As a writer I’ve run out of adjectives to depict the high-quality drones of Maeror Tri, and I’m quite surprised we’re still being supplied with available product from this German trio which disbanded years ago – around 1996 I think. Ambient Dreams (ZOHARUM ZOHAR 320-2) – a slightly soppy title, but in keeping with this group’s preoccupation with themes of sleep, hypnosis, mental illness, and melancholia – was originally a cassette from 1990 on the ZNS label, which later reappeared as downloadable files, then reissued by Beta-Lactam Ring records in 2007. You’d think all of that exposure might have satisfied global demand for the product, but here it is again, with a new cover. Pretty good actually. The angle here is that nothing we hear is purely electronic, and it was all generated by the treatment of “natural ambient sources”. While I usually half-remember Maeror Tri as being rather Teutonic and sinister, this one has a mysterious charm in its vague, unfinished surfaces.

That’s right, it’s a set of cover versions of Velvet Underground tunes and songs played by a “dream team” of avant musicians…Pascal Comelade is a French hero of avant-garde composition, keyboard and synth music since 1980, not just with his amazing compositions but his own distinctive take on synth-pop or “cold wave” – his 1982 Fall Of Saigon project is required listening for any self-respecting post-punk student. Lee Ranaldo’s avant credentials hardly need amplifying either, although my own memory of Sonic Youth is that they wisely steered clear of cover versions for the most part, preferring to push buttons in other imaginative ways to evoke every aspect of psychedelic rock from Charles Manson to The Grateful Dead. Drummer Ramón Prats comes to us from The Voodoo Children Collective and numerous other projects, and he may be here to represent the Spanish arm of this project (along with writer Ignacio Julià, about whom more shortly).

At one stage I thought it was considered bad form, if not taboo, to attempt to improve on The Velvet Underground back catalogue, but that was before the group’s ill-advised reformation in 1993 when Lou Reed himself seemed intent on turning his own legend into a karaoke-styled cabaret version of the real thing. After that watershed, anything goes, I suppose. In 2023 (when Velvet Serenade was released) this record may not only be admissible to the high courts of music justice, but it may even add something to our understanding of the original corpus – at least, that’s the plan. The trio perform six cuts – three of them come from the first album and two of them were originally sung by Nico. There’s also ‘What Goes On’ and ‘Ocean’, two exemplary pieces if you see the Velvets as practitioners of long-form mesmerising trance rock, which is why it’s a shame our modern trio did not opt to cover ‘Sister Ray’.

The CD has index tracks, but plays back as a continuous performance, which is very much in its favour, and after a rather tentative start they warm to their task by track three, injecting more swagger and noise into the equation. Indeed it’s about this point – midway into their version of ‘I’m Waiting For The Man’ – that the American of the group starts to wail his vocal input and get a shade more crazy on the axe, although the latter is boosted I think with the use of effects pedals that that can scramble normality and extend the player’s ideas into audio fireworks, rather than the radical, extreme hammering and detuning techniques that Sonic Youth used in the 1980s (along with objects inserted into the neck). Meanwhile, the French pianist – arguably reincarnating himself in the John Cale role, in particular the side of John Cale that picked up ideas from La Monte Young – is managing to find more invention, melody, intervals and opportunities in the original source material than you would have thought possible. And speaking of John Cale, that version of ‘All Tomorrow’s Parties’ which so tentatively opens the LP, reminds us of Cale’s arrangements for Nico’s The Marble Index – skeletal, disjointed, fit for setting the scene for intense psycho-drama.

However, after two up-tempo numbers, the trio decide to follow the more introspective and mysterious acoustic-ish side of VU for remainder of LP, ending with ‘Ocean’ and ‘Femme Fatale’. Both versions disappoint; ‘Ocean’ misses the gothic, family-curse subtext of the original in favour of something approaching a mild backache, and ‘Femme Fatale’ even sacrifices the lyrics, thus losing their one chance to make good on Reed’s no-nonsense advice to lonely young men, in favour of a daintified, halting attempt at rethinking the melody. So far, not great – for one thing, the purist in me is slightly irked by the very ordinary drumming by Prats on this record, which is the opposite of the perfect stripped-down simplicity of Mo Tucker, and by the vocal phrasing of Lee Ranaldo when he interprets the lyrics in his own unique way. But we must respect the fact that this record is an attempt to “relive” the VU, and is “a non-nostalgic reinvention of a musical legacy that takes an influential past into the future”.

The other dimension to this release is the concept of Catalan writer and poet Ignacio Julià. This fellow is uniquely qualified to throw his beret into the arena – he is one of a small number of rock journalists who has interviewed all the members of The Velvet Underground (since 1978 onwards), and recently completed a book Linger On: The Velvet Underground which assembles all his relevant articles; plus he has form in the area, as founder of the magazine Ruta 66 in 1984. Today’s record could be regarded as an extension of the book, an attempt to articulate some of the ideas about the music expressed by Ignacio Julià in his words. One of these is what he diplomatically calls the “creative tension” between Cale and Reed, a quality which I think most long-term fans of this band are already aware of, and if they’re not they should take a listen to side two of White Light White Heat, where the two mavericks pretty much explode in a rage of ego-fuelled tension and do everything but engage in fisticuffs, and it’s all documented on tape.

This leads us to my main bone of contention with this record – it has virtually none of that creative tension, and falls far short of delivering even the basic elements of our cherished VU moments – no feedback, no attitude, no radical experimentation, no sense of flirting with danger, such as drugs, fetishism, violence, and none of the defiant sneer at normal society. Even the basic rock drive is missing somewhere. I’ll admit we get some interesting variations on familiar VU themes here, but with a band of this stature don’t we deserve something a bit more than that? Still, my respect for the players here remains intact, and perhaps we can learn to regard this oddity as something more than an interesting gloss on the history of underground rock. (28 APR 2023)

One breakthrough moment for them may have been their Thin Wrist Recordings LP in 2016 (quickly picked up by a German label the next year), but they’ve been putting out their own cassettes and LPs with hand-stamped covers since 2013. Another moment was 2019, when I Was Real appeared on an albums-of-the-year list chez The Wire. Even today’s record Power Failures (KR108) is a reissue, kind of, since it was one of many projects to which they turned their talented paws during the lockdown years, first emerging on Bandcamp in 2020. Today’s manifestation on good-old Karl Records is a double LP and sees our chums occasionally joined by guest musicians Sue Garner, Steve Maing, Yasi Perera, Barry Weisblat, and Ira Kaplan, guitarist from Yo La Tengo, who ya gotta figure is a loyal fan.

Before actually playing the record, for about two seconds I formed the wholly mistaken impression that we’d be getting Sunburned Hand of the Man mark II, or possibly something in mode of Mouthus, another NYC combo beloved of Thurston. Instead, 75 Dollar Bill turn out to be very far from excessive or noisy or trying to outdo a million Cecil Taylor imitators with a mistaken attempt at “energy” music, and have a strong “ethnic” vibe with their hand-knitted ragas, non-Western rhythms, and distinctly African flavour on certain cuts – ‘Another Jumper’s Harp’ could probably pass the Ali Farka Toure blindfold test at fifty paces. Although some listeners evidently perceive lysergic swirls and psychedelic patterns in what, inevitably, gets tagged as “mantric” or “trance-inducing” music, I’m more impressed by the unfussy and unpretentious playing of this duo, who work through each long-form groove with patience and insistence, and don’t feel compelled to hide their skills behind loud volume, effects, or other gimmicks. I’d like to think their stage show has the same “what you see is what you get” vibe. (July 2023)

Having this land on the doormat recently set me thinking that I always assumed that, when the Gen. P. Multi-national corp. was in the pink, White Stains were either a shadow-hugging Psychic T.V. offshoot (with an interchangeable membership), or, some kinda naughty wicked Orridgean spoof. But now those vague suppositions can be thoroughly rubbished. Th’ Stains really were a living, breathing musical entity, replete with just a pinch or two of brimstone in its D.N.A. Formed in Sweden by bassist/vocalist Carl Abrahamsson in the mid-eighties, they were, not surprisingly, named after a book of porno-poesie authored by “the great beast” hisself; Aleister Crowley (working under the pen name of G.A. Bishop).

Here, they find themselves comped in a chronological, warts’n’all crammer detailing all of their single releases (and an album track) before the band morphed into the curiously-named Cotton Ferox. And a crammer it certainly is as during this two-year period, they appear to have skidded across (micro) genres like there was no tomorrow. “Sweet Jayne” open the collection, having nothing to do with the V.U. standard and everything to do with American actress Jayne Mansfield’s fatal dalliance with the Church of Satan; wah-wah’d to the max (c/o Jan Ekman) and sharing the same set of dilated pupils as the Stooges’ Detroit/gregorian downer anthem “We Will Fall”. Well, a celebrity car smash certainly sets a certain mood, but then, it’s all change as those restless genes start to kick in. Neo-gothic/hard, flinty garage rock signatures emerge in “Express Your Desire” and “The Energy”, and if accompanying sleeve art (a goat/human skull hybrid and a shaven head band member portrait) could ever encapsulate the sounds within… It’s here, wearing a Cheshire cat scowl and bathed in the same dark aura last encountered in the works of fellow countrymen The Leather Nun years previous. “The Awareness” and “The Result” (both dedicated to Mr. Crowley), round off the set. The ‘all change’ on this occasion finds the again, re-jigged combo in machine-tooled electro-funk mode (a la Sheffield’s Chakk and/or Hula).

The Stains’ releases were only ever pressed in severely limited numbers, some not even realising triple figures (!), leaving even the most intrepid vinyl junkie regularly clutching thin air. Thankfully, Zoharum’s thorough investigations have now plugged this gap.

Same offbeat humour on cover of I Might Be Stuck (EKTRO-148) where he appears (still in mirror shades) with trench coat and dog on a leash collaged onto a panelled interior probably lifted from an old Ikea catalogue. These 11 cuts, we are informed, were composed for a cinema performance at a festival in 2022, said film directed by my favourite experimental Finn, Mika Taanila (who sent me these CDs). Lively and rich instrumentals which may appeal to you more if you don’t get the joke of Rock Boat above (if indeed there is one). Expertly realised and executed by Jussi and also succeeding in conveying something of the movie’s thematic flashes and suggestions. Let’s hope it’s an experimental piece of cinema with many confusing and disconnected images with a rapid editing style, even if early cuts on this album suggest more conventional travelogue fare, and some of themusic may even work for a low-budget action-adventure yarn. But click onto ‘Don’t Stop’ for something more experimental, unsettling, and relentless in its attack (though even this one gives up the ghost and yields to melodic sweeps from the keyboard banks). As with his Oric exploits, I am struck today by similarities to Jean-Michel Jarre, but this time it’s a self-sabotaging android version of the very successful French electronic act, one who can’t resist blowing up his equipment, and then himself, in a finale of sparks of smoke.

Both arrived 31 October 2022.

The outer cover may look a bit ordinary with its “creased paper” motif, but the gatefold inside has a nifty drawing of a bear in a green suit and an antlered deer standing outside in traffic. These two charmers appear in the promotional videos ‘Tired’ and ‘Normal’, both directed and designed by Lambin – it seems the deer is a punk rocker and an Iggy Pop lookalike. I’ll gladly voice my support for an animated weekly TV show along these lines, and I keep hoping for a moment when the record serves up something with as much potential charm and spontaneous anarchic fun, but the band singularly fail to deliver. Competent enough garage rock with few surprises is what you get, and none of the personnel at the mics exhibit any desire or capacity for letting fly with a truly demented punk-out riff or excessive angry noise, as they plod diligently through each ho-hum number. The main attraction I suppose is Olivier Lambin’s voice, which has a certain desirable quality in its hollow, bored-sounding croakiness, but he’s still not abrasive enough or powerful enough to be mistaken for Cobain or Iggy, seeming to lack any conviction in the content of his own spiky lyrics. Even his frequent (and very stilted) use of the F-word fails to inject any drama, barely registering a flicker on the shock-o-meter. (21/03/2022)

Lotus of Darkness, Towards the Emerald Empire, China, Pest Productions, PEST-A08 limited edition CD digipak (2023)

Blending instantly catchy and distinctive Thai folk melodies with raw black metal is Bangkok-based trio Lotus of Darkness on recent EP “Towards the Emerald Empire” which has been picked up by Pest Productions for a limited edition CD release. As with previous recordings, Lotus of Darkness bring dark Siamese folk tales and mythical beings such as the Nagas (serpent creatures that stand guard at Buddhist temples) to vivid life in a context that is almost as much rock’n’roll as it is BM / Thai folk fusion.

After a sinister ambient instrumental introduction, in which the cries of those damned to eternal hell rage behind a cold droning ambience and heavy subterranean waters, the trio gets down to business with “Raging River”, a powerful song of rollicking folk melodies and rhythms going head-to-head with blast beats, fierce tremolo workouts on guitar and phin (a stringed lute-like instrument) and spine-chilling spider vocals from vocalist / guitarist Suriyakat. The track races up hill and down dale with a spirit and force coming from the surging melodies and angry vocals, and powered by the hard-working percussion. In spite of its length (it’s over 10 minutes), and even during quiet moments when only the melodies on the phin are holding everything together, the song maintains focus and energy. Hard rock elements like solo lead guitar and intensely emotional riffs help make “Raging River” an unforgettable song and a potential single, if the musicians were considering a commercial release, even with all the long instrumental passages.

Another watery ambient piece, with a religious chant in the background and a cold synth drone wash melody, passes us by and we’re into the second long track “Towards the Emerald Empire”, another raging song with speedy blastbeat percussion and more wobbling tremolo guitar and phin riffs going full-tilt fast and furious. This track is not quite so rock’n’roll as “Raging River” and its melodies are more workman-like with the thin craggy vocals becoming more important and prominent in the music as a result. Once most of the vocals are out of the way, the phin and guitar take up their alternating positions as lead solo instruments in their headlong rush into blackened folk metal euphoria. 

The entire EP really does play like a very long single with an equally long B-side even though it’s long enough to be an album in its own right. The short ambient pieces play like extended introductions to both long songs. The Thai folk music elements exert an emotional (mostly melancholy) pull that is hard to resist; they hint at tales of past suffering and hardship in times when the material world and the spiritual world were once closer and interacted much more often than they do now, with humans often being unwitting and unwilling victims of malevolent spirits. The best moments in the EP come when the phin and guitars are raging and racing together, matching raindrop note for raindrop note in long chains of fretboard riff scrabble. The long songs are so densely packed with such riffing, and all riffs saturated with heartfelt emotion, that listeners may end up having to replay them over and over even though the music sometimes can be repetitive.

If Lotus of Darkness were based in the West and released this EP as an extended single, it could have been their breakthrough release. As things are though, the trio may have to wait through another album or two before their distinctive style of blackened folk fusion is recognised outside Thailand.

When River Flows Reverse (TWISTED FLOWERS TF001) gives us eight songs of acid-drenched melodic instrumentals and songs from a combo named River Flows Reverse. Most of the instruments are played by local hero Ambrus Bence (who also produced the set), joined by the singers Kriszti Benus from Lemurian Folk Songs and Lorinc Sántha from Indeed. Tibor Kovács, from Strong Deformity, adds drums. There’s also the guest trumpet player Nico Delmas from Hold Station. Guitarist Bence happens to be in several not-unrelated bands, such as Liquidacid, Satorinaut, Slight Layers, Predictions, and the already-noted Lemurian Folk Songs, and has been appearing on records since 2017.

So far one might be expecting a Hungarian take on The Bevis Frond (one-man band, heavy psychedelic influence), but Bence and crew have their own distinct voice. A track like ‘At the Gates of The Perennial’ impresses with its clarity and simplicity; the guitar tone is clear, no excessive pedal effects, and though it’s an instrumental it’s by no means an empty, meandering “jamming” session. Bence picks his notes with care, performing with calm focus over the sort of determined steady shuffle figure you might associate with Opal, Can, or even Wooden Shjips. There’s also ‘El Sendero II & III’, another long-ish piece which allows our man to stretch out into an epic “cinematic” sweep on the lines of ‘Kashmir’ replete with exotic aural touches, without feeling the need to resort to Page-Plant histrionics or bombast; on the contrary, much of the melodic topline here is “suggested” rather than stated, by combining guitar strums, percussion, and minimal lead electric guitar stabs (as fine as a knitting needle). It’s probably the banjo of Lorinc and the trumpet of Delmas here that make me think I’m hearing a reimagined soundtrack of a very dark revisionist Western movie, one where all the cowboys are skeletons and the county jail is a nuclear bunker full of toxic waste.

We should also mention the two vocalists, heard notably on ‘Leaving Shades Ahead’ and on the minor-key ‘Final Run’ with their chilly harmonies; the latter song is very like meeting Nico on her way to give a slap in the face to Grace Slick. River Flows Reverse tell us the record was made in a cold shed in the middle of a muddy forest, and seems to have been a response to the lockdown situation when all gigs were cancelled, the band members felt bored, and just started playing this music; “this is a masterpiece of our curfew recordings,” reads the press release. It is something of a relief, after a series of lockdown records being used as platforms for a pious lecture or some quasi-philosophical drivel, to hear someone honestly admit that they were simply “bored”. Tamás Tóth did the cover art, with its imaginary geography and adding to the sense this this whole LP is a travelogue, winding us down rivers and across terrains with its stately wagon-driven pace. I shan’t say that every track is essential, or even that it needs to be a double-LP, but there are enough strong examples of the band’s instrumental craft to make this a worthwhile visit.

Diviner Blues Sessions (TWISTED FLOWERS TF002), credited to Slight Layers, Predictions, also a double LP, is the more conventional of the two – a document of 12-bar blues sessions, and showcasing the lead guitar work of David Nagy; Ambrus Bence is here again, now playing bass guitar, and Mate Varga is on drums. The album was recorded in the “underground” rehearsal space used by other Hungarian bands – Satorinaut, Lemurian Folk Songs, Pilot Voyager – and more, which I mention as further evidence of this thriving psychedelic rock culture in Hungary.

Unlike Bence above, Nagy has his own more florid and discursive approach to lead guitar, quite some way from the refined guitar minimalism displayed above, and he’s not afraid of letting rip with blues-based riffing, whammy bar action, and the sort of trippy non-stop marathon playing that is so loved by fans of Jerry Garcia. However, much to his credit David Nagy doesn’t overdo it with the pedals or amplifier distortion, although there may be some wah-wah and other effects on occasion, and if you like a good clean guitar tone you should tune in to ‘Vital Verifications’ on Side D. On ‘Subconscious Takes’, the band reveal a talent for group dynamics and a reasonably well-worked-out melody that sustains a 23-minute workout, even if it’s arguable we’re not hearing much musical progress from Jeff Beck, Cream, or the Jimi Hendrix Experience. Indeed as the record continues, we start to sense that here’s a rock music culture that’s been largely untroubled by significant musical developments like punk rock or post-punk; even the harsh atonalities of Sonic Youth offer no temptations to our Hungarian lads. Unlike their psychedelic heroes though, this is a band that largely seems incapable of freaking out or transcending the form, and they stick doggedly and efficiently to the execution of the chosen task.

Enfin, competent and professional blues rock jams are the bill of fare, despite whatever esoteric strangeness and unknown journeys the cover art imagery may promise us.

For nearly 40 years after its first release in 1985 this album by Minoru “Hoodoo” Fushimi was much sought after and consequently hard to find by collectors for its whimsically eclectic combination of electro-disco funk, drum machines, synthesisers, hard rock guitar and shamisen playing, and early hip-hop – not to mention the fact that it was all composed, recorded, produced, designed and released by Minoru Fushimi himself. What is most remarkable about “Thanatos of Funk” (and a big part of its charm to collectors) is that at the time it was made, Fushimi was teaching high school students during the day and presumably was only able to work on the album’s songs in the late evenings. Now at last this album has been remastered and is available digitally and in vinyl LP format courtesy of French label 180g. With remastering, the album sounds fresh even though the music’s style and sounds are very much of their period and the songs are more or less restricted by the capabilities and limitations of the electronic instruments Fushimi was able to use.

The general presentation is amazingly clear and very polished, and all instruments, even those in the far background or delicate in tone, can be heard distinctly. With most songs featuring vaguely Japanese or other Asian melodies, and all done in a fairly spare way, the music sometimes appears a bit over-refined, even precious. How many of the ten songs are Fushimi’s own originals, I do not know: he covers Jimi Hendrix’s “Foxy Lady” so of course there is at least one cover. The inclusion of “Foxy Lady” and other songs with titles like “Gals’ Blues” speak to a rather droll sense of humour on Fushimi’s part given the nature of his day job. Several tracks feature electronically treated or distorted vocals along with the heavy thumping funk rhythms and those synth drum beats that sound like blown-up packets of potato crisps being hit together.

The album starts well with “Thanatopsis” and “In Praise of Mitochondria” which feature twangy shamisen in amongst the beats, the funk, guitar and a huge range of familiar 1980s-era synthesiser effects and tone wash. From then on, it tends to coast along on an even keel though individual songs do have their particular charms like Fushimi’s rapping (“Hensachi-sama”) and occasional lead guitar break-outs. The album can start to pall a bit around the halfway mark and the inclusion of “Foxy Lady” and smoky blues elements along on “Gals’ Blues” and “Disco Thesis” is not enough to save the music from sinking into its own electro-disco funk kitsch. By the time we reach the truly dreadful “Dompan (Private Funk)”, the twee quality is reaching alarmingly nauseous levels.

After a couple of spins to become acquainted with “Thanatos of Funk”, you’re best advised to hear the album in small bites of a couple of songs rather than playing it all at once from start to finish. Truly unique music it is but like a lot of outsider music made by DIY enthusiasts doing everything themselves, it does have a lot of hit-and-miss moments.

The other two tracks are credited to the present trio, suggesting they are semi-organised jams – savour the chaotic tumblings of ‘Three Islands’ and enjoy the claustrophobic riffage and poundage of ‘Tokugoya’ which spins around in ever-increasing circles like an acid-trip whirlpool…just think what Finnish rockers Circle would have done with the same material. I confess I stopped listening to Acid Mothers Temple records after a while, mainly since there are so many of them and they began to seem too much like clever pastiches, but this one is as genuine as they come, a powerful unkempt beast of unashamed retro-rock. (21/06/2021)

Berlin sound artist Jana Irmert here with The Soft Bit (FABRIQUE RECORDS FAB088), last heard by us with her Flood record which attempted to tell a story and created all its atmospheric effects purely by electronic means, eschewing use of processed field recordings. However, she’s gone back to playing “objects” on this record, alluding to materials such as “metal, water, sand and air” which were the source recordings for these eight audio episodes. She’s aiming to convey something about the surfaces and granularity and physical sensations of these elements, and hoping to create a very immersive experience on The Soft Bit. As she worked through the process, she was bit surprised to find that rocks and metal created “soft” sounds – while air and water produced hard, percussive beats. At this point she stops short of alluding to any sort of metaphysical or alchemical procedure (thankfully), and makes a point of telling us there were no preconceived ideas, structures or storylines determining the ultimate form and direction of the record, suggesting she was guided by more intuitive and instinctive methods. Good surfaces and textures, each track tending to blend two or more layers together to produce a certain light tension, occasionally allowing minimal melodies on piano or keyboard to emerge from the nebulous clouds. (21/06/2021)