OFF: I'm waiting for my Hawks: recent acquisitions

[Christian Mumford]

With all this talk of the two new Hawkwind releases, I figured I'd go
over some spacey stuff I've gotten in the last few weeks (my Visa
is smokin'!):

Neu! s/t - the opening track "Hallogallo" all I have heard so far (now
                playing) since I just picked this up. This is awesome,
                driven stuff, a really tight rhythm with spacey guitar
                "wah's" bubbling up at regular intervals. I didn't think
                Neu! would be so *spacey*, this is great stuff... oh,
                here we go, the next track... so far, WOW.... (later:) The CD's
                played its course by now... other GREAT standout is
                "Negativland", and this is overall a little mindblower.
                Now I know where Negativland got their name! I
                also got Neu! 75 but have yet to give it a spin...

Alien Planetscapes - "Life On Earth" - Again, brilliant stuff. Really really
                really brilliant. Music played by aliens, a groove unknown
                to man emanates from my speakers... I suppose if Ozric Tentacles
                actually were from another planet - maybe they'd be this
                good in a million years. Every single track here is a
                masterpiece. Get info via the Born To Go site! NOW!

Breath Grenades - "Space Rawk Replicas" - this is bizarre punkrock from a
bunch
                no good heads. Not overly great, it's like the first Monster
                Magnet demos played on a fucked up tape deck at double speed.
                Sort of a crass meeting of that and Cosmic Psychos after a fatal
                beer & LSD lobotomy. Some good acid ranting towards the end of
                the CD, the (barely) standout tracks here are "Punkwind" (just
                a really fast punk thing with no melody and lyrics about
                mohawks and razorblades in space) and "Turn That Shit Off", which
                is the same noisy sound but with different lyrics about getting
                messed up and playing loud music. Some really bizarre keyboard
                noises quack along under the fuzz throughout which is likely
                to mess you up big time if you are turned on. Most curious.

Melting Euphoria - "Upon The Solar Winds"        - this is ok Cleopatra label
                spacerock, decent enough. Sounds ALOT like Brainticket
                maybe with a dash of Ozrics, but nothing truly mindblowing.
                Also, that icky tinny sound that Cleopatra seems to love
                (along with the often tacky design) bothers me as usual.
                Give me Steve Pond's vinyl anyday!! (I disagree with Carl
                here, the vinyl transfer has alot more "oomph" than the
                CD transfers on the ICU CDrom!)

Gong - "Shapeshifter+" - Looks like the reconstructed Aellen line up are
                groping for something as good as the Radio Gnome stuff,
                and are not even coming near. Ok, IMO better than the
                Aellen-less (cold?) fusion stuff, but a far cry from
                old glories... ok listen, though disposable enough.

Amorphis - "Tales From The Thousand Lakes" - this is decent enough
                death-y metal with a melodious folk influence and
                more range than most of these kinds of bands. Pretty
                different than the My Kantele psych effort (which was
                IMO very cool). Too bad about the dumb "death growl"
                vocals which mars some fine music. Somewhat mystical
                sounding in places, and captures an atmosphere of
                the Finnish folk poem the Kalevala, though nothing
                out of this world.

Jessamine - "Another Fictionalized History" - I posted about this
                band before, but I'll try to make more sense here.
                Definetly an interesting combination of the Spacemen 3
                "drone" spacerock branch of the galaxy and drippy,
                kraut-y analog keyboard tendencies of early Tangerine
                Dream and Cosmic Jokers etc. Throw in a dash of US
                "indie hipster" muzak sound (??) I guess, or some
                of Stereolab's less "loung-y" aspects. Some tracks are
                huge, cosmic psychedelic affairs (like "I'm Not Afraid
                of Electricity"), and it also contains some GREAT covers
                of both Suicide's wonderful "Cheree" and "Oscillations"
                by Silver Apples (I'm not familiar with the last band
                but they seem interesting from an article I read in Wire).
                Anyway, to me at least, this is a great Jessamine primer
                and a varied selection of single tracks collected on one CD.
                VERY nice digipack too.

There! Now, as I patiently wait for DH and 1999 Party....
Christian