NEW
VARIOUS ARTISTS Head Music Fruits De Mer LP Fruits De Mer marks the 40th anniversary of seminal krautrock label, Brain, with this four-sided homage. Brain
coaxed an amazing variety of material out of their artists, so there’s a nice mix of spaced-out floaters (Black Tempest’s spiritual exploration of Klaus Schulze’s ‘Bayreuth Return’, Zenith: Under The Stars’ contemplative navel-gazer, Popul Vuh’s ‘Mantra II’, and Frobischer Neck’s dreamy take on Ash Ra Tempel’s ‘Schizo’) and more unrestricted acid jamming (Vibravoid’s hallucinogenic mindwarping of Kalacakra’s ‘Nearby Shiras’, Temple Music’s synth-meets-guitar-shredding of Neu!’s ‘Negativland’, and an excerpt from Bevis Frond’s 25-minute acid jam on Electric Sandwich’s ‘China’). Add a bit of Amon Düül I’s communal hippie vibe (Earthling Society’s impressively Floydian ‘Paramechanical World’) and electro-synth pioneers Kraftwerk (Dead Sea Apes’ outerspace floater ‘Rückstoß Gondoliero’) and Tangerine Dream (Electric Moon’s headswirling ‘Madrigal Moon’), and you have some of the finest space grooves you’ll hear all year. Brain-frying, indeed! Jeff Penczak
VARIOUS ARTISTS Sorrow’s Children: The Songs Of SF Sorrow Fruits De Mer LP Various artist renditions of rock operas can be fraught with disaster (Tommy, can you hear me?), but Fruit De Mer’s tribute to
the Pretties’ beloved warhorse succeeds because, from the unforgettable opening of The Luck Of Eden Hall’s punchy ‘SF Sorrow Is Born’, it’s clear these artists are bringing their unique perspective to the material and are not just replicating the SF Sorrow songbook. Sky Picnic drapes a proggy cloak over the sitar-laden ‘Bracelets of Fingers’, Hi-Fiction Science’s female vocals on ‘Private Sorrow’ perfectly encapsulate a mother’s anguish over her son’s wartime adventures, and Langor and The Seventh Ring of Saturn add a proto- metal attack to ‘Balloon Burning’ and ‘Death’.
Although the folkier elements have been buried under a barrage of guitars and effects, there’re enough interestingly askew arrangements to breathe life into
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the old chestnut and the Pretties themselves contribute an exclusive live bonus track, ‘Loneliest Person’, from a 2010 100 Club performance. Jeff Penczak
VIBRAVOID Gravity Zero Sulatron LP/CD
As the mothership hovers over Düsseldorf, inter- galactic space cadets Vibravoid beam down for another exploratory
incursion into the space between our ears. Continuing on from last year’s Minddrugs, the German trio’s sixth album, Gravity Zero, follows a similar trajectory with mellotron, theremin, stylophone and sitar creating Eastern-scented marshmallow psych-pop melodies toasted with fiery space-rock guitar. Like fellow travellers Wooden Shijps,
Vibravoid have the rare sensibility to produce adventurous yet catchy psychedelic rock. ‘Gravitation Zero’ is a slow-building opener which successfully launches the album after a 13-minute- plus journey through an oscillating soundscape of stoner intensity and gives way to more compact, hypnotic highlights that include the spacey flower children anthem ‘Eruptions Of The Green Sun’, psychedelic break-up song ‘Get Out Of Here’ and a ghostly, claustrophobic cover of HP Lovecraft’s ‘The White Ship’. The first 500 vinyl copies of this cosmic
gem of an album come in liquid blue. Alan Brown
Vibravoid
45s
THE AFEX She’s Got The Time Acid Jazz EP Penned by Tom Shipley (one half of US stoner folk duo Brewer & Shipley), and undoubtedly picked up from Randy Meisner’s
garage act The Poor’s version, ‘She’s Got The Time’ has become a milestone (and a millstone) in the fleeting history of Dagenham’s teenage beat merchants The Afex. Oft-comped, and filling mod dance floors across the globe since the ’80s, this 1967 King Records release is understandably a highly-prized gem. An infectious groove, swirling organ, a pounding step-to beat, and a youthful vocal – all ingredients of a ’60s nightclub smash.
Included here are both sides of the King single and two demos from the band’s earlier attempt at securing a record deal. The bonus material pales against the distinction of ‘She’s Got The Time’, but thank you, you good folk at Acid Jazz for giving mod DJs across the globe an alternative to hawking their copy of Rubble 17 to their next night out. Louis Comfort-Wiggett
THE CONTINENTAL SHOWSTOPPERS/ THE VALENTINES Not Too Young/ Breakaway Soul 7 You can’t beat an independent reissue label run by a soul DJ, or in this case two, for digging the crates and coming up with the master
tapes for a couple of obscure dance floor fillers. Both sides of this split 7”, #26 in Jazzman Records’ ongoing Soul 7 series, were originally issued on John Richbourg’s Seventy Seven imprint out of Nashville – best known on the northern soul scene for releasing a string of 45s by Ann Sexton along with the under-appreciated soul singer’s debut LP Loving You, Loving Me in 1973. First up is The Continental
Showstoppers’ cover of Jacky Beaver’s up- tempo ’68 side ‘Not Too Young’, which adds funky brass and uptown sweet soul backing to the originals gritty, hard-driving southern soul, while the flip-side keeps the faith and resurrects The Valentines’ infectious pop-soul anthem ‘Breakaway’ – both tracks guaranteed to leave a pool of sweat on the parquet. Alan Brown
DIVISIONISTS We Play Rock Music Mount Watatic Vinyl EP Debut four-song EP from UK quartet fronted by ex-pat Abunai! guitarist Brendan Quinn. There was always a pop sensibility
lurking within the psychedelic maelstrom that surrounded Abunai! releases, but the bubbly, sunshine pop of ‘Success’ is an unexpected surprise – it’s three minutes of
pure pop perfection! ‘Tyburn Tree’ mines more familiar territory, with giant guitars serpentining around a chunky backdrop. Over on the flipside, ‘Both Sides Of The
Question’ introduces a catchy reggae inflection to the guitar-based pop, while ‘Far From Home’ wraps the set up on an admittedly downer note via a droney, Neil Young-ish dirge that brings acoustic guitars to the party, but leaves with a nasty attitude of badass six-string destruction. Limited to 500 copies on 140-gram vinyl, each with hand screen- printed artwork. Jeff Penczak
JOHN FALLON Picture Yourself Today/Theme For Steve McQueen St Albans John and his brother David emerged from the LA sunshine in the early ’80s like rays of light destined to be stars. Their
Irish/American band The Steppes signed to Voxx and released a string of albums that somehow complemented the garage- revival whilst completely at odds with it. Dressed in UFO Club clobber (all Victoriana crushed velvet, granny specs and wide brimmed hats), their music combined the regal poetry of Bowie with Hendrix guitars and chiming Byrds and Beatles riffs. They should have been huge. Lead singer and guitarist John returns
30 years down the line with a new home produced lo-fi effort that could have been demos from Stewido. ‘Picture Yourself Today’ frames his unchanged Gaelic brogue with a lo-fi dirge of guitars. At first dull, the song soon catches your ear. A proto-disco glam drumbeat drives ‘McQueen’ along whilst a show of guitar riffery and a gloomy vocal lurk underneath. Jon ‘Mojo’ Mills
JACCO GARDNER Clean The Air/A House On The Moon Action Weekend
“Jacco Gardner is a baroque pop artist from the Netherlands,” states this amazingly fresh faced and youthful one-man band’s
introductory website salvo. And you can’t put it better than that! ‘Clean The Air’ has been something of a revelation here at Shindig! Towers and has also picked up its fair share of praise through that thoroughly modern medium of promotion, Facebook. The A-side (and its equally good flip) position young Jacco as Syd singing lead with The Strawberry Alarm Clock, produced by Ron Grainger. It’s a thoroughly authentic – but equally as compelling today – collision of tinkling harpsichord, thudding bass and psychedelic wonderment that could have sat at home equally in The Middle Earth Club or Pandora’s Box circa 1967 or as support to psych-loving pop stars The Horrors on their summer 2012 tour. Jon ‘Mojo’ Mills
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