Bardo Pond - Bufo Alvarius, Amen 29:15 (1995)

I don't really know how to classify this album. Drone, shoegaze, noise rock, post rock, space rock, psychedelic rock, or is it some kind of Frankenstein monster made up of all of them? Fuzzy droning guitars build up layers of solid sound and then the band weaves melodies through the wailing wall of sound, whether they are some sort of cosmic blues, meditative chant, or some other remnant of whatever musical influences built this album.

The main portion of the album explores all of the possibilities contained within that collection of influences. The album ends on the collosal "Amen," and while I love the kind of sloppy noisy blues rock that makes up the rest of the album, Amen feels relaxing. It relieves the tension of the album. It is almost a peaceful song, despite the droning guitar. The bells and the female vocalist have a sort of beauty that is lacking in the rest of the album and is a fitting way to end it.

I figured this was the least likely album of my possible choices to have overlap with the group, so hopefully I will be giving some people a new listening experience. DemonCashew is pretty positive about it, so hopefully thats a good sign for the rest of your preferences. (Though he likes Lady Gaga and Animal Collective so I'm not sure if we can trust him.) He says I should mention the vocals, which I guess are kind of weird when they are actually trying to say something. I don't know what that guy is going on about.

the place of sending

post courtesy of Florpy.

Palace In Thunderland - Apostles Of Silence

To dare, to will, to dominate, to demolish.

Little is known about this Stoner \ psychedelic band from the US. The band distinguishes itself from other like-minded bands of the time by incorporating a rapid fire progression of riffs and fuzzed out metal songs backed by long winded psych rock jams all fitting together to form a complex yet beautiful and trippy jigsaw puzzle in the end. The band wanders carefully down the 70's rock road with heavy psych elements tugged deeply into their hands. With influences ranging from Sabbath to Monster Magnet to Floyd, Rush, Zeppelin, Hawkwind and as well as Faith No More the tunes of the band seem to move from a groovy stoner rock song to a slow mo psyched out space psych jam.



It was a long bumpy ride for the band, but the era of Palace has come to a close after seven long years. The singer from this band would eventually move on into Black Pyramid which released their debut album earlier this year, thus garnering some of the much deserved reputation for the band.

Get Pschyed

My Solid Ground - My Solid Ground (1971)

Genre - Krautrock, Space Rock, Psychedelic Rock
Its difficult to define their genre. Since Krautrock itself is a wide term, it doesnt necessarily help define the sound of "My Hairy Chapter". I have seen people on prog archives lable it as progressive rock but honestly their isnt much progression going on either. Its more of a hard rock album with spacey and psychedelic passages.

Its a beautifully executed album. There is this "A Saucerful of Secrets" aura about this record, It may not be as spacey as that legendary album, but its more varied as a whole. Keep in mind that I am not suggesting that its a Floyd rip off by any means. Just that it will be a sure hit among early floydheads. The album begins with the song "Dirty Yellow Dust" which has the psychedelic guitar tone throughout, Its immensely repititive to the point that you end up loving the song. Then there are definitely a few fillers here and there but that dont distract you much from the original sound. This version has a 25 minute version of the song "Flash" which is where you see all the improvisations, melodic key solos, stoner guitar leads, and whatnot! ENJOY!

-EyehateDoG
-Megaupload

Paul Chain - Sign From Space (2001)

Paul Chain, has always been overlooked in the metal scene, right from his early days when he created the ever so influential Death SS (FeatherofHuginn: with Steve Sylvester). Being from Italy, it wasn't a surprise that he turned out to be one of the best doom metal acts to have ever graced the metal circles. However, with the release of Alkahest he gained a small fraction of his long over due fame and respect.

Ever since, his open mindedness to experimentation has led his crazy mind to wander off of the streets of doom metal and heavy metal, the very streets that gave him some of the recognition he so badly deserved, into such genres of music one would never in his wildest dreams dreamt of him to go off to. And that brings us here today with his release, "Sign From Space" which as pretty easily decipherable belongs to the space rock genre.

Heavily heavily influenced by 70's rock and space rock bands such as Hawkwind, this release has been divided into 4 tracks, Sign From Space 1 - 4. This musical journey is in fact a musical realm of bluesy guitars, the signature psychedelic chaotic calmness and wicked studio effects. If you like 70's rock with a touch a psychedelia mixed with a tad of metal influenced guitar solos, then you cannot go wrong with this release.

~ Vaibhav (formerly: SpectrumOfDeath)

Mediafire

Afterlives - A Ticking Clock I Couldn't Stop

Genre : Ambient/Rock/Experimental

Coming from the eccentric ENEMIES LIST HOME RECORDINGS label, this project appears to be a mellower expansion of the more ambient tracks from Have A Nice Life. Combining acoustics with some noise influenced ambiance and sorrowful vocals and by adding some drony atmospheres and psychedelic components, this album leaves you gloomy and oddly refreshed at the same time.
The album is mainly driven by seemingly loose, lazy strumming but when combined with some percussive beats and other added effects,this album gives much more for the listener to divulge in. Best enjoyed on a cloudy day when everything around appears to be moving at a lower pace than it should.

Enjoy!

Porcupine Tree - Voyage 34 (1992)

Genre - Space Rock, Psychedelic Rock

Reviews - This is the their most underrated work apart from the epic 40 minutes version of the track "Moonloop". Its a shame that the fans dont bother exploring PT's earlier efforts which in my humble opinion is far more matured, varied and better than their latter mainstream albums like Deadwing, In Absentia, Lightbulb Sun.

This EP is over 1 hour long and contains four awesome trippy songs. Songs that will be best enjoyed by turing the lights off and playing at "just audible" volume. There are pretty obvious Hawkwind influences on this EP.Infact the Hawkwind influence was also there on "The Sky Moves Sideways". Its more of space rock oriented than Progressive rock which the band adopted in the coming years. Its mandatory for the fans of post-TSMS fans of PT r anyone who hasnt heard this one before.

Part 1 Megaupload
Part 2 Megaupload
- EyeHateDoG

Sólstafir - Masterpiece Of Bitterness (2005)

So here it is, by request Solstafir's Masterpiece of Bitterness.

With this years release of Kold it seems Sólstafir are gaining popularity, which they deserve. However, it seems that a lot of fans of the new album are not recognising Masterpiece of Bitterness.
s
Without a doubt this is Sólstafir's best release to date, and in my opinion one of the finest albums to grace my collection. With a much more atmospheric feel to it then any of their other releases this album flows together so perfectly, switching from fast aggressive style riffing to epic drawn out laid back sections in the blink of an eye in a beautifully constructed piece.

Contrary to popular belief this is neither a black metal album or a viking metal album, in fact you can throw a lot of genres on this band and it is very difficult to tie them down just to a single style of music; from the stoner/sludge Esq vocals, there is a psychedelic overall sound mixed in with a huge amount of atmospheric metal and the riffs contain elements of Solstafir's black metal days also it's worth nothing each song has an almost post - rock song structure, huge build ups with crushing endings.

To pick a highlight from this album is nearly impossible as each song really does have it's high points, each song has it's part on the album and it's one of the few albums I feel that nothing should be changed. Also, the second longest song on the album 'Ritual Of Fire', starts with a beautiful piece of music that sounds like it's been lifted straight from Sigur Ros's Takk, both bands are Icelandic and both albums came out in the same year, strange hey?! Well not really, must be an Icelandic thing.

I really could go on and on about this release, but for now I'll just say check it out. Even if you do dislike this album it deserves to be heard.


Download: Mediafire
Disclaimer: None of the albums I add are uploaded by myself and are intended for promotional purposes only, if you enjoy the album please support artists by buying records.



- RTG