Hi there!
Please check out the video for the title track of the next Astral Magic album Dance of Destiny! The album will be out 7.3.2025 and available on limited edition CD and digital download. Would also fit on LP, if some label is interested?!
Other news is that I just got frozen in Facebook again after a few group postings... Seems useless.
Oh, the Chakra Vimana album will be released on Tonzonen Records on 23.5.2025! 300 copies on coloured vinyl and also on digipack CD. I'm so excited!
Fruits de Mer Records (intro 7)
The first disc starts with the band's FdM debut single Volume One and I just love these cover tunes. Three cuts form the Suspiria EP are wonderful too, of course... Then we get the 7" postcard single track "Take a Heart" and several songs from their FdM album The Sun Yard. Then we have pieces from Sunny Spells EP and Head Music 3 3LP and even some rare promo etc. tracks that I have never even heard before! The disc one ends with three tracks from Love Your Enemies album. Wonderful psych pop tunes in there.
The second disc starts off with even nine songs from the band's The Last Wave album released on Friends of the Fish together with the legendary Flicknife Records in 2020. I missed this one since there were sadly only 99 copies made on LP, so it's nice to have the tracks here, at least. One digital single and split cassette track later we get to the tracks from their El Shoegaze Bossa Nova LP that was actually released on Sugarbush Records, not on FdM. I'm not a big fan of bossanova, so I did not buy that one... But the real gold is saved until the end when we get to hear some alternative mixes and previously unreleased stuff! You'll definitely get your money's worth with this great compilation, warmly recommended. This will be available at the end of this month.
www.fruitsdemerrecords.com/sfaintro.html
A great 4.5/5 review by Carry Munter of the next Astral Magic album out on the 7th of March:
carrysnewundergroundmusic.blogspot.com/2025/02/review-astral-magic-dance-of-destiny.html
Here's translation for those who do not speak Dutch for some reason:
Astral Magic from Finland is the solo project of bassist Santtu Laakso, a member of the psychedelic space rock band Dark Sun, which was founded in 1991.
On September 30, 2020, he released his first solo album, Pathway To The Stars, followed by 65 more digital releases, some of which were also issued on LP and CD through Space Rock Productions, Sapphire Records, Clostridium, Tonzonen Records, and Aumega Project. On March 6, 2025, Dance Of Destiny will be released on his own label, Astral Magic Music, both as a CD and a digital download. The album features eight tracks, with Laakso playing all the instruments himself, except for track 2, where his son Anton contributes on Moog.
The album opens with Intro - Open The Portal, a fantastic up-tempo krautrock piece, followed by the title track Dance Of Destiny, a brilliant space rock song with a steady tempo and a catchy recurring rhythm influenced by the music of Hawkwind.
Next is Distortion In Space-Time, a fantastic up-tempo progressive rock track with an Eastern vibe, space rock influences, a swinging rhythm, and tempo changes, followed by We Plunge Into Chaos, an excellent melodic space rock song with light space rock elements and an infectious rhythm.
In Transmission Psi, Astral Magic delivers a delightful, Eastern-sounding track at a moderate tempo, reminiscent of In The Labyrinth, while Slumber Of The Ancient Ones offers an outstanding space rock song with a not-too-fast pace and a hypnotic rhythm that induces a light trance.
The album continues with Zep Tepi, a swinging, up-tempo space rock song with an infectious recurring rhythm that makes it impossible to sit still, and concludes with Last Days Of A Time Cycle, a delightful electronic track at a moderate tempo, which could easily have been performed by Kitaro.
Dance Of Destiny by Astral Magic contains eight outstanding tracks, primarily categorized under space rock. I thoroughly enjoyed this remarkable album and highly recommend it to every fan of the genre.
I had recently decided not to put out new Astral Magic releases as often
as before, so an idea was received from my friend Jaire to release this
under a different project name. That I way I could still keep my
promise without cheating (much...)! I decided to call this new project
Strange Vibrations according to one of the tracks, and Shane liked that
too. To shake things even more I did remixes of two of the most "normal"
tracks and put those out first as
"Astral Magic Mix" single. I added bass guitar and my vocals to these
single versions, two of the most recognizable elements from Astral Magic
that I have decided never to use in Strange Vibrations to keep some
distance.
Jonathan Segel helped us a lot by mastering all the stuff while I came up with all the dodgy artwork myself (Andy was too busy making three different designs for my other projects...). Getting confused? No wonder... Anyway, this is more or less how it all happened. I hope you like it! The album will be out on March the 7th only on Bandcamp (and maybe YouTube) as digital download and limited edition of 33 copies on home-made CD-R. There will also be a new Astral Magic CD Dance of Destiny available then. The Longing for the Stars / Solarwind single was released last Friday when Bandcamp donated all their share to victims of the Los Angeles fires, you can hear and buy it here:
Nick Pipitone has published a cool Astral Magic interview on his magnificent The Third Eye music blog!
To read the interview and know what's going on, please go to:
thirdeyepsychrock.blog/2025/02/07/a-conversation-with-finnish-psych-rock-traveler-astral-magic/
Fruits de Mer Records / Regal Crabomophone (winkle 57)
Like many albums of the original era, Stellar Season is a loose consept album about a rural society far from Earth that was in love with the Sun, Day and Summer with not so good end results. We have seven songs in 43 minutes and they form a very interesting, beautiful, well balanced and rather peaceful arch. We get plenty of acoustic guitars, sitar, great bass patterns, nice harmony vocals, soft rhythms, heavenly keyboards, synthesizers, woodwind and almost everything you would except from an album like this. Well, no clear-voiced female singers or violins, though. All in all, a very enjoyable experience that will give lots of aural pleasure to fans of progressive folk music. There are two different vinyl variants to choose from and the black one is the more limited version. Recommended!
www.fruitsdemerrecords.com/stellar.html
Fruits de Mer Records (intro 6)
This great power pop trio from California loved their 60s mod/freakbeat/garage/psych influences from the US and UK. They were frequently involved with Fruits de Mer since the 2010 compilation LP A Phase We're Going Through until they went on indefinitive hiatus some time ago. Well, until sort of now, of course, when this double CD-R compilation was released last month.
The first disc features all the band's individual tracks for Fruits de Mer (mostly covers, 11 in total) plus nine bonus tracks that are all their own compositions. They cover for example The Bee Gees, Bowie, The Kinks, The Small Faces, The Pretty Things etc. and do a wonderful job at it. Six of the bonus tracks are from their 2012 album Venus, Saturn and the Crecent Moon. Then we get two demos of tracks from the same album plus a short piece recorded for the Strange Brew broadcast. There's lots of stuff to love here! The second disc includes their complete remake of the Strange Roads album by The Action, first time on CD format! I have previously reviewed that album, so please read my thougts over here.
www.fruitsdemerrecords.com/sidewalkintro.html
Fruits de Mer Records (intro 7)
Okay, I have a confession to make. Vibravoid from Germany is the best band that has ever released anything on Fruits de Mer and one of my favourite bands ever... With one constant member Christian (Dr.) Koch they have been around for 35 years and released a massive back catalogue also including numerous remakes and reissues. Vibravoid is one of the leading acts in the psychedelic rock in general and everyone into psychedelia and krautrock, old or new, really should check them out.
This double CD-R compiles some of the best covers the band has recorded for Fruits de Mer on the first disc and some live versions (including previously unreleased) and studio album covers on the second disc. Many of the original limited edition 7" and LP releases are now almost impossible to get at reasonable prices and are totally essential, so it's very cool that you can now hear some of the best pieces in a very economic and easy way. 15 tracks in total on disc one, I love every minute of it. We have covers of Pink Floyd, Can, Amon Düül II, Iron Butterfly, Traffic, Kraftwerk, even Eddie Cochran etc., you name it.
The hard-core fans like me who already have everything are probably most intersted in the previously unreleased live stuff on disc two. "Colour Your Mind" was recorded at The Cavern Club in Exeter in 2016 and has a really great sound. Very cool version! "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" from Film Museum in the band's hometown Düsseldorf in 2017 rocks like hell... All 12 minutes of it. Then we are back at The Cavern Club with over 15-minute long version of "Mother Sky", splendid. "No Silver Bird" is from the 2011 Burg Hertzberg Festival and might be a different mix to the one from the live albun the band released from that gig. "Incense and Peppermints", "Magic Mirror" and "Oscillations" are the covers released on two of the band's studio albums in 2008 and 2013 and they are amazing versions for sure.
All in all, this is great album to get into Vibravoid and even if you have most of the stuff this makes a great listening experience. Just get it!
www.fruitsdemerrecords.com/vibravoidintro.html
www.youtube.com/@VibravoidOfficial
Humu Records (HUMU041)
Positive Wave is a Helsinki-based prog rock band that has been active for a long time. For some reason some bands like them need a decade or more to make an album, and the self-titled debut was released already in 2010. They have had some draw-backs though, mainly the untimely passing of their original keyboard player Jani Häggblom in 2022. Jani is still very strongly present on the new album. So what can I say about the band? Like their name suggests, they spread positive vibes through their warm, happy and pleasureable music. The vocals of their charismatic and lovely singer Susan Karttunen are in Finnish, but don't let that stop you from chcking out their stuff even if you don't understand a word.
They are often labeled as progressive rock band, which is mostly true. They also play around with reggae, afrobeat and other world music as well as folk, funk, jazz, pop and a bit of psychedelia. I guess Wigwam is one of their influnces, but there must be lots of others as well like Santana. There's a certain early 70's vibe in there, but especially the latest stuff also has some more modern elements, so you can't really just label them as relics. All the 11 tracks on the CD are very well written, arranged and performed. These guys are really good players and can keep the stuff interesting and uplifting. Susan is one of the best female singers in this genre in Finland, for sure. The album took a long time to finnish, but it was worth it. It sounds just great, and I also love the suitable drawings by Eetu Pellonpää. If you like positive, nice progressive, creative and versatile music, this is a must.
Hello and Happy New Year!
Some Astral news. Bad news first: my Facebook accounts are frozen, so my almost only channel for promoting my music is down again after hours and hours of hard work of getting connected to like-minded people again. A Bummer. I hope I can get it back this time, but let's see. That's the reason I'm now asking for help in spreading the message and sharing this post to all possible social media sites you are on, thanks and astral blessings to all those who are ready to help!
No new Astral Magic releases in the near future, but our album with Jay Tausig and Bridget Wishart as Astral Hawk Machine should be out soon on LP and CD. More news a.s.a.p. Also the true heavy space rock album Into the Cosmos should finally be out on LP and CD later this year. Just wait until you hear that one! There might also be a new Astral Magic magazine with a new compilation and at least one more Astral Magic album this year. Probably more, you know me...
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Then to the good news: we have a new project album ready now; Chakra Vimana - Feed My Soul. Chakra Vimana is a new modern & jazzy prog/psych/space rock project by Shane Beck, Mark Cook and Santtu Laakso with special guest Steven Leak. Debut album Feed My Soul will be released in 2025. Album design by Andy Wainwright. We are now in the process of finding a record label for the album, please be in touch if you have any ideas?
You can listen to an album sampler on our bandcam site:
We also have a new Facebook site (Mark had to start again after mine was frozen yesterday):
Mark also did a cool video of the album sampler:
