at, but almost instantly obliterated by either cross-tempo drumming or some other intrusive noise. The band do vary the dynamics a little across the album, and at times the listener is rewarded with quieter themes, such as the first few minutes of The Golden Butterfly or the strange breakdown in the middle of The Nested Boxes which pairs a stuttering oscillator with an odd Donkey-bray guitar part.
However the long and the short of it is that Kellar are a noisy experimental band who worship the decomposition, primitive jamming, distortion and idiosyncrasies that conventional bands go to pains to remove from their music or get out of their system in dank rehearsal spaces years before they present their output to a willing audience. At times, enough white noise is overlaid to create the illusion that the album was perhaps recorded in a large open-plan workshop or other Wagnerian hive of industry, with the band playing along, or against, the prevailing background noise.
On the whole the music has a largely unplanned vibe that hints at such extremes of music as the proto-industrial wash of Throbbing Gristle or the uncompromising avant-rock of AMM or The Red Krayola, which although challenges the listener deserves much respect simply for not trailing off into either tepid Post-rock ambience or a more explicitly affected musique concrète.
Listening to Beloved Dean of Magic whilst going about daily activities provides an entirely plausible alternative soundtrack as one navigates busy shopping areas, industrial areas and public transport networks. The constant pillow of noise that Kellar subject the listener to almost offers a cathartic remedy to the inconsistent and constantly fluctuating machine noise you encounter in daily life but tune out to, blood pressure withstanding. One can imagine this works both ways; creating such music is probably as cathartic to the various members of Kellar in the same way that the hour's worth of unskilled pounding and unsteady riffing on Earth's Living in the Gleam of an Unsheathed Sword broadly represents Dylan Carlson's purification and rebirth following years of heavy opiate abuse.
Picking out various tracks for praise or damnation is especially difficult. The band have a single thick wall of sound that they fall back on with every track although sometimes a more notable feature, such as a spiralling phaser or dolphin-song oscillator will float up to the top of the music. However, in the main, the music stays fairly constant in both bombast and texture, proving at times a chore to listen to, but raising important questions as to where the boundaries of music and virtuosity can be realistically placed.
By way of slight contrast here, Kellar explore more open and spacious textures on this cut. Maybe having successfully cast out their various demons on Beloved Dean, the band allow a greater musical freedom, and rely less heavily on thick walls of distortion. Instead the music here is infused with an emotionally heavier and slightly occult and dreamy vibe. Opening track Voice of a Broken Machine sounds for all the world like a terminally broken rendition of the Elevators' May the Circle Remain Unbroken, having been left exposed on a high plateau for a millennia or three, with an understated swirling guitar part counteracting drums echoed to the point of self-oscillation.
This icy track follows this vein long after a conventional band would have changed either the tempo or the timbre of the music (and again drifted off into dull Post-rock) and six minutes in, the same esoteric guitar parts are still vying with echoed drums for attention. Perhaps a little frustratingly, the band revert back to their wall of noise, as the echoed drums begin to take up all the sonic space left in the track.
Second track, the Bauhaus-esque They Gather the Horizon, pairs another tribal rhythm with a grinding bass line over which a roughshod Daniel Ash guitar part limply sustains and feedbacks incoherently. This track visits a few different textures, morphing from aggressive passages to ambient passages with a certain ease previously unhinted in Kellar's music. However, the basic theme of the music is still too sparse to be properly fleshed out here, leaving the track with an unfinished air.
Overall this track has the most conventional composition and generally indicates that it is built up from a prepared score of some kind, although it still sounds far from finished with the tempo wandering as the track progresses. This track feels more like an unfinished piece of conventional music, with a band desperately trying to patch the cracks as they appear, and is perhaps less enjoyable purely because it lacks the blundering anti-composition of Kellar's earlier works.
Third track, The Levitation of Princess Karnak, opens with slowly swelled chords reminiscent of the string-synth soundtracks of '70s horror and thriller films. Here the band finally find a next level to their abstract texture-driven music. Whilst the music reflects their earlier experimentation with sheer noise, the overall timbre of the music is so shifted that it evokes a completely different atmosphere. Although still lacking such rudimentary features as a set tempo and melody, the more experimental and ambient nature of this track hints more towards the pre-sequencer Tangerine Dream album tracks of slowly shifting phasers and sustained chords. Whilst the track yet again gets noisy and incoherent it still retains this subtler flavour.
For more info, visit the Kellar Bandcamp site.
The 2013 Fruits de Mer Annual — Temple Music / Vespero split single
(Fruits de Mer Records 2012, Crustacean 35, 7" vinyl)
Jerry Kranitz
The Fruits de Mer annuals feature what the label considers the best of what they hoped to release the past year but for whatever reasons couldn't. And the 2013 edition has a pair of winners indeed.
One might furrow the brow or purse the lips at the thought of pairing covers of Hollies and Faust songs with one another. Well, I wouldn't, I think that's cool as hell. But when you hear how Temple Music handles The Hollies' Pegasus, you'll realize that this decidedly un-Hollies-ish treatment sounds like they might have wished they'd been assigned a Faust song instead.
Temple Music take this 3 minute slice of pop craftsmanship and run it through an avant-psychedelic slice 'n' dice. The vocal portion of the song and core melody are intact, but everything else that surrounds it is 8 minutes of spaced out, tripped out drones and lysergic mind-fuckery. In fact, I'd say that Temple Music's interpretation of Pegasus should be held up as a model of the kind of imagination and creative license that should be taken with cover songs. Absolutely kick ass! Note that this will be on the Hollies covers LP Fruits de Mer has scheduled for 2013.
Faust have covered a wide range of music over years, from abstract experimentalism, to Krautrock, psychedelia, and songs. Jennifer was one of their songs, and to me it's a beautiful blend of meditative drift, avant-psychedelia, and noisy experimental elements. Russian space rockers Vespero tackle the song, and to my knowledge this is the first recording that the usually all instrumental band have released with vocals.
Vespero put their own stamp on the song by dispensing with Faust's more overt experimental elements and focus their efforts on creating pure trippy psychedelia. At least they do that for the first 6 minutes. The last two minutes consist of a free-wheeling space improv with rumbling, droning, soundscapey electronics and bursts of drumming. It must be tough to take a piece of music that's already firmly in the experimental realm and put your own spin on it, and Vespero do an admirable nice job.
The single will be available mid-December and is limited to 800 copies, and as usual this is vinyl ONLY, no CDs or downloads. If interested you better hurry because Fruits de Mer releases sell out QUICK!
For more information, visit the Fruits de Mer Records website.
Various Artists — The League Of Psychedelic Gentlemen
(Fruits de Mer Records 2012, Crustacean 34, 7" vinyl)
Jerry Kranitz
The League Of Psychedelic Gentlemen is a 7" EP from Fruits de Mer Records with new and previously unreleased songs by Nick Nicely, The Bevis Frond, Anton Barbeau and Paul Roland.
Nick Nicely had a single on Fruits de Mer earlier this year that featured his 1982 song Hilly Fields, plus a re-recording of the song on the flip side. Rosemary's Eyes is his contribution to this set, and it's a steady paced rocker with propulsive drumming, acoustic and electric guitars, and bubbling alien keys that really make the song. The Bevis Frond contribute I'm A Stone, which is trademark Nick Saloman acid minstralism. Hot on the heels of his 3-song Fruits de Mer single, Sacramento based songwriter/musician Anton Barbeau offers up When I Was 46, recorded with his band Three Minute Tease.
This is totally spaced out pop-psych with a bouncy groove, great piano and mandolin (or some such instrument) interplay, and UFO synths blazing about. Finally, Paul Roland's The Puppet Master was recorded in 1980 and originally intended for his second album, House Of Dark Shadows. In fact, the promo sheet says that Paul had lost track of the song until a fan sent it to him recently. This sucker sounds like some lost nugget from the 60s. Both fun and creepy, it's right up there with the earliest Syd penned Floyd singles. Note that the song includes Robyn Hitchcock and Knox of the Vibrators on chorus.
A nifty set from a quartet of psychedelic underground veterans! The single will be available mid-December and is limited to 1000 copies, and as usual this is vinyl ONLY, no CDs or downloads. If interested you better hurry because Fruits de Mer releases sell out QUICK!
For more information, visit the Fruits de Mer Records website.
The Luck Of Eden Hall — 4-song single
(Regal Crabomophone 2012, Winkle 9, 7" vinyl)
Jerry Kranitz
Chicago based psychsters The Luck Of Eden Hall have a sizable discography dating back to the early 90s, and have made many contributions to Fruits de Mer Records compilations and singles. Regal Crabomphone is the Fruits de Mer sub-label for releases that include original songs and the latest from The Luck Of Eden Hall is a 4-song single with two covers and two band penned tunes.
The first of the covers is a killer interpretation of The Doors' Crystal Ship. I love the way it switches between dreamy and acidic sections. Proggy mellotron-ish orchestrations sail throughout, which sounds really cool paired with the molten guitar bits. The second cover is Black Sheep, by a band called SRC that I'd never heard of. A quick YouTube search took care of that, revealing that SRC was from Detroit and Black Sheep was released in '68.
The song has a haunting, doomy organ melody and shimmering acidic guitar licks. The Luck Of Eden Hall are faithful to the spirit of the original, especially the crucial organ riff. But the band put their own indelible stamp on the song, with their characteristic vocals, the drumming is more dramatic, and the guitar solos have a ripping STING.
The two band penned tunes are from their Alligators Eat Gumdrops album, released this past summer. Bangalore opens with a brief sitar/acid guitar combo intro and then quickly launches into a high energy psych rocker with chunky guitar chords and sitar riffs. This Is Strange has a great pop-psych sound, but also more of that chunky guitar that injects a heavier, meatier edge into the music. The spirit of the 60s lives large in this band, though the songs are no mere retro affair. The compositions are outstanding, and combined with top notch production and arrangement makes the music pretty damn impressive.
The single will be available mid-December and is limited to 750 copies, and as usual this is vinyl ONLY, no CDs or downloads. If interested you better hurry because Fruits de Mer releases sell out QUICK!
For more information, visit the Fruits de Mer Records website.
Various Artists — The White EP
(Fruits de Mer Records 2012, Crustacean 33, 2 x 7" vinyl)
Jerry Kranitz
Fruits de Mer have been coming up with some cracking ideas for theme albums. The White EP is a double 7" set with covers of 8 songs by 8 different bands from The Beatles' White Album (yeah, I know, technically just titled The Beatles). Here's the rundown:
Three Minute Tease (Anton Barbeau's band) do a more or less faithful cover of Cry Baby Cry. It's got a more drugged, valium-like feel than the original, and Barbeau's vocals alone make it quite different than the The Beatles. I got the same feel from The Seventh Ring Of Saturn's cover of Savoy Truffle. Not nearly as rocking as the original, it nonetheless has a nice groove, and the jam segment has a cool dirty bar Blues vibe.
If I'd been tasked with assigning The Bevis Frond with their song, Glass Onion certainly would have been on my short list, and sure enough, it sounds exactly what you might expect Glass Onion to sound like if covered by The Bevis Frond. The Luck Of Eden Hall do a nearly spot on cover of Everybody's Got Something To Hide Except For Me And My Monkey. Ditto for Jack Ellister's spirited Dear Prudence. And Henry Padovani's Long Long Long sounds like what the song might have if Nick Drake had done it.
Among the more adventurous re-interpretations of the set is The Pretty Things' sedate rendition of the ultra-aggressive Helter Skelter. The Pretty Things ease the pace considerably, giving the song a steady rhythmic groove, light symphonics, and cool snaking acid guitar licks. But for sheer creative muscle flexing, Cranium Pie's cover of The Continuing Story Of Bungalow Bill is the hands down winner for me. Jeeez... how do I describe this? It's like they were first assigned to cover Revolution #9, got into the spirit of that piece, and then did an about-face and covered Bungalow Bill instead. Considering that Bungalow Bill was one of The Beatles fun novelty type songs, this is some pretty crazy stuff. I love it!
The single will be available mid-December and is limited to 1234 copies, and as usual this is vinyl ONLY, no CDs or downloads. If interested you better hurry because Fruits de Mer releases sell out QUICK!
For more information, visit the Fruits de Mer Records website.
The Interstellar Cementmixers — Submerged Reality
(Planet X Records 2011, PX 2038)
Albert Pollard
I press play on the system and stand at the gates. I wait in silence, eager before the great shadowy nothing, charged in anticipation for my frequency to shift.
All around me, the bloated synthesizers bubble and toil, I align and proceed, understanding that the solitary walk into measureless blackness may take some time.
The monotonous tones and the recurrent distortions of frequency ensure that the submerged reality plays for eternity with no audible difference from when it began; this I assume is to accommodate for the natural vibrations of the total 3/4 fractal resonance system.
The reverberation I find is akin to being dead. But once in that place, one then assures oneself that nothing lasts forever, and one's hopes lay on the premise that the constant attack of audible frequency will end before insanity consumes one by its constant repetition and its minimal droning.
At this point some initiates call out to their God for blessed release. Some on the other hand revel in this submerged reality, and become quite contented with the subtle hypnotic twinkling of electronics. I however take out a packet of rizla's, and without remorse time long I sat, pondering that the occasional organ sounds a lot like the Crumar under my bed!
Without remorse I smoked numerous big 'uns, and by the third phase I finally conclude that a tempo change is surely needed, but experience assured me that it would not come, and 'like a day' it did not materialize, and again I further time long sat twitching rizla's.
Twenty minutes later, I fell asleep.
Resolutely based in the subtle phases of synthesizer sound creation, The Interstellar Cementmixers take the ethic of Tangerine Dream and make it their own. They do not try to further it, but rather they align with it. They take what the great pioneers of the genre have placed before them, and have interacted with it over and over throughout the 80 minutes of Submerged Reality. I like it because I love early Tangerine Dream, and I find that The Interstellar Cementmixers have this distinct Tangerine Dream feel, more in the vein of Atem or Zeit, as it is more noises and drones than it is sequenced patterns
Submerged Reality is a total mellow hypnotic headphone album, and a very subdued and melancholic one at that, as the title suggests!
Check out The Interstellar Cementmixers on Bandcamp.
Projective Module — Other Things That Happened
(Black Note Music 2011)
Albert Pollard
Projective Module is the latest project from J.C. Mendizabal, aka Kyron. And like so many well-produced Kyron albums, I find that the production of Other Things That Happened is also very well executed.
The mix of the subtle with the edgy seems to be in perfect equilibrium, making the journey through the album all the more pleasant without any injustice to the listener. The feel of the tracks to me lie in very ambient places, and if I was to sum up the sound, I would state that it is somewhere between Jorge Reyes on the subtle etheric level, and Son Kite on the transient minimal dance level. It is electronic orientated hypnotism that has melody, beat, and structure, rather than pure sound creation that has not, and it plays heavily with this melody and beat ethic throughout the majority of the twelve tracks of the album.
Other Things That Happened, according to the overview on the bio, is based entirely upon the conception that Three Immortals fell into a deep dark slumber and ventured far into realms of existence far beyond our own, seeding our nervous system with alien life! Yet, there is no mention to the condition that only through death can one truly and fully understand that the frequencies of immortality are the true opposite harmonic resonance's of the present reality's constant F# drone, and therefore cannot be penetrated materially due to the vast frequencial difference of a dense material body.
However, with a Merkaba, one could in theory bodily escape from this three-dimensional intergalactic universal monotony without being astrally dependant on the light body, as is with these supposed Immortals. So, for this reason I assume that the Immortals went nowhere and were indeed sleeping off a drug haze! Keep it up J. C.!
For more info, visit the Black Note Music site at Deconstuctionist.
Jesus on Mars — Jesus on Mars
(Dissolving Records 2012, Henge 006)
Albert Pollard
Playing heavily on the noise aspect of synthesizers, Jesus on Mars, in my opinion should be sent to Mars, and left to twiddle his knobs alone!
The sounds are in your face, and relentless with it. They seem to get under your skin and make you feel uncomfortable and somewhat agitated. As if that is its purpose! It plays along repetitive throughout the five tracks. It also has a definite feel of improvisation, which tends to add to the uncomfortable nature of the whole affair.
Certain sounds on here make me think of Edgar Froese's solo stuff, i.e. Aqua and Epsilon in Malaysian Pale in particular, which really allows for the mismatched chaos to embed itself deep into the soul without much effort. The style is ambient, but it is also noisy. It has something unnatural about it, and I put this down to the stark clashes of sound, and the way that the constant sound levels throughout have no particular structure, which leaves one rather battered by the drones and the frequencies, without any respite.
There are parts that are mellow and relaxing, namingly track 4, Galactic Pot Healer, which is my favourite track, as this takes the Edger Froese sound in earnest, but on the whole I tend to find that Jesus on Mars is a very hard listen. I expect this of course with certain types of synthesizer sound creation. This is no bad thing, but I just find that it is too much of one thing and that there is not enough difference over the sixty plus minutes to really get me into it. The style of sound is somewhat a constant oppressive, so this in itself makes for a difficult listen.
For more info visit the Dissolving Records website.
Stubb — Stubb
(Superhot Records 2012, SR001CD)
Pat Albertson
"Stubb" the album serves as both the recorded debut for the three-piece band of that name, and the first release by Superhot Records. Hailing from the UK, Stubb the band consist of Jack Dickinson on guitar and vocals, Pete Holland on bass and backing vocals, and Chris West on drums. The power-trio format and heavy blues rock approach bring to mind images of The Jimi Hendrix Experience, Cream (although without the quirkiness) and Taste, and all three bands are reflected in the music. No drum machines, synthesizers, lofty concepts or philosophising here (at least not until the acoustic Crosses You Bear, a two minute interlude that sits smack in the middle of the album), this band is all about fuzzy riffs, and speedy guitar solos, with generous amounts of wah-wah.
The intro and solos on album opener Road in particular are the sounds of late-period Hendrix rising from the grave, while Scale The Mountain - best track on the album - features a rolling groove that is hard to resist, with a barrage of surreal guitar effects to close. Dickinson's vocals are perhaps not quite as strong as his guitar playing, but serve the purpose for the heavy rocking music. The album was recorded live in a basement with minimal overdubbing, but such is the power of the bass playing and drumming that the sound is very full and thick even without a rhythm guitar, as on Flame, the third track in.
By track number four, Soul Mover, there is a danger of formula and repetition setting in, which the aforementioned two-minute Crosses You Bear manages to break up, although it also highlights the shortcomings of Jack Dickinson's vocals. Hard Hearted Woman rolls out another head-shaking heavy rock groove in the tradition of Hendrix's Foxy Lady, but with evil on her mind, before collapsing into sparse and echoing guitar solo over a slinky bassline. Crying River is about as close to a ballad as Stubb ever gets, while Galloping Horses manages to achieve semi-epic status across its seven minutes of fretboard mangling guitar solo.
At 35 minutes, Stubb the album is probably about the right duration, and will surely appeal to fans of '70's classic rock revivalists such as Colour Haze and Radio Moscow, as well as the original generation of psychedelic blues rock. Footage of the band performing such tracks as Hard Hearted Woman can be found on youtube, as can an amusing tongue-in-cheek clip of the band spinning the test pressing of Road.
For further information, go to the Stubb Bandcamp site.
Ogressa — Warts and All
(Dali's Llama Records 2011) 
Pat Albertson
If there was ever a CD cover that gave a perfect image of the music found on the disc inside, Ogressa's Warts and All is surely it. The band name and album title only enhance the expectation of sludgy, grimy stoner rock, a promise that is absolutely delivered on throughout the album. The cover of Warts and All features the titular Ogressa advancing menacingly, brandishing a wooden club with iron spikes like she is getting set to bash your brains out, and with a suitably disgruntled look on her face.
The mean dude in the shadows of the Ogressa monster is Zach Huskey, long surviving member of California stoner rock band The Dali's Llama. While that band remains very much a going concern, Huskey is presumably suffering from creative overload, hence this new side project, where he is joined by Whores of Tijuana drummer Trent Ramseyer, who switches to lead vocals for Warts and All. While not likely to challenge Pavarotti or Bono, Ramseyer's gravelly Ozzy-meets-Lemmy-in-a-dark-alley voice is well suited to the dirty, heavy guitar sounds of Ogressa.
The first three tracks on Warts And All set forth the recipe for the entire album, that being big fat grinding guitars and stomping rhythms, a-la mid-'70's Black Sabbath. Indeed, Give Me Some Space practically screams Hole in the Sky at you, but if it is indeed a steal, it is a damn good one. Mange features some far out Huskey guitar soloing, which contains a bluesy element found in all the best '70's hard rock bands, while Rational Man opens with a few sustained power chords before moving into a gutsy driving mid-paced rocker, making it one of the albums highlights.
Sound effects oddity She Awakens features Ogressa waking up, stomping around her cave, and presumably looking for a few humans whose bones she intends to grind to bake her bread. Lady Ogress is a slow doomy sludgefest that calls to mind the heavy nuggets of Leaf Hound, Warhorse, Uriah Heep and - inevitably - early Black Sabbath. The Boss is quite different, perhaps because it is the only non-original track on the album. First recorded by UK 1977 punk band The Mutants (who were dismissed by punks at the time for being too rocky), The Boss is a guitar instrumental that sounds a bit like The Ventures playing in a damp and dilapidated garage, nicely breaking up the overpowering distorted guitars found on much of the remaining album.
Sonaran Debris, a world-weary sonic dirge featuring Huskey on vocals, is followed by the amazing and unstoppable Cuts on My Scars, a real standout track that ratchets up the tempo several notches, fast, funky and ploughing all before it. Album closers Snakehead and Animal Mask return to the sounds of the opening cuts, the former consisting of slow grinding menace, the latter swinging a lead-heavy groove.
Ogressa is a celebration of classic 1970's heavy guitar rock, with a brief nod to "Nuggets"-era garage psych, and laced with '90's grunge and stoner rock. If the sound of Black Sabbath with all the miserable bits taken out sounds appealing, give this warts-and-all recording a spin; you will not be disappointed.
Find this album on Dali's Llama Records SoundCloud page and for more info, check the Ogressa page on the Dali's Llama Records website.
Hyne — 3000
(self-released 2011)
Mike Reed
Not really sure as to what drew my attention to this CD to review for Aural Innovations. Perhaps it's because I noticed the CD was a left-over from the submission list of titles to cover from the previous list of choices. Or maybe I simply dug the CD cover. Either way, I thoroughly enjoyed this debut CD effort from Hyne - a five-piece stoner rock collective from Hamburg, Germany. I couldn't help but notice that this CD has no bar code or a catalog number. Therefore, I could only assume that the band had assembled this CD themselves which also sort of impressed me.
Liked about every track here -like Loafer (which I thought sort of maybe had a Monster Magnet-like vibe), the full-throttled rocking title cut 3000 that definitely reminded me of Motorhead, the ass-kicking Slow Suicide (are we having another Motorhead moment?), Suck It which belongs on Internet radio and the nine-minute stoner mind-blower Cries From The Hidden which is, in my opinion, the CD's best song - hands down. That leaves Vertical Roll, the head-banging Witch's Cauldron and the finale Spirit of Now to this thirty-five minute outing of pure stoner / metal mayhem.
3000 undoubtedly possesses heavy guitars, mighty bass and droning drums to take its listeners all the way in. Sure, this sort of stoner rock has in fact been done over many times throughout the past so-many years, but 3000 is a fully welcomed (addition) to all the similar CD's out there.
Line-up: Adam McLocklan - vocals, Sebastian Dietz and Christian Roos - guitars, Stefan Bucholz - bass and Bjorn Frohlich - drums. Should draw in fans of Kyuss, Monster Magnet (obviously), Dixie Witch, Sheavy, Electric Wizard, Orange Goblin, we can't forget Motorhead and possibly Queens of the Stone Age. Essentially, a must-hear.
For more info, visit Hyne on Bandcamp.
The Gray Field Recordings — Hypnagogia
(Reverb Worship Records 2012, RW 191)
Carlton Crutcher
Of the hundreds of CD's, tapes and vinyl albums I have, this release is one of a handful that I go to repeatedly if I want music that is truly art and music that sounds better and different every time I listen to it!! From Stillwater Oklahoma, The Gray Field Recordings is R. Loftiss and friends and Hypnagogia is a reissue on the excellent Reverb Worship label.
BLOODSTREAM: Instant other worldliness, R. Loftiss vocalization and then spoken lyrics with an array of sounds and noises. RING BELLS: Drumming and flute? Sounds like a Mayan ceremony or celebration! No listing of the musicians involved with this CD?! HOUSE OF GRAPE: Somber and still, repetitive ominous riff then some percussion and second guitar with spoken vocal thru a 1920 telephone! Yes, meditative and interestingly coolio. The vocal reminds me of Yoko on Revolution #9, "then you become naked". This one sounds Tibetan!! IN EXODUS: Sounds like a top spinning with blips and blorps then some keyboard drone!! A stroll on another planet, yes!!
PRELUDE TO AN ALCHEMICAL WEDDING: Classic experimental sound of droning stringed instruments. Great title!!! Get's louder and heavier... sounds almost like an orchestra tuning up but more flowing, keeps going and growing, like walking thru an old dreamhouse! FORTY WHITE HORSES: Another great title, plunky guitar stoppin' and startin', then a second one... clear sound/recording... almost like someone got recorded preparing for a recording without knowing it! The big spoken/sung Rebecca vocal. Again, very beautiful and ethereal, then some violin, very nice... two female vocals. YOU HAVE SUFFERED: Recording of old scratchy record mixed together with the country record of "You Have Suffered" run thru loops and effects.
NANCY'S SONG TO CHARLIE: Spoken word with cello... "and swallows us"... then light airy acoustic guitar riff with angel vocals and more spoken word. STARS FALL TO EARTH: Industrial growls then drum noise and loops. Sharon says it sounds spooky... now some piano and sampled vocal, very trippy, original, clear clean production. PASSIFLORA: Poetry recited by Rebecca with guitars... some singing then super distorted guitar... Pop/Noise? The next wave?? Picks up where Jesus and Mary Chain left off? CREEPING: Quiet doodling, atmospheric and contemplative.
COLDSPACE (LIVE): Sounds like a cold space! Prolly was! Groaning instruments all slowly leaning on one another. Yes, very nice. It's opening my third eye! Violin and cello?? No listing of instruments with CD?? Yes, sounds like it was recorded in a boathouse over a frozen lake. DRUM SLUT (LIVE): Speed violin, then smooshy electro drums. Very clean recording for being live. Sounds very Middle Eastern but also very modern and experimental.
NANCY'S SONG TO CHARLIE (LIVE): Somber with somber vocals, then some pretty guitar, fantasy swooshes, then hops into another dimension... lilting guitar and back to somber vocals and cello, but lighter/different now! TULUM (DEMO): A Renaissance Festival sound, but nice... keeps developing, moving upwards and around, almost like a recital you'd hear at a University?! SCARED OF WOLVES (ORIGINAL): Last song on CD, eerieness, spoken vocal in the distance, then sung/spoke Rebecca live vocals... Gongs??... and back to eerie spoken distant vocal, taken from TV?, cool liquid piano tinkling, and it's over...
For more info, visit The Gray Field Recordings on Bandcamp.
Panzerpappa — Astromalist
(Rune Grammofon 2012, RCD2135/RLP3135, CD/LP)
Jerry Kranitz
Panzerpappa are a Norwegian quartet with an interesting variety of instrumentation that includes saxophone, keyboards, drums, bass, electric and acoustic guitars, and everyone is credited with percussion. Numerous guests contribute bassoon, English horn, flute, xylophone, vibraphone, cello, violin and viola. Astromalist is the band's fifth album since their debut in 2000, and their first for the Rune Grammofon label (and my introduction to their music).
The music across the album's 7 tracks is firmly in the RIO/Avant-Prog mold, with Present and Univers Zero being the closest analogies, though Canterbury influences are also apparent (the promo sheet notes that one or more members played in Richard Sinclair's band some years ago). But Panzerpappa occupy the more accessible end of the RIO/Avant-Prog spectrum. The music can be beautifully melodic, and only mildly dissonant, and indeed Panzerpappa have a flair for incorporating dissonance in a way that retains the music's accessibility and makes it more interesting and compelling.
Bati La Takton!, Femtende Marsj, and Satam are the heavy rockers of the set. On Bati La Takton!, saxophone and guitar trade licks over the kind of intense rocking piano/bass interplay and rhythmic pattern that characterized the early Present albums. I also hear some Zappa-like compositional elements. Femtende Marsj is similar and brought to mind the soundtrack to a frantic movie chase scene. Then after a couple minutes the music takes a 360 degree turn into a calmer chamber music section, with voice samples talking about the Lockerbie bombing, before wrapping up with an intensely rocking finale.
LOTS happening in a mere 4 minutes! Satam has a high energy rocking Univers Zero/Present feel, though it transitions through Canterbury flavored segments, and another section with guitar and piano interplay that I enjoyed, made all the more interesting by the addition of a brass section (which must be the keyboards). The musicians are then whipped into a frenzy for a full blown orchestral finale.
Ugler i Moseboka is a fun track with intriguingly varied themes. It opens with a lovely flute melody, soon taken over by a brief section that sounds like it could be the music to a Frank Sinatra song. It quickly takes on a Canterbury-ish vibe, though its highly orchestral and gorgeously melodic. But then it takes a slightly darker turn, starting to rock out a bit more, while retaining the orchestral elements. The pace quickly rises and falls, but never abruptly. These guys are like Olympic gymnasts of composition and arrangement.
Anomia conjured up surreal images of a Fellini movie featuring some kind of gypsy jazz Italian street festival. The music is whimsical but also includes parts that will make listeners swoon. The title track is in some ways similar, and includes bits that sound exactly like the first Present album. Finally, at 9 minutes, Knute pa Traden is the longest track of the set. It begins with a lulling sax and flute duo, against mildly intense guitar, piano and rhythmic pace. And from there Panzerpappa take us through their continually shifting, slightly off-kilter and dissonant Prog rock thematic paces, seamlessly incorporating styles and influences faster than I can type the analogies that are popping into my head.
In summary, Panzerpappa will surely appeal to fans of the classic RIO bands like Univers Zero, Present, and Samla Mammas Manna, though they are accessible enough that the music may be a good introduction to the Avant-Prog world for Progheads with more mainstream tastes.
Astromalist will be re-released in August of 2025 from the Panzerpappa Bandcamp page. For more info, visit the Rune Grammofon website.
Mawwal — High Hills in the Creaving Road
(Ancient Records 2012, CD)
Jerry Kranitz
Massachusetts based musician and composer Jim Matus has released albums under several band names, the common thread being a focus on progressive world fusion. The 2001 released ISHQ album by Paranoise was my introduction to Jim's music, followed by three Mawwal albums. Though familiar with them all, the new Mawwal album - High Hills in the Creaving Road - is the first of Jim's music I've reviewed, and the first question that crossed my mind while listening was what the heck does "Mawwal" mean? Jim's website reveals that "Throughout the Middle East 'Mawwal' is a form of popular music that often criticizes society and is performed through improvisation." CLICK HERE for a Wikipedia page with additional details.
As you might by now guess, the music on High Hills in the Creaving Road is highly influenced by Arabic themes, though there are significant African influences as well. The album consists of Matus penned songs and traditional songs that Matus arranged. The album opens with Youmala, a traditional Gnawa song arranged and with additional lyrics by Matus. This prompted another Google search and Wikipedia page from which I learned that, "The Gnawa people originated from North and West Africa.", and "Gnawa music is a rich repertoire of ancient African Islamic spiritual religious songs and rhythms." The song has great grooves and I love the sound of the ethnic acoustic string instruments, which struck me as African versions of the sitar (in the feel they communicate rather than the sound). The vocals, both male and female, are passionate and have an uplifting spiritual quality. Search "Youmala" on YouTube and you'll get several hits, including a variety of Gnawa music.
One More Arabia is similar, but with tabla-like percussion more prominently adding to the groove. Mustt Mustt is a cover of a Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan song arranged by and with additional lyrics by Matus. (Another one worth searching on YouTube for a reference point.) Mawwal's interpretation is very much in the spirit of Ali Khan, but the acoustic instrumental/percussion combination and beautiful soloing violin, along with the Matus/Jill O'Brien vocals give a distinctive Mawwal character to the music. We Must Fall features steadily grooving ethnic percussion, incredible vocals from Jill O'Brien and Laila Salins, some of which are almost operatic, and pied piper soloing from the bansuri flute, which Wikipedia describes as "a transverse flute of India made from a single hollow shaft of bamboo with six or seven finger holes", and to my ears sounds like something between a flute and a piccolo.
The title track is one of the most compositionally intricate songs of the set, with the stringed instruments and percussion seeming to be operating in multiple thematic directions, yet it all comes together seamlessly. The violin solos and vocals are nearly feverish in their intensity, and Percy Jones' fretless bass, not surprisingly, injects a jazz element to the piece (Jones just guests on this one track). Khawaja Piya is a traditional Pakistani song arranged by Matus, and another one worth a YouTube search for the valuable reference points it returns. The song has beautiful instrumentation, including cool grooving tablas.
No Finer Men Than We is a little different, with the vocals giving the music a Celtic feel, while the instrumentation remains firmly in the Middle Eastern themes that characterize the rest of the album. But we've also got trumpet, adding yet another dimension to the music, the whole being a variety of intriguing contrasting elements. Wrapping up the set is what seems to be a dual song. Kosh Chenare is a traditional Uzbek song arranged by Matus, which blends into the Matus composed The Burden'd Air/Eleven Shreds Of No. Gently flowing music gives this a somewhat pastoral feel, though the grooves kept my body in motion and the characteristically impassioned vocals kept me inspired and alert.
Aural Innovations readers will be well acquainted with the use of Middle Eastern and Indian themes in psychedelia, and while Mawwal is by no means a psych band, the music transported me in ways very similar to what I experience with psychedelic music. Though it certainly seems like all the music is carefully arranged, most of the songs have a loose jamming feel that allowed me to groove along comfortably throughout the entire album.
Find the album on Jim Matus' Bandcamp site. For more information visit the Jim Matus website.
King Kronos — Soundzilla
(Elektrohasch 2012, EH156)
Alan Bragg
King Kronos herald from Germany and can be loosely categorised as stoner rock, though they cover broader musical ground on Soundzilla. They are a five piece band featuring a female vocalist and a twin guitar attack that sets them apart from the more compact riffage of Acid King, the easiest band to directly compare them with. Be warned however, one false click on the internet will bring you face to face with a ginger-dreaded rapper operating out of the American Midwest under the same title!
A cursory first listen to Soundzilla brings you up to speed with King Kronos' modus operandi with Kyuss-style fuzz guitars dominating the proceedings. Straight out the gate the opening track, (The Rising of the Awesome) Soundzilla, opens with a downtuned Eagles of Death Metal sleaze swagger that builds into the same charging rhinos drive that notably propelled the aforementioned Kyuss during their heyday. However it soon becomes noticeable that whilst the guitars are heavy, the instrumentation in general is quite muted and attenuated with even the cymbals sounding dull and restrained. The album credits state that it was recorded in a studio called "Die Lobby", which is perhaps a nod towards the overall dry acoustic of the record, sounding largely like the band jamming together in a small room.
The mix works in King Kronos' favour for two notable reasons. Firstly the listener isn't left with the aural fatigue that more cavernous, punchy and aggressively mixed stoner albums tend to employ. Secondly King Kronos's female vocalist, Stephanie Koch, is given far more sonic space and whilst her vocals are often layered with effects they are never obscured or pushed into the background, instead floating over the background layers of sludgy guitars. Furthermore, any additional instrumentation, featuring on a fair number of the eleven tracks, really sparkles against the fuzz backdrop.
Musically the band explores a greater territory than can be commonly attributed to stoner rock bands, a genre which is already showing signs of advanced atrophication in some areas. Instead of relying on slightly tired runs up and down various blues scales, the band uses some interesting dynamic contrasts and musical passages to keep the listener interested. Track five, the B movie homage The Love Blob, notably ends with a zither part played in unison with the churning guitar riffs. Furthermore the crude oscillating electronics on Alehouse Rock are reminiscent of the DIY electronics heard on Faust's debut album. Elsewhere sparse use of both an ocarina and a driving piano line, a la The Velvet Underground's White Light/White Heat, again add an extra dimension to the music whilst interesting mixing techniques, such as distorted drums, give each track a unique thumbprint away from the 'theme and variations' feel of some stoner releases.
The lyrics themselves also look beyond the typically misanthropic and down-on-my-luck lyrics of stoner rock. Tracks pay homage to Transformers characters and dodgy '50s B movies, clearly a personal preference for the band. Rock to Whom Rock Is Due lampoons posers and the perennial fear, in rock circles, of selling out (whilst mentioning anti-dandruff shampoo). In general the lyrics have a slightly too simple narrative quality that highlights, or betrays, King Kronos' German origins. Furthermore the lyrics seem at times rather clumsy, with too many words crammed in, jeopardising the effectiveness of Koch's pared down Ozzy-esque vocal melodies.
The biggest limitation of Soundzilla is that at times the music indicates that an almost academic study of previous stoner rock releases has been carried out. The use of audio samples from B movies is a too-often used gimmick that isn't used with any great weight here. The track Ultima Thule is also perhaps also too formulaically following the great rock tradition of putting one "Set the Controls for the Heart of Planet Caravan" lighter song on the album to demonstrate the band's quieter side. However the band do show that they are looking beyond the typical conventions and are perhaps indicating a more direct link with their European identity that may become more abundant in further releases. Watch this space.
Check out the King Kronos Bandcamp site and find the album in the Elektrohasch webshop.
Also published this month on Aural Innovations is a live review of Monster Magnet and My Sleeping Karma in Oslo:
