Member:
ffroyd
(Profile)
(All Album Reviews by ffroyd)
Date:
4/23/2006
Format:
CD (Album)
OK SPACE CADETS! PREPARE TO HURTLE THROUGH THE COSMOS IN TODAY’S TURGID EPISODE!
This is madness I tell you! Pure space madness! Never before in the history of our galaxy has such a death-defying mission been undertaken! What’s this, you say, has ffroyd’s brain been sucked through the airlock into the vacuum of space? Again?! No friend, what I’m babbling on about is perhaps the single most ambitious musical collaboration I’ve ever come across. A space rock masterpiece for the ages!
So just who exactly are these Psychedelic Avengers and what is this ever-so-evil sounding Blood Empire? Well, it’s a bit difficult to describe; The Psychedelic Avengers are not a band at all but a conglomeration of many heroic and adventurous musical artists from around this globe we’ve come to recognize as Earth. All told, there are 43 different entities contributing sonic structures on two compact discs filled to capacity. This unique 155-minute aural journey is not a compilation with each artist contributing their own tracks. No, these artists collaborate in a different configurations for each track, producing a very distinctive musical creation.
The performers involved come from a very wide array of musical genres including space rock, techno, ambient, post rock, indie, neo psychedelic, pop, funk, hip hop, experimental…the list goes on and on. Countries like Germany, Japan, Greece, Sweden, Iceland, UK, USA, Denmark, Belgium and Finland are all represented. Pretty much all of them are rather obscure. Of the 43, the only names I was familiar with were a few odd space rock acts like Zone Six, Liquid Sound Company, Dark Sun and Mandra Gora Lightshow Society. The entire list of those involved can be found on the Psychedelic Avengers web site.
The basic concept here revolves around a story written by Leo Lukas concerning the Avengers struggle with the Decterian Empire who wants the entire galaxy to succumb to their malevolent wishes. While the album doesn’t exactly contain much narrative, there is a flow since each track is meant to convey a different part of the story. Things go extremely smooth too, considering the vast contrast among all the musicians that take part. The text supplied in the CD booklet is written in German, but there is a section in the Psychedelic Avengers web site where an English translation can be downloaded.
I think that it’s nothing short of astounding how brilliantly unified this entire project is. The music is amazing and the continuity throughout makes it sound like it could have all come from a single artist. It took me a few plays before I really became hooked on the album. I’ve listened to it about a dozen times so far and each time new elements unfold. Like a complex movie, the whole thing cannot be grasped in just one sitting.
Although I would call the bulk of the album space rock, the style is quite a bit different than what I was normally accustomed to. Sure there’s no shortage of synthesizers, vocoders, wave generators, effects processing and digital editing but the truly amazing part of this project is how unique everything sounds. While there are a few heavy parts, they are heavy in not a metal or punk way. Some of the songs with lyrics have a strange indie pop slant that could be described as being similar to the vocal moments in Quarkspace’s songs with a Sun Ra influence. Yes, they are “out there.”
This whole thing may have never come about without the vision and dedication of Sven Missullis and Timo Lommatzsch who produced and directed the project. Just getting 43 artists to participate in such an ambitious undertaking must have been quite a task, making it all sound so smooth was something completely out of this world.
Just like in a long mission across the universe, there are way too many highlights on this disc to list in this short review. The entire captain’s log is still in transport from Penubis 9 and probably won’t arrive until several thousand light years from now. Until then, this is a very admirable document and proof that various alien races can work together to attain a common goal.
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