Trip Lava - Octatroid

The evil King Meldagar once ruled the village. He was viewed as a tyrant by his people, and was soon ousted. The exiled king was determined to get his revenge on the villagers. He found a new home underneath a mountain, where he set up a shop to build his army of destructive robots. His first evil robot (Gurgblah) is sent out to the village to wreak havoc on the people who overthrew him.

That's the premise of this solo recording by Joel Lee who, on his Myspace page tells that his music sounds like "Acoustic drums, electric guitar, bass and loops/drones improvising in a circular pattern... sometimes it has a mind of its own, and I go with the moment. The finished tracks are then spliced together with sound effect segues and other strange things." I think he's aptly described what Trip Lava is all about... I'm more curious as to who his target audience is, if indeed he has one, because what he's come up with is an incredibly eclectic mix of sounds to be sure but one that's sure to leave a fair number of his listeners wondering, "What the heck is this?"

Now, that's not necessarily a bad thing – what Joel's put together is 13 tracks that aurally describe the events of a fantasy story that he's documented in the accompanying liner notes so there's clearly a lot of thought and planning that has gone into creating something completely packed with unearthly sound effects, off-kilter jazz sounds, insistent drumming and a vivid mayhem that at times is actually a real riot to listen to - it's even got a manic sense of beat that's quite infectious at times, such as on 'March To Battle' where the heroic robot warrior Octatroid marches off to deal with the villainous Gurgblah.

Honestly, though, I'm not sure what to make of it – it's an incredibly busy, even frenetic, work. I imagine Joel having an absolute blast pulling all of this together – and it's certainly the most unusual album that I've ever been sent to review. If you like the idea of Can performing at the BBC Radiophonic Workshop then I think you'd have a great deal of fun with the total madness captured in its cacophony of rhythms and sounds; but I suspect you'd have to be a devotee of off-the-wall discordant anarchy to really appreciate this one. If you are, then its $5.00 for a CD or a download at CD Baby.

Trip Lava Myspace Page

http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/TripLava1

Serpentina Satelite – Mecanica Celeste

I wrote up the previous release from Peruvian space rockers Serpentina Satelite, Nothing To Say, a couple of years back in the pages of R2/Rock N Reel magazine and very much liked hearing "high-octane riffs, a splattering of the obligatory Radiophonic Workshop electronics and some portentous intoned mantras" in a "frenetically busy work that never lets up on the acceleration pedal... instantaneous, rough around the edges space rock that could never sound the same way twice." They released that CD on Germany's Trip In Time label, a follow up to an independently released EP, Long Play; now they've moved on to Rocket Recordings for what I'd described as a massive leap forward in Mecanica Celeste.

They're still the masters of the extended, improvisational, movements for, with the exception of the two-minute 'Imaginez Quel Bonheur Ce Sera De Voir Nos Chers, Disparus Ressuscites' which itself probably takes longer to figure out how to say than it runs for on the album, everything here is five, eight, ten, eleven minute tracks that take their starting points and their inspirations from traditional religious music and expand that through their own traditional mind-dissolving riffs. Certainly the opening track, 'Fobos', has a lot of the more free-form element of Hawkwind to it, and the title track itself could well be Hawkwind circa Electric Tepee if you compare it to something like Alan Davey's 'LSD' number, but the use of religious themes (such as the intoning on what we'll now for simplicity's sake simply call 'the two minute track') breaks the heavier rhythms in a quite fascinating manner and really adds both something ancient and something mythic and mystical to this record.

'Ai Apaec' to my ears seems to echo the image that I have of the band working away in Lima's cloudy heights hammering out their particular brand of psychedelic grooves, all fuzz and swirls with some fabulous Dave Brock-style guitar sounds. 'Sendero' has an oppressive militaristic drumming with the guitars marching in unison with the beat, really powerful and driving stuff that purposefully builds into a massive crescendo of pounding sounds and yet it breaks down into High Church 'hallelujahs' that really echo through old stone walls and vast Cathedral spaces adding a beautiful resonance to what has been delivered before.

Amazon, I notice, are listing a vinyl version of this album and have it for download – I don't see them listing a CD – so I'll link here to these releases but this is another great album for those looking for a fix of Hawkwind-style improvisational space rock. Apparently the October edition of Rock Sound has an interview with the band and a track on their covermount – one to watch out for.

Serpentina Satelite Myspace Page
Rocket Recordings Website

Quarkspace Archives: Quarkspace & Matt Howarth – Node In Peril

There's plenty of new space rock that's been landing here over the last few weeks and which I'll be writing up over the next few days, including the new album from Serpentina Satelite, some modern progressive rock from Jack Jeffery and some sci-fi concept material from Trip Lava as well as other Myspace pages, MP3s and digital downloads that I've been e-mailed over the last two or three months. But I'm also going to be taking a regular step back in time and trawling through the archives of US band Quarkspace who've been very patiently waiting for some write-ups since their Paul Williams kindly sent me a whole bunch of their albums an embarrassing number of months back. So with apologies to Paul and his collaborators for the delay, let's kick off this series of 'Quarkspace Archive' reviews with Node In Peril, a concept album and accompanying comic book from 2004 released on their Eternity's Jest Records.

Quarkspace have been around since the mid-1980s and they're a band I first came across through a free-to-download album, Drop, which I'll write about later in this sequence of reviews, but they're well-known to space rock enthusiasts for both their prolific output and their appearances at the Strange Daze festivals. As for influences, they'll cite "the American and English psychedelic scenes of the late 60s – The Grateful Dead, Buffalo Springfield and Jefferson Airplane combined with the more keyboard-orientated Soft Machine and Pink Floyd... [and] sometimes channelling more modern influences [such as] Stereolab or The Orb."

What we have with Node In Peril is a collaboration with comic book writer /artist Matt Howarth, someone with a long history of exploring the three-way relationship between rock music, science fiction and sequential art. He was the creator of Savage Henry, a comic series about a guitarist from an alternate reality, worked with Daevid Allen on a comic strip for a Planet Gong newspaper that was distributed on Gong's first US tour, produced comic strip format music reviews for Heavy Metal and in the comics industry mainstream worked on Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Justice League Of America.

One of the things that strikes me on reading the little comic book that is packaged with the digipac gatefold CD – apparently it was Howarth who approached the band about this project, inviting the idea of having Quarkspace compose music to complement his artwork – is how the story matches with the idea of 'SciFi Strange' that the SF author Jason Sandford has been talking about and compiling an on-line anthology dedicated to this week (find out more about this and great some great short story downloads here). It's certainly a heady mixture of weirdness and Hard SF with its evocation of organic technology and 'underspace' parasites that mixes far future imagery with time travel and ecological politics – what I'm not so clear is to what extent the accompanying music is indeed to reflect the storyline and visuals of this sixteen page comic.

Certainly the opening track, 'Underspace', succinctly scores the surreal aura of the strip's opening frames – a vivid and trippy composition that floats in weightlessness and sets up the tone of this instrumental work as being otherworldly and ethereal in nature. And that's what's done so well across the 8 tracks here – it's the sort of space music that pulls you to listen to it via headphones, lying down in a darkened room – from which the senses can be absorbed into the suite of sounds with their dominance of synths and keyboards.

Paul notes how the majority of the album was developed from work that had been put into building Spacefolds 7 and 8, a part of their regular Spacefolds releases, but a couple were specifically written in response to art that Matt Howarth had sent over: 'Signal To Noise Ratio Error' and 'The Misinformed Eco-Terrorist'. The latter is the shortest piece here and actually one of the most engaging with some lovely and sprightly synth lines over some more strident bass and drum patterns, and the former a more improvisational piece based around a programmed rhythm and is quite Hawkwind-ish in its own way.

When you get a package that is actually two disparate types of media being brought together it's almost beholding to ask how the individual creative works inform each other and gel together. In this case I'd assume from Paul's sleevenotes that the comic book and the music combine most effectively together is at least in part a case of serendipity since it's not hard to visualise the music being composed with the vibe and feeling of the story (if not specifically its narrative) in mind and the two most definitely come together. In essence I'd guess this is down to Howarth choosing well the band with which to create this package, on the basis of much of the music being created independently as Quarkspace 'work in progress' rather than written for the graphics. If that's the case then the collaboration was well thought-out indeed since this is certainly a case of two pieces of creativity sparking off each other in a very satisfying way.

Quarkspace Website

Matt Howarth Website

Void Generator – Phantom Hell And Soar Angelic

This is the absolutely HUGE sound of Italian space/stoner rock pounding out of the opening salvo, 'Message From The Galactic Federation', a 15 minute slab of intense and driving, yet at the same time melodic, no-nonsense freak-out that's the gateway to this exciting collision of Hawkwind and Porcupine Tree influences.

Void Generator were formed in Rome back in 1996, musicians who'd played together in various local situations who wanted to explore and build on what had been done previously in taking bits of psychedelia, bits of progressive and doing something innovative and experimental with it. And that's really what they did for quite a while, eventually pulling together a self-released eponymous four track CD in 2004 and getting some attention from on-line reviewers with my old mate Scott Heller writing about them for Aural Innovations that October and describing their work as "impressive stuff" while hearing the track 'Sidereal Connection' as being a "very heavy Monster Magnet – Kyuss piece of psych rock with a wall of sound approach but also some cool windy and drony synths thrown in." That release got them some exposure on compilations and a quick follow-up in a ten-track second album, We Have Found The Space.

It's taken a little time since for them to come up with their next offering, and a few changes in their roster as well, but the sounds that Scott Heller was enthusing about back in 2004 are still standing them in good stead here because though the first track is without doubt a pulse-racing noise fest that really gets the blood circulating, I'd like to try and compare it to Hawkwind because that feels right though I'd be lost to try and direct that comment to a specific era (it isn't Charisma Hawkwind in any way, shape or form, if it was Space Ritual then it's definitely an updated and reimagined one... the best I could do is say that it's 21^st Century 'We Do It'... or something like that), then I'd have to go and compare its following 13 minute opus, 'The Morning' to the current tone of Porcupine Tree. I loved it's pensive mood swing, the way it immediately channelled something very different from the tone of what they'd already established on this record, that it seemed to add something sophisticated and intelligent to something else that was barbarian and primal.

That same sense of subdued, perhaps restrained or coiled atmosphere exists on 'The Eternaut', like the moments before the storm, waiting for it to arrive and knowing that when its hits its going to do so with an irresistible force, which it inevitably does, led by Gianmarco Iantaffi's grinding guitar and heavy metal vocal deliveries and possessing a real energy and power to it that subsides in the eye's storm, with some atmospheric synth chimes running free-spirited around Sonia Caporossi's ruminating bass lines, but is always ready to remerge. Remerge it does, both in this track and what puts all other hidden and unlisted tracks to shame, a 23-minute fourth appearance of the band on what purports to be a three track CD. No idea what this final session is called but it ranges from experimentalism to Pink Floyd soundscapes and again powers into oblivion until it plays out with a sparse coda of distortion.

Really good stuff, released by Phonosphera Records, this will make a lot of fans here I think.

Void Generator Myspace Page

Phonosphera Myspace Page

Phonosphera Website

Spirits Burning – Behold The Action Man (Preview)

When I was young, I guess really up until I was fourteen or fifteen, we used to take our family holidays exclusively within the West Country – indeed, Weston-Super-Mare is about the furthest I can remember us venturing. I suppose that this being the early-mid '70s then the package holiday was only then really starting to come into its own, but it passed us by completely. A lot of these weeks were spent in Torquay, which geographically slightly misses the location of my opening point, but for some reason this generally included a visit to the Somerset town of Taunton, generally on the Saturday of our return home. One of my maternal grandparents had relatives who lived in what seemed to be a fairly big house in the town principally occupied, it seemed, by a not totally tame, house-trained or domesticated rabbit that had the run of the house. The point of mentioning this is that somewhat out of the town centre there was a newsagent type of shop that never seemed to be open on the Saturday afternoons that we walked passed it on our way to the home of these seemingly eccentric relatives but through its darkened, or on reflection almost sepia, windows could be spotted, on a shelf behind the counter, a selection of imported from the US Bantam books that reprinted what seemed to my early teenage years rather dangerous and exotic pulp magazine reprints: Doc Savage, The Shadow, and most intriguingly of all, The Avenger.

Now, Doc Savage and The Shadow I knew about from reprints released over here. Corgi Books issued three Doc Savage novels including the original Man of Bronze story whilst New English Library reprinted four Shadow adventures including one that I still own to this day, The Living Shadow. But to my knowledge neither Corgi or NEL had a go at The Avenger, even though this was the era of lurid paperbacks of US pulp fiction – highly erotic and glamorous covers on editions of Edgar Rice Burrough's Mars and Venus stories, editions of other ERB novels be them Tarzan books or At The Earth's Core type yarns, The Spider and something called Raven with Chris Achellios covers. But never The Avenger – in fact the only other exposure to this character that I can remember in the 70s was seeing a copy of the Jack Kirby version of the character in DC's Justice Inc comic book on one of those rotating wire-rack magazine point-of-sale displays in a newsagents in the fishing village of Looe (more family visiting – my maternal great-grandfather was a sea captain) that seemed to be there every time we visited and never sold.

I read the two-part Justice Inc series that DC published in the 1980s as a spin-off of their radically reworked version of The Shadow – which I rather liked, though preferred Howard Chaykin's four-part miniseries - and then mostly forgot about the character, though I'd occasionally think about the contents of that now, I assume, long-gone Taunton shop either when I'd be in the town or driving past it on the M5. I don't believe I ever entered its doors but it seemed to smell of exotic mysteries and the opportunity to rifle its contents would have been heaven to me in 1974. But lately I've been reading a few of those Bantam reprints courtesy of my friend Roger Neville-Neil who most kindly sent some across from America. Roger is, as most blog readers will know, the chap who contributed lyrics to the Hawkwind songs 'Needle Gun', 'The War I Survived' and 'Heads' and has already influenced this blog by sending me albums by the terrific US band The UpsideDown – but he's also a guy with a quite encyclopaedic knowledge of pulp and noir fiction and characters and a real love of The Shadow, The Saint and all those other great operatives. They seem much less outlandish now... rather formulaic works really (hardly surprising when you consider how quickly and regularly these stories were bashed out), but they still have a certain thrill and a cracking pace to them which make them enjoyable diversions if not living up to the rather thrillingly forbidden image that I'd cultivated of them all those years past.

But, Roger, great guy and I was so pleased to get the chance from him to read those stories at last. Aside from those lyrics for Hawkwind, inspired of course by Robert Calvert who Roger knew and still carries a great admiration for, Roger has contributed lyrics for Farflung and Spirits Burning, along with his long-running sequence of Chandler/noir-esque gig reviews for Aural Innovations styled as the 'Action Man' stories and is a very talented photographer who has snapped many bands both live and in the studio – some of his work appears, with his very kind permission, in my Hawkwind book. Now he's one of the pivotal creators in the latest Spirits Burning album, Behold The Action Man, which is due from Voiceprint Records in the next few months (Don believes it will appear in August) and of which I received an advance CDR copy this weekend from SB's main protagonist, Don Falcone.

I'm a big fan of Spirits Burning, having reviewed this space rock collective's work for R2 and for Record Collector, and having interviewed Don a few years back for Colossus magazine, and Don's again assembled an impressive line-up of collaborators to realise this album. From Hawkwind, SB regular Bridget Wishart along with Alan Davey and Paul Hayles, Nik Turner collaborator Paul Fox, Dr Brown's Kev Ellis, Jefferson Starship's Trey Sabatelli, Daevid Allen, the ever-welcome viper violinist Cyndee Lee Rule, and Don Xaliman from Melodic Energy Commission – amongst others. I do think that the prolific outpouring of the Spirits Burning concept is both one of its strengths – there's a significant regular outpouring from this ensemble and a diversity of writing credits that gives it a wide-ranging outlook and sound – but also something of a downside as well. And that's sort of how I feel about Behold The Action Man on initial listening – there's a lot of it, sixteen tracks in all and it's just something of the 'less could be more' feeling about it. I'm nine tracks in and listening to a really motivating, strum-along rocker called 'The Train', for the second time this month a track that I'm immediately going 'Black Rebel Motorcycle Club' about, one where Don has written lyrics and the music, and its bloody fabulous. On the other hand, I've got to track nine liking what's come before without really sitting up and being thrilled.

I've enjoyed 'Stand And Deliver', lyrics by Bridget and Roger and vocals from Kev Ellis, one that could work really well if ever there's an on-stage coming together of Spirits Burning instead of their across-the-ether modus operandi. I liked 'Straffed By A UFO', which sounds like a Dave Brock solo album track but with a Calvert vocal (provided by Don) and I was engaged with the instrumental 'Crank Up The Vibes', which actually doesn't do what it says on the tin but is more of a mid-album downward change of pace, ready for the tracks to pick up the heat again with 'The Train'.

A complete change of vibe is 'Every Space Opera' which has a bit of a torch song feel to it, accentuated by Catherine Foreman's sultry vocals and Bridge's EWI playing which the liners note as producing Clarinet, Bassoon and French Horn; a lovely piece all told. On the other hand, Roger's private-eye ruminations on 'Obelisk of Fondue' are lost to Daevid Allen's wilfully eccentric reading of the lyrics on the album's only real misfire and I just thought that any point to this one was completely lost in translation. Then again, 'Astral Flight Gassed' has a delightfully '60s/Gerry Anderson opening sequence feel to its music even if the lyrics become a tad 'arch' at times and the play-out 'Underworld Messiah' is a moody, atmospheric, triumph.

To take it as a whole then, as always some very good stuff but it's a little bit muddled, as though there is an interesting concept trying to come through but one that's been sidetracked out of cohesiveness in a way, lost sight of perhaps, so that we are not really 'Beholding the Action Man' but seeing glimpses of him through a haze of other ideas. It's a good record, but it could have been more focused. Look out for it this summer though – there's a lot of very decent material here.

As a curious co-incidence, as I was thinking through this preview/review yesterday I was also watching the Audrey Hepburn / William Holden film Paris When It Sizzles. The Avenger was, of course, the code name for Richard Benson... the same character name as played by William Holden in Paris...

Linkages – June 2010

The latest issue of online science fiction magazine Clarkesworld has an interesting feature by Jason Heller entitled 'Moonage Daydream – The Rock Album as Science Fiction'. Round-up the usual suspects to some degree, but some interesting additions and observations and a juxtaposition of the roles of the embryonic rock 'n' roll of the 1950s against the role of science fiction in the '50s. Hawkwind are mentioned courtesy of Space Ritual, where the author of the piece has heard Mike Moorcock delivering 'The Black Corridor' when it's actually Bob Calvert reading Moorcock's words on the album. Good stuff though with some unexpected entries and a whole host of YouTube links – read it here.

Today I was delighted to receive in the mail a free Omenopus 4 track EP, 'Portents', which as I understand it is a sampler for their debut album proper and which I'm happily listening to whilst typing up these links. How can you obtain your copy of this impressive mission statement I hear you ask! Well, I believe one way is to wait until the Sonic Rock Solstice festival later this month and blag a copy off of Bridget Wishart who'll be playing there as part of acoustic campfire duo Chumley Warner Brothers, or alternatively invest 99p in paying for P&P and order it direct from the new Omenopus website – ordering details here.

I reviewed the new album by Zuu here a few weeks back and now there's a chance to win a copy of the album on the Exploding in Sound website. Actually, I couldn't see when the end date for this was and I'd been notified about the link a few days back (sorry, Mary!) but I saw the band tweeted the link this morning so I assume the competition is still open to entrants and it's definitely a release worth having in your space rock collection. I believe the competition is to promote their debut music video that has been put together for their 'Water' track which I've embedded here:

"Water" (the Ken Andrews Remix) from Zuu on Vimeo.

Talking about Exploding in Sound, Dan Goldin sent me a press release concerning a planned HUM tribute album, the comments of which I'll reproduce here:

The time has come to pay tribute to one of the 90's most influential yet criminally overlooked bands, HUM. Pop Up Records, an independent label operating from deep within the space rock scene is searching for bands that are heavily influenced by the iconic HUM to round out the line-up for an official tribute album set for release in 2011. Hailing from Champaign-Urbana, IL, HUM released several albums throughout the 90's, both independently and with the major label RCA. Their break out hit "Stars" catapulted the band into the limelight for a brief period, but the band has always remained an underground phenomenon. Their music combines the shimmering layered guitars of space rock with elements of grunge and post-punk for a timeless sound that was unique and refreshing.

Several bands have already been confirmed for the HUM tribute album including: Funeral For A Friend, The Esoteric, (Damn) This Desert Air, and Anakin. If you are interested in being part of the tribute, please have your representation/label send an e-mail to: HumTribute@PopUpRecords.com with your band's information and a few words on HUM's influence on your music.

The album will be presented by a team of like minded individuals including: Pop Up Records, ExplodingInSound.com, escapingtheordinary.net, DecoyMusic.com, Chancellor Design, and HOUSEWITHOUTWALLS Design. Having all been influenced by HUM themselves, the team is dedicated to the project, paying tribute, and all of the bands involved. Pop Up Records are no strangers to paying homage to the icons of the 90's, as the label released the exceptional The Nurse Who Loved Me: A Tribute to Failure in late 2008. The album featured a wide range of acts from Paramore to Exeter, showcasing the great range of Failure's influence on the different artists involved. The album primarily featured fairly unknown up-and-coming bands, introducing the world to the likes of ORION, (Damn) This Desert Air, Satellite Tragedy, and many more bands. The tribute paid its respects to Failure with the utmost brilliance, inadvertently forming a tight knit community amongst all those involved.

You can follow this one on Facebook, Myspace and Twitter and interested parties can contact Dan through Exploding in Sound or Larry Suglio at Pop Up Records.

Lab Partners – Moonlight Music

This is another album that I've been hanging on to for reviewing for a little while now, and for once it's not just pressures from other writing outlets that's delayed some commentary here but that it just took a little while to really get a feel for this record and to get under its skin since whilst on the surface there's a lot of melodic pop sensibility about the music here, there's actually a lot bubbling under the surface as well.

Firstly the historically perspective here is that this is the third album from Dayton, Ohio's Lab Partners who operate out on the shoegazer / indie band region of space rock (Wicked Branches and Daystar are its predecessors, as well as a couple of EPs – this band goes back as far as 1999 on their discography). They are, at least according to their Facebook page, Michael Smith (guitars, lead vocals, multimoog), Amy Smith (bass, keyboards), Mike Volk (guitar) and Kevin Vaughn (drums), though they've also got some additional musicians on this album. I can't comment on their earlier work, or make any comparison, since Moonlight Music was a nice 'out of the blue' surprise from their label, Pravda Music, but judging from what I'm hearing here, they're a band with a great sense of mood and melody who play some gritty riffs with more than little bit of delicate beauty going on around the edges. It's psychedelic, fuzz-laden and fills the speakers with big sounds even when its being introverted and quiet.

I saw an American review of this album that seemed to convey a sense of disappointment that there wasn't more "cranking up the volume and luxuriating in sonic distortion," which left me rather perplexed, since what I'm listening out for and hearing the most across its 14 tracks is its hazy sheen of day-dreamy reflection that makes the songs here quite compelling in their individual ways. 'Back's To The Wall' (I have an urge to 'sic' that but I'm not clear if it's a misprint on the digipac or not, honestly) is a genuine and heartfelt sounding example of that introspective thoughtfulness, particularly coming in straight after the powerfully anthemic and brash 'Strange'.

'All Is Beautiful' has a sparkly sense of life-affirming zest rippled through its sonic distortions and its almost child-like leads, 'Solar Storm' takes that in another, edgier, and more out-and-out rock direction. Play-out track, 'Open Your Eyes', is an acoustic melancholic rumination. 'We're all hanging by a thread, it's true.' In truth, these are all songs that seem to reach into the heart of what Lab Partner's music is all about, connecting with its listeners with an honesty that bleeds through the power side of their work and underpins the more gossamer parts.

I loved the contrast of their cover artwork (is there a nod to Hawkwind here with the three tepees, I wonder?), that sense of freeness and ancient tradition juxtaposed onto a star-lit moonspace is evocate and highly effective. Musically, they have a nod in the direction of Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, who they've previously toured with and so you'd also have to pick up something of the Jesus & Mary Chain in their work as well – the second track here, 'It's Funny' has touches of both of those bands going on – but they have a clear sense of their own worth and individuality as well and are very much worth investigating.

Pravda Records Website
Lab Partners Website

Could I Be A Bigger Twit?

Don't answer that. No, really, don't. But do please follow me on Twitter as I plan to post regular snippets of commentary on incoming music, whwether spacerock or more general stuff - look for @IanAbrahams or find me here.

Incomings

More effort this week to get back on track with reviews of good stuff that has piled up whilst I've been distracted with general 9-5 stuff (let's not even start on the thirteen-hour days recently, eh!); to kick the week off, a bit of a summary of some things that have landed and which I'm either reviewing elsewhere, hoping to review elsewhere in addition to mentioning here, or which are slightly off-topic.

Let's kick-off with a much anticipated release that got mentioned here recently, the new studio album from Sendelica. Pete and Glenda have been very kind and sent over a copy of the limited-edition version of Streamdelica, She Sighed As She Hit Rewind On The Dream Mangler Remote, and once again I'm in awe of the ability these guys have to come up with such eclectic titles for their records - as evidenced by the 'no inspiration at all' title of this latest blog posting. This is another RAIG release and is available in two versions - the standard is available for £10.00 including post & pack from the Sendelica Myspace, whereas the version that I've received here is a CD/DVD two-disc set is £15.00 and contains, "The movie Trillian Eight plus bonus promos and live videos." I didn't get a chance to look at the DVD over the bank holidays weekend, so something to keep me going during the week to look forward to, but regards to the album 'proper' if you downloaded and enjoyed the free sampler that I linked to during the recent interview with Pete Bingham here then you'll definitely want to send-off for the whole thing. If pushed to pick a real highpoint on this one, then I'd go for Lee Relfe's sax-playing on 'Screaming And Streaming Into The Starlit Nite', which is beautifully haunting and evocative and which you can totally immerse yourself in to the complete exclusion of what's happening around you. 'Power Of The Sea' pulls the same atmospheric trick, another lovely piece, but there's also plenty of noise-fest going on bringing in the space rock and playing on their krautrock interests. I'm a huge admirer of this band.

A couple of really good things incoming from Mark and Vicky at Esoteric / Atomhenge records (via Cherry Red) that I am definitely reviewing elsewhere, and can say that with confidence, since the first of these two I review in the latest issue of Record Collector and the other I've recently submitted copy on for the same place, is their stupendous and frankly sumptuous reissue of The Crazy World of Arthur Brown and the new album from one of life's real gentlemen, Harvey Bainbridge: Dreams, Omens & Strange Encounters. The former really needs no introduction, since it is quintessentially the sound of the psychedelic sixties, but Esoteric have done such a fabulous job on presenting this reissue, with extensive liners that include a fresh interview with Arthur himself, and a second disc with a selection of b-sides, outtakes and radio sessions and alternative versions, that it's actually less of a reissue and more of a respectful and celebratory enhancement. Harvey's new album, which I assume from the title is a collection that he's been talking about for a few years, since I noticed a work-in-progress of that name getting mentioned in an Aural Innovations interview a few years back, finds Mr. Bainbridge in instrumental, rather than stream-of-consciousness, mode - very evocative and picture-forming even though at times I wished he'd added some of his outrageously wild 'spouting'. I hope this album does well for both Harvey and for the label, since it would be lovely to see some of his earlier solo and collaborative releases getting the reissue treatment and I guess the success of this new record might well lead onto that happening.

A quick 'shout out' to London-based sci-fi rock 'n'roll punksters (I hope this is a fair approximation of their raucous mash-up of sounds) The Stabilisers, who have a Myspace page here and feature my old school mate - Redruth Grammar School 197something or other, Francis Braithwaite, on drums and backing vocals. They play in and around London and though I've never managed to be in town when they've had a gig, they sound bloody good fun.

Another quick 'shout out' for Psi Corps, led by my old friend Alisa Coral, who've made a preliminary announcement of a new album due this summer, All Roads Lead To Amber, based on the 'Amber Chronicles' by Roger Zelazny. This is another RAIG release, and RAIG also are handling an EP that Psi Corps plan to have available, again during the summer, 'Shadow Creatures', which is a four-tracker that also is inspired by the writings of Zelazny. Not connected at all to these releases, but his Roadmarks novel - I guess one of the lesser known of his canon, has always been one of my favourite time-travel books and I always wondered whether it at least in part inspired Hawkwind's 'Motorway City' track - or at least the visuals they were using to back it live in the early 80s. Anyway, Psi Corps to look out for during June/July and I'll update when I hear official release dates.

That kick starts this week's blogging - later in the week I'll be posting on Astralasia, Sun Dial (who I see got a terrific feature in the new issue of Shindig! magazine), some Voiceprint releases and other good stuff.

A Couple of Linkages

Fred Laird of Earthling Society updates us with news of the band's latest endeavours: "Earthling Society have just finished recording the track for the Sky Saxon tribute album to be released on GRA records later this year. The track, titled 'Lost In A Daze' was written late in the life of Sky and is a spiritual hymn to his wife and the Source family. We are deeply honoured to be given a track that has been heard by so few people and we hope that we have done Sky justice." The album also features The Damned, The Chocolate Watchband, Electric Prunes and Iggy Pop to name a few and there's details to be found here. Earthling Society also have recorded what Fred describes as "a charmingly amateurish video for an unreleased track called 'God In The Mushroom'. The track is an acid-country tinged ballad dedicated to the genius of Roky Erickson and Tommy Hall and can be viewed here. Finally, Earthling Society are booked to appear at the Lost In The Woods festival.

Tonefloat Records are just about to release a new vinyl-only LP from Astralaisa, the alter-ego of free festival favourites, the Magic Mushroom Band. I'll be reviewing that shortly, but I notice there are some very limited editions of this release on Tonefloat's order page, so an early visit to secure a copy might be a good idea!