Lucille Furs - Another Land / Leave It As You Found It 7"

Treehouse Record Co. (TRC001)

Lucille Furs is a dreamy psychedelic baroque pop band from Chicago. They have previously released one 7" and one album last year, but the first time I heard about them was when I got sent this new 7" single that was recently released. The band has taken quite a lot of influences from the 60s psych pop/rock scene but they still have a fresh, melodic and interesting style of their own. If you know artists/bands like Jacco Gardner, Balduin or Temples and remove the modern technology you sort of know what to expect. I guess you could call this 60s inspired psychedelic baroque indie pop.

This new single has two new simple but catchy songs: "Another Land" backed with "Leave It As You Found It". "Another Land" starts off in a slow, mellow mode bringing to mind The Doors and The Beatles, but soon goes into a hypnotic, mid-tempo verse. I really enjoy the soft dreamy vocals. The slow intro returns for a while after the short chorus and then we go again. There's a little lead guitar part and the track is over. Simple but brilliant! You just have to put it on again, since you are hooked right away. The B-side is a funny little, fully orchestrated number that I don't find that captivating but it's still okay. It only lasts under two minutes, anyway. This single comes on tasty green vinyl and is available now on Treehouse Records. I'm already looking forward to the band's next album! Check them out.

www.lucillefurs.com

Dj Astro's Playlist @ UFOP Psychedelic Easter, Bar Lepakkomies, Helsinki, 31.3.2018 (Warp Transmission, Albinö Rhino, Laserdrift & Hadal Sherpa)

Wow, what a night! Great bands, amazing visuals and sound, sold-out and wild going! This is what I spinned:

Aphrodite's Chils - End of the World
The Byrds - She Don't Cre About Time
Pink Floyd - The Scarecrow
The Beach Boys - Good Vibrations
Cream - White Room
The Beatles - Pebby Lane
Blues Magoos - Pipe Dream
Amboy Dukes - You Breath Sunshine, I Breath Fire
The Bubble Puppy - Hot Smoke & Sasafrass
Eloy - Time to Turn
3rd Bardo - Five Years Ahead of My Time
The Electric Prunes - I Had too Much to Dream (Last Night)
Thirteenth Floor ELevators - Slip Inside This House
Hawkwind - Hassan I Sahba
Deep Purple - Hush
Blue Öyster Cult - Godzilla
The First Edition - Just Dropped In (to See What Condition My Condition Was In)
Cosmic Triggers - Homo Fractaliens
The Spacelords - Plasma Thruster
The Crazy World of Arthur Brown - Fire
Fever Tree - San Francisco Girls
Can - More
Fonex - AX100
Barrows - Entrada
Chemistry Set - Legend of a Mind
Plastic Crimewave Sound - Wasted All the Time
Vibravoid - Om Gang Ganpaye Namah
The Jimi Hendris Experience - Foxey Lady
Nik Turner - Fallen Angel STS-51-L
Hawkwind - Night of the Hawks
Chrome - Firebomb
Helicon - Seraph
The Black Angels- Comanche Moon
Dreamtime - Brujeria

Hadal Sherpa - S/T

Self-released

Hadal Sherpa is a really cool instrumental ethnic prog/psych rock band from Southern Finland and this is their first album. I've seen the band live a couple of years ago with supporting Hidria Spacefolk and noticed their potential already then. The first pressing of this digipack CD released in June 2017 sold-out rather quickly but luckily there is a second pressing with slightly altered art work that I got.

The album includes eight long tracks, all between 7:20 and 9:30 in length. Hadal Sherpa has a rather light, folky sound compared to some other similar artists. They are more progressive and less danceable than Hidria Spacefolk, more organic and less electronic than Ozric Tentacles. I can also sense some Kingston Wall vibes, or maybe more like 70s airy, jazzy prog rock like Caravan or Camel or some of the Finnish folk/prog masters like Piirpauke. The great melodies have lots of Eastern/Oriental/Balcan/North-African sounding themes and the use of flutes etc. and odd time signatures add the ethnic mood. At times the band rock more steady in space rock mode too which is great. Never do they get very heavy, though, but some tracks are more intense. As a matter of fact they have a rather unique style after all, although you can hear some of their influences for sure. The tracks are well-structured and interesting and the listener is easily transported into some better, more beautiful and love-filled place. There are also bits of synthesizer in there from time to time to make things more interesting, but they could maybe use that more to get spacier. Unless they don't want to... The playing is great throughout and sound quality excellent too, so in summary I must say that this is one of the best modern Finnish prog bands at the moment. Listen for yourself and please remember that you can see the band live this Saturday in Helsinki at Lepakkomies with Albinö Rhino, Warp Transmission and Laserdrift along with Yours Truly on decks!

www.facebook.com/HadalSherpa

Love Machine - Times to Come

Unique (UNIQ225-1)

Times to Come is the third album by 60s/70s styled bluesy psych rock band Love Machine from Düsseldorf, Germany. These young hippies have now all grown tasty mustaches and also deepened their musical abilities and style. I have previously reviewed their debut Present to the Galaxy and the following Circles on the excellent Tonzonen Records, now they switched labels to Unique.

Like before, the listener is right away reminded of The Doors when the first track "Got To Love" starts to blast from the speakers. Yes, it's maybe mostly due to their deep-voiced singer. By the way, a nice addition are the backing vocals by some of their friends. Also, this time the lead vocalist at times reminds me of Johnny Cash! Anyway, the opener has a cool, sort of sunny, almost African vibe to it as well as a faster, jammy rock section towards the end. Nice! "To the Universe" is a rather mellow piece in the West-Coast style and the longer (7:51) "Blue Eyes" a cool bluesy number with some Grateful Dead styled guitar work and vibe. I like the extended ending on this one. The slow and mellow "Solar Phallus" is the track where the singer brings to mind Johnny Cash the most. There is also some flute on this one. "Visions" is a trippy, groovy instrumental jam with some analogue synth and cool solo guitar work. Very nice! The short, rather minimal title track "Time to Come" has a stronger folk rock vibe á la Donovan, and the last piece "Earth, Again" is a beautiful, soulful number somewhere in between The Byrds, Love and Jefferson Airplane. All in all, if you like late 60s/early 70s styled bluesy rock music with some slide guitar and psych vibes etc. you should check this band out. Out on vinyl, CD and digital download.

www.facebook.com/LoveMachineGermany 

Hotlist March

This is what I've mostly been playing this month (top 15 this time instead of 10 since I can):

Seven That Spells ‎– The Death And Resurrection Of Krautrock: Omega
Secret Saucer ‎– The Reset
Black Lizard ‎– Celebration Of A New Dawn
GNOB ‎– Electric Dream Demon
The Oscillation ‎– U.E.F.
Sounds Of New Soma - Live At The Green Mushroom Festival
Judas Priest ‎– Firepower
Fu Manchu ‎– Clone Of The Universe      
King Gizzard And The Lizard Wizard ‎– Polygondwanaland
Blown Out / Comacozer ‎– In Search Of Highs Volume 1
Melody Fields - S/T
3rd Ear Experience ‎– Stoned Gold
Sammal ‎– Suuliekki

Earthless ‎– Black Heaven

Dungen + Woods – Myths 003 

Dj Astro's Easter Special!

I'll have two ultra cool happenings to dj in Helsinki this Easter, here they are:

Electric Wizard (UK), Hooden Menace & Tombstoned @ Circus, 30.3.2018

Facebook event: www.facebook.com/events/325726737923545
Tickets: www.ticketmaster.fi/event/224015

UFOP: Psykedeelinen Pääsiäinen Vol. 2 (Warp Transmission, Laserdrift, Albinö Rhino & Hadal Sherpa) , Bar Lepakkomies, 31.3.2018

 Facebook event: www.facebook.com/events/754101878106422
Tickets only at the door, come early!

Sounds of New Soma - Live at The Green Mushroom Festival

Tonzonen Records (TON041)

This is the first "live" album by German psychedelic neo-krautrock/ambient/kosmische music group Sounds of New Soma following their three great studio albums and one one-sided 7".  This amazing sounding LP was apparently recorded at The Green Mushroom Festival that sounds like a very cool party although I couldn't find any info from the net. Either it's the kind of fest you only hear your weirdest friends whispering about or the band dreamed the whole thing...

Anyway, what we got here are five previously unreleased tracks. I'm not sure how much is improvised on the go but there must have been at least some stuctures beforehand. This album has a less electronic, more organic vibe to it than the previous albums and I like that. Only the shortest track "Projektionen" is pure electronica with sequencers. Drummer Armin Schopper who was already featured on the previous album La Grande Bellezza is augmenting the core duo of Alexander Djelassi and Dirk Raubach again as well as "other psychedelic astronauts". The opening track "Schein" has a five-minute ambient intro until the slow drum beat begins. I really like the laid-back, hazy atmosphere of this track. There is guitar, spacey electronics and keyboards and bass bringing to mind early 70s Pink Floyd or Electric Orange. On "Om Namah" the vibe gets spacier and more psychedelic. Another slow burner with also a couple of bit heavier guitar parts to a great effect.

On the B-side "Weinende Eidechsen" is a very powerful and trance-inducing track that is probably my favourite on the album. Very psychedelic, deep stuff... After the excellent, Berlin-school-styled sequencer piece "Projektionen" the album is finished off with "Henriette Mutterkorn" that is a bit groovier, killer hypnotic space/krautrock number that moves both your brain and ass. Wonderful! Whether this LP really was recorded live or not it's a very welcome addition to the SONS album family and perhaps the best one yet. Definitely one of the best albums this year so far. There are three different, limited vinyl editions with enclosed CD as well as a separate CD release out there on 6.4.2018. Be sure to get your copy and get spaced out with it!

www.facebook.com/Sounds-Of-New-Soma-618719828173832