Might as well

[Space-Dementia]

July 30, 2019
Journey in Satchidananda by Alice Coltrane
Sure, this is jazz, but that droning, psychedelic groove that takes us through the opening track would be a Black Sabbath track if you replaced the sitar with a heavy downtuned guitar and threw in Ozzy in place of the harp and sax. But Pharaoh Sanders' fantastic playing serves as a terrific opening statement, shining through the layers of noise underneath it, and then making way for Coltrane's beautiful harp. Joanna Newsom brought the harp to my attention as an instrument that could be used for more than just classical music, but Alice Coltrane makes the harp cool. This journey she takes us on is relaxed, chaotic, psychedelic, jazzy, and beautiful.
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These are my favorite albums right now.

[Space-Dementia]

August 1, 2019
From Filthy Tongues of Gods and Griots by Dälek
This is so forward-thinking for 2002. Most of the songs have industrial elements that mix really seamlessly with the hip hop beats and the rapping, but some of these songs border on some sort of psychedelic post rock thing, especially in the second half that comes after the 12-minute distortion-led and beat-less “Black Smoke Rises”. That track leads me to see this album as divided into two halves, which also makes it easier to swallow in one sitting. The first five songs are terrific industrial/experimental hip hop, then “Heads” is pretty much just samples of people saying the group’s name, “Black Smoke Rises” is the peak of their experimentation, and then “Trampled Brethren” introduces a sitar, which acts as a guide through the final four tracks of the album, which continue in the style of the first half, but also experiment with other styles. The best track on the album is “Forever Close My Eyes”, a huge song that reminds me of Sigur Ros in its beauty and intensity. It’s a song that takes this album beyond just experimental or industrial hip hop. It serves a statement on its own and is one of the most successful musical experiments I’ve ever heard. It takes a while to get used to the album’s style, but after repeated listens this is fantastic.[/b]
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These are my favorite albums right now.

[Space-Dementia]

August 6, 2019
Hagerae 1983 by Aster Aweke
The album is repetitive, but I could listen to this for hours. The drums just barely lay the foundation, with the keyboard/organ and bass providing a solid backdrop for Aweke's voice to shine all over this thing. I've read that this type of music is like the Ethiopian version of blues, and I don't know what it is she's singing, but I can tell she's longing for something. Hagerae just gives off such a pleasant, melancholic vibe for the most part. But, at other times, she just gets the sound slightly wrong, and since the songs are long and repetitive, it ruins the whole song. The first three songs are a good start, with "Hagerae" being far and away the best song on the album, but then we get "Lekas Fikir Yih New", which doesn't have nearly enough interesting ideas to warrant a 9-minute run-time. It's the most boring song on the album, and it also happens to be the longest one. Luckily, after that the album plateaus and stays consistently solid for the rest of its running time. Hagerae isn't very diverse or adventurous, but it's pleasant enough for me to keep returning to it. And it's definitely a great introduction to the world of Ethiopian music.

Aerial Ballet by Harry Nilsson
Having only heard his cover of "Everybody's Talkin'", this isn't at all what I was expecting to hear. Sure, in its sound it hints at the Kinks, the Beatles, and the Beach Boys, as well as foreshadowing Billy Joel's entire career pretty much, but the lyrics are what makes this an original and exciting album from the late 60s. He just covers so much ground in so little time. Opener "Daddy's Song" is an absolutely terrific opener, as we meet Nilsson's playful and loving father, who ends up abandoning Harry and his mother in the second verse. It's so sarcastic and bitter which fits the upbeat and quirky music perfectly. Then after that we get what sounds to me like a simple ode to Nilsson's "Good Old Desk", unless I'm missing some hidden layer. It's a great song though, and it's not until the third track on the album that we get a straightforward love song. "Don't Leave Me" starts off beautifully, but about halfway through Nilsson's vocal meanderings ruin the song for me. Nilsson's voice is something to get used to. It's a great and powerful but raspy voice that he often uses as an instrument, providing a little solo near the end of some songs, but sometimes he gets a little carried away, like the "beep beep yeahhh" section on "Don't Leave Me", which I never want to hear again. After that, though, he gets back to his eccentricities, with a song about a musician and his fans, a lullaby that apparently his mother used to sing to him, and then a pretty little baroque pop love song that closes out the first side of the album and gives way to "Everybody's Talkin'" which really stands out from the album and makes me wonder whether he initially wanted to include it, since he recorded it for the movie Midnight Cowboy, so maybe he wanted it to be a standalone single. Either way, I think it really changes the atmosphere of the album, by introducing us to Nilsson's more traditionally emotional and poetic side. He may not have written the lyrics, but he might as well have, because this to me sounds like Nilsson taking a break from his sarcastic jabs and funny stories to kind of reconnect with the world. Anyway, the album continues along with a pleasant but forgettable track which leads into a reprise of the lullaby we heard earlier, "Little Cowboy". "Mr. Tinker" brings back the storytelling nature heard earlier in the album, and then "One" is a really interesting and clever play on words over a subdued but honestly pretty intense backing track. After that is a nice little samba-inspired track, until "Bath" closes things out, but his final statement that he's "beginning to think there's hope for the human race" is a little overly-conclusive for me. I would have liked to see him close it out with another story or with that "Little Cowboy" reprise. But all in all this is a really cool album that's short but complete and introduces Nilsson as a musical counterpart to some other contemporary bands but a lyrical anomaly, refusing to give in to any preconceptions of what he should be singing about.
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These are my favorite albums right now.

[Space-Dementia]

August 7, 2019
Tri Repetae by Autechre
This definitely seems more fleshed out and complete than Amber, and it's definitely more memorable, but it's still missing those little synth melodies that'll stay in your head. But I think I'm starting to realize that that's not something that Autechre like to focus on. In fact, none of these songs really have a melody at all. What sticks out from these songs is tiny ideas and sounds that you hardly notice at first, like those weird breathy percussive sounds that feature throughout "Dael", the way the bass line morphs in and out of itself on "Clipper", and when they finally introduce the full chord progression about halfway through "Leterel". Other songs, like "Rotar" and "Stud" don't have anything that sticks out, which means that they end up just kind of floating by without leaving much of an impression. The order of these first couple songs makes it so that once you're halfway through the album you've been on like a 17-minute lull and you're really hoping something can come in and change things up. Luckily, "Eutow" is that unlikely savior. It's only about 4 minutes (as are the next two songs after it), and it's a breath of fresh air, with an active beat and a collection of fuzzy and stringy synths interacting with each other overtop of it. "C/Pach" and "Gnit" bring in some cool ideas too, and they're short, so you don't really have the chance to get tired of them. "Overand" takes us out of the string of shorter songs, and it's also pretty uneventful, and it's the quietest song on the album, which makes it easy to overlook or zone out its soft analog synth line, and "Rsdio" is another needlessly long song which does grow and change in the background, but whose main idea just isn't interesting enough to warrant a 10-minute runtime. Autechre have terrific ideas, but I think the length of their releases, and of the songs on them, is what's keeping me from getting comfortable with them. And looking ahead, it looks like that's not something they ever really addressed, so I'm not sure if I'll ever find an Autechre album that truly speaks to me as a complete and concise project. However, they definitely have a good number of songs that can stand on their own, so maybe I'll just have to make myself a compilation playlist, or maybe it's one of their EPs that will speak to me.
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These are my favorite albums right now.

[Space-Dementia]

August 8, 2019
Leak 04-13 (Bait Ones) by Jai Paul
So, it definitely sounds unfinished, and it doesn't help that most songs have some sort of parenthetical attached to them, usually "Unfinished", but I think there's enough ideas on here that you can kinda put the puzzle pieces together and get a good idea of what it is he wanted this album to sound like. "Str8 Outta Mumbai" is definitely the best song on here, because it feels complete, but also just because it's a fucking banger, and it's a nice summary of what the album sounds like pretty much: it's like if you combined MIA with Caribou and compressed the shit out of it. This thing definitely sounds really dense because of the way it's mixed/mastered, the way the bass drum sucks you in every time it hits. Overall, the production seems like an integral part of this album, and it's especially easy to focus on since a lot of these songs really are unfinished, but it's important to note that there's a lot going on compositionally too. There's hooks on hooks and the chord progressions on those synths are so satisfying. I'm sure this would have sounded terrific and ahead of its time back in 2013, and it really is a shame that he wasn't able to release it as planned back then. It's great that he finally decided to release it, even if it is unfinished, but it's just so exciting to think about the effect he could have had on pop music if he had released this as planned 6 years ago. But, either way, we have it now, and it's a great release.

This is Marijata by Marijata
I've seen this categorized as Afro-Funk, but that first song might as well be dub/reggae. Actually, I checked out this album cause I saw I had added it to my wishlist a while back, and, having forgotten about it, the first song made me think this was a Caribbean band. Either way though, they rock that groove so well, and that simple chord progression is beautiful. The horns and vocals take it to another level entirely, and the only thing I don't love about it is that guitar solo near the end, which really is bad, but luckily it's not enough to ruin the song for me, especially since it's near the end of the track. And the song is rescued by those beautiful horns that come in right after the guitar solo and really elevate this into an essential track. After that, the other three songs are more by-the-books Afro-Funk, with some terrific horns playing overtop some incredibly funky backing tracks and met by the singer's intense and optimistic vocals. Some of the other solos aren't great either, like the trumpet solo on "No Condition is Permanent", but the solos are all pretty low in the mix, so you can kinda tune them out and just focus on the groove, which is always rocking. This is a short album, especially once you get past that first monster of a song, and I'm not sure it feels complete. But, since this is pretty much the only album these guys put out, it stands as a terrific sample of a sound that was taking Western Africa by storm.
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These are my favorite albums right now.

[Space-Dementia]

August 11, 2019
Funky Kingston by Toots & the Maytals
I just looked up this album for the first time after giving it like five listens over the past few weeks and I found out that there are two versions of Funky Kingston, the original and the US version, released two or three years later. It seems like the US version has a couple songs from the original, plus six songs from the band's next album. Normally, in finding this out I would try and find the original version to listen to, but since they only have the US version on Spotify and that's what I've been listening to, I've gotten used to it and I really like it, so I'm just gonna be writing about the US version.
The songs here are really simple and accessible, but Toots & the Maytals really know how to find a groove and rock it for 3 to 5 minutes. It starts with its best song, with "Time Tough" ironically acting as one of the best opening songs to an album that I've heard in a while, even though it originally wasn't included on the album and showed up as the fourth song on their next album, In the Dark. It's such a simple song, with two chords repeated on and on with Toots singing about how he can't sleep and he's got his rent to pay but he can't find a dollar, but it just gets the message across so efficiently and with such a laid back feel that it's instantly addicting. After that is "In the Dark", which also was taken from their second album, but this one is a little too simple. The bells and chord progression make it kinda sound like a kids' song, but it is still catchy. The title track comes in next and I think it's funny that the first thing I thought of was the Pitbull song that samples it, but this song is great. It's hard to talk about this album because the songs are all pretty similar, but they're really all great and this is just such a pleasant listen.
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These are my favorite albums right now.

[Space-Dementia]

August 14, 2019
Astigmatic by Komeda Quintet
Well this is way more avant-garde than I was expecting it to be. The first track consists of a recurring theme of this chromatic chord progression on the piano that's joined by a bouncy rhythm section, but there's other parts to it too, and halfway through the song there's a trumpet solo, a bass solo, and a drum solo that are completely alone. It's really interesting and it's not really something I've ever heard before. The next song "Kattorna" is more straightforward and kind of reminds me of what Miles Davis was doing 5 years before on Sketches of Spain. Komeda has a great piano solo, and the whole song kinda feels like a train ride. I also hear the similarities to The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady that other people have noted, especially in the first and last songs. This album requires a lot of patience. The first 3 minutes of "Svantetic" are very slow and might lead you to believe that this is the album's ballad, but after that long intro, a great bass line comes in, and the song is in full swing, with a terrific trumpet solo, followed by a perfectly laid back sax solo. So yeah, the songs are great, and if you add to that the fact that this music was composed by a Polish guy and played by three Poles, a German, and a Swede, this becomes a memorable and noteworthy album that shows you the kind of art coming out of communist Poland in the 60s.

Third by Soft Machine
The music of Soft Machine seems to be constantly shifting around a plane whose x-axis has rock on one end and jazz on the other, and whose y-axis has pop on one end and avant-garde on the other. The 5 minute intro to the first track, “Facelift”, is abrasive, dissonant, and atmospheric, failing to resemble anything until we finally get some sort of first idea, which fades away quickly and finally, 7 minutes into the song, we get something familiar: a King Crimson-like instrumental rock section with an absolutely absurd guitar or organ (I can’t tell) solo complemented by harsh saxophones. It only lasts about 4 minutes though, before gradually transitioning into an ominous flute solo that, 2 minutes later is met with another similar rock instrumentation, then transitioning into a sax solo which gives way to a big finale, played forward, then backwards. It’s an insane song that lasts about 18 minutes and leaves you speechless heading into the next song, a relatively straightforward but phenomenal jazz tune that’s constantly switching between ideas and time signatures. It’s the same length as the first track, but it could be twice as long and just as entertaining. Now that we’re halfway through the album we’re finally met with Robert Wyatt’s vocals. It’s interesting that they’re a lot further back in the mix then they are on Rock Bottom, where they were definitely a main focus. Here they sort of just seem like an extra layer. They also seem like an improvised afterthought, which probably makes this the worst song on the album for me. But the song does get better halfway through, once the vocals cut out for the most part. This one reminds me of Yes a bit. The final song starts with a 5 minute synth-intro that sounds like slowly taking off into space, but it transitions out of nowhere into what could have been a track off Zappa’s Hot Rats. Finally, the last 3 minutes are a return to the intro, this otherworldly array of synthesizers that serves as a final statement and brings you to the end of the album. It’s a great album, one that’s not tightly focused, but that’s unwilling to fit into any one sound or movement and visits so much territory over an hour and 15 minutes that it honestly feels about half an hour shorter than it is. I’m excited to see what else Soft Machine has in store, because this and Rock Bottom, although sonically and thematically very different albums, are both so promising and fulfilling.
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These are my favorite albums right now.

[Space-Dementia]

August 15, 2019
Reward by Cate le Bon
It starts off really strong. "Miami" is a soft and peaceful but ominous little opener that serves as an intro to the best song on the album. "Daylight Matters" is amazing and really catchy, even as she sings the heartbreaking chorus, "I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you but you've gone." It's one of the best songs released this year and, unfortunately, nothing else on the album reaches its level. One thing I do commend her for, though, is how unique her sound is. It does remind me a bit of St. Vincent, just because of how weird it is, but the sound itself is really original. Unfortunately, it's not great though. A lot of it is pleasant, especially thanks to the production, like the way the guitars tingle around your ears on "Here it Comes Again", but none of it is captivating, besides "Daylight Matters". And it really loses steam on the second half, with the exception of "Magnificent Gestures", the last sign of quality before the album ends with two more forgettable tracks.

U.F.O.F. by Big Thief
This thing is terrific. It hints at Sufjan Stevens and Joanna Newsom, with a voice that resembles Melody Prochet's. I'll admit I can barely make out any of the lyrics, but the music here is phenomenal. It's first apparent that these guys are going out of their comfort zone when, three minutes into the first song, "Contact", a hauntingly beautiful folk tune, we all of a sudden hear a woman scream and a dissonant, distorted guitar come in for a weird solo-type-thing. It's absurd but incredible. The next song, the title track, has guitars that remind me of songs like "Jigsaw Falling Into Place" and "The Rip". The singing on this song also for some reason reminds me of the guy from Yo La Tengo. All that being said, though, this song isn't quite as good as the opening track, but it's still great, and again, they take risks in the last 45 seconds or so, with some weird samples throwing you off guard. The next song is back to the quality of the opener. "Cattail"'s main melody seems so familiar, and I could listen to it forever. "From", the next track, gets a little annoying, especially because of her voice which repeats that "Be my man" thing too many times for my liking. The next song is better, though, and the track after that, "Orange" sounds so much like Joanna Newsom it's absurd. Overall, this thing has great hooks, great chord progressions, great production, and it's just really interesting, especially for a modern folk record. "Jenni" is a creepy song and one of the heavier ones on here, and it shows the range of ideas Big Thief have on the album. Even though every song has Adrienne's whispered vocals accompanied by fluttering acoustic and electric guitars and a steady drum beat, the band is able to pull those limited sonic options in so many different directions, and it makes for an exciting and endlessly interesting album.
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These are my favorite albums right now.

[Space-Dementia]

August 16, 2019
Safe as Milk by Captain Beefheart and his Magic Band
This is so much more straightforward than Trout Mask Replica and, honestly, I like it more than that one at this point. It's this terrific mixture of blues and psychedelic rock and it gets surprisingly heavy, like the part where everyone cuts out except the bass, drums, and Beefheart on "Zig Zag Wanderer". That bass tone is so fat and fuzzy and just satisfying. As far as opening tracks go, "Sure 'nuff 'n Yes I Do" is outstanding. I just love blues played by rock bands for some reason, and this is terrific. You can definitely tell he and Zappa were friends, like on "Dropout Boogie", which sounds like it could have been taken off of The Mothers' Freak Out!. I love the way he repeats every line twice and how seamlessly he transitions into the little 3/4 baroque pop part and then comes right back to the heavy boogie type of thing. "I'm Glad", the song after that one, also reminds me of Zappa, in that it's this doo-wop sort of thing played in the style of classic rock. And he changes his voice enough that it really fits the song so unexpectedly well.
The album continues with all these diverse styles. "Electricity" is one of the heavier tracks on the album, "Yellow Brick Road" is surprisingly happy and light, and "Abba Zaba" is really weird for a single, with nonsensical lyrics and Beefheart's voice doing all sorts of weird things. The album gets a little to weird at that point, with tracks 9, 10, and 11 sorta getting lost in their absurdity, and not in the way that the songs on Trout Mask Replica do. Those are more focused; these just kinda meander. But "Autumn's Child" is a cool closer that brings everything back together again. The album is really top heavy and starts to lose focus in the end, but I think the good songs are so good that they cancel out the not so great ones. And anyway, this album keeps growing on me, so maybe eventually I'll love even the worst songs on here. For how much Trout Mask Replica is talked about as his masterpiece, I'm surprised at how good this is.
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These are my favorite albums right now.

[Space-Dementia]

August 24, 2019
Os Mutantes by Os Mutantes
The United States of America by The United States of America
Listening to these two records along with The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, it's sort of funny that albums like The Doors and Surrealistic Pillow are also thought of as psychedelic rock / psychedelic pop, because those are so much tamer in comparison. The production on Os Mutantes, USA, and Piper does seem "of its time" and a little out of date now, kind of frail and all over the place, instead of full and consistent like the production we're used to now, but this whole using the studio as an instrument thing definitely adds to the psychedelic feel of these albums. When I was on acid, I remember what stood out to me the most in the music that I listened to was the production. Even on a song like "Us and Them" off Dark Side, it wasn't the sax solo or the choir that made an impact, it was the way the production sort of raised everything up to where it felt like it was enveloping my surroundings. So I definitely see the point in doing all these weird things with the production, because it just makes for such a unique and mind bending experience.
Some songs definitely work better than others on Os Mutantes. It starts off perfectly, with the first two songs setting a beautiful, sunny, and drug-fueled atmosphere that the rest of the album tries to keep up. "O Relogio" is beautiful and slows things down a lot, and then they almost lose me with "Adeus Maria Fulo", until their brilliant cover of "Baby" brings things back into focus. Some songs have an interesting idea but don't take it anywhere, like "Senhor F" and especially "Bat Macumba". I think I might grow to love these songs, but at this point they're too repetitive. I'm surprised at how successful they are across such a diverse range of styles. "Le Premier Bonheur Du Jour" is another slow song in the style of "O Relogio", but it, like the former, is just as successful as the first two upbeat songs. It starts to lose steam again with the next two songs, but "Ave Gengis Khan" saves the album, with a really catchy and airy rhythm leading the way throughout most of the song. Overall, the thing always feels like it's just about to collapse, but it's always saved by a catchy melody. It's an interesting album because you start off listening to a nice pop song, then a minute or so later you find yourself lost in some collage of sound, but by the time you try figuring out what's going on, it's right back to the melody and then the song is finished. It also makes the album go by like a breeze.

Although I do think the two albums are similar, throwing on "The American Metaphysical Circus" right after finishing Os Mutantes is another vibe entirely. It's so creepy and so heavy, especially since the whole album doesn't have any guitars in it, apparently. As far as openers go, this one is definitely up there. It's just so sinister. Unfortunately, nothing else on the album sounds much like it. In fact, I think I'd say the rest of the album sounds sort of like if Jefferson Airplane was a circus act. Nothing else reaches the heights of the opener, but there's still some cool songs in there, like "The Garden of Earthly Delights", "Where is Yesterday" (which starts off with a Gregorian-like chant and goes in a very different direction from there), and "Coming Down" (which appears to be describing coming down from a psychedelic trip and transitions beautifully into the next song). "Love Song for the Dead Che" is very relaxing, and "Stranded in Time" is a nice classical tune, and the album closes out with its weirdest song, which includes what sounds like 10 different things being played at the same time, one of which is a medley of segments of all the other songs on the album. The whole song, but even just the last 30 seconds alone are a perfect encapsulation of how strange this album is. I think it's less of a success than Os Mutantes, partly because it seems like these guys are taking themselves a bit too seriously, but also just because I think it covers too much ground in its running time. Not enough of it is memorable, and the stuff that is memorable isn't always great. It's a very interesting album though, and definitely one of the most psychedelic that I've heard.
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These are my favorite albums right now.