• Music

    Shūko No Omit – 秘密の回顧録 (Secret Memoir)

    December 4, 2023 - By 

    Ramble Records out of Australia have published a unique album here – one that should be seen as a modern psychedelic rock masterpiece.  From their Bandcamp site: “Shūko No Omit, the name of the band, featuring Yonju Miyaoka on guitar and Vocals, his older brother Taiju Sugimori on bass and chorus,and his cousin Yuya Yamazaki on drums and chorus, is a mix of Japanese and english. Yonju told me he came across the word omit while reading an old English dictionary. Shuko (終古) is old Japanese. A word no longer used. One lost to time. The characters 終 + 古mean…

  • Music

    Various Artists – D​-​Day: A Grateful Dead Tribute from Krautland

    November 12, 2023 - By 

    Although the bands themselves on this comp from our dear friends at the Lollipoppe Shoppe might play Kraut-influenced music, this comp is definitely NOT Krautrock.  I can’t say that the music is perfectly straight-ahead covers of some of the Grateful Dead’s finest work, but to hear these songs in a more modern setting is rather refreshing.  The tunes maintain their psychedelic heart, even if there is a touch of Kraut (a welcome addition, mind you) imbued into these tunes.

  • Music

    Kikagaku Moyo/幾何学模様 – Kumoyo Island

    May 6, 2022 - By 

    Some very happy news today, as Japanese acid-folk-psych band Kikagaku Moyo have given us a fresh album. From their Bandcamp website: “In many ways ‘Kumoyo Island’ represents the culmination of a journey for Kikagaku Moyo. While their decade-long career can be summarized as a series of kaleidoscopic explorations through lands and dimensions far and near, there’s a strong intention in each of their works to take the listener to a particular place, however real or abstract they may be. In that sense, the title and cover art for the band’s fifth and final album draws you into a magical mass…

  • Music

    Jeff Gburek – Omnia Sacra et Miracula

    February 16, 2022 - By 

    Our friend and one of our perennial favorites at this blog, Jeff Gburek, comes to us with a mini-LP’s worth of meditative guitar music supplemented with an electro-acoustic bass berimbau, pine cones, and field recordings.  There is an element of twangy, echoey, lo-fi music in these recordings which reminded me of the primordial, primitive guitar stylings of Robbie Basho or John Fahey blended with touches of American psychedelic folk as heard by bands such as Texas’ acid-folk legends Charalambides.

  • Music

    Upupayāma – Upupayāma EP

    November 18, 2021 - By 

    From the Upupayāma Bandcamp site: Upupayāma is the musical persona of Alessio Ferrari, an Italian multi-instrumentalist and songwriter who lives in a small mountain village above the city of Parma. In addition to playing guitar, bass, keyboards, and drums, Ferrari himself also incorporates a number of other instruments into his work, including sitar, erhu, transverse and wooden flutes, and a variety of percussion instruments. This is a stunning debut by Upupayāma, whose take on psychedelic rock caught my attention. The album swims along nicely, reminding me of bands like Kikagaku Moyo. I hope they stay on this vein. It’s pleasantly heavy…

  • Music

    Fontän – Svett / Bekçi

    November 2, 2021 - By 

    Sweden’s Höga Nord Rekords always produces some from psychedelic rock, but this 7-inch singe from Fontän is a kraut-y scorcher. Fontän hail from Gothenburg, the home of the label, and they produce two solid slabs of fine psychedelic fuzz with a gently grooving drum beat, dubby bass, loads of echo and electronic effects, and some impressively clean production for the genre.  The single will be out on November 26, 2021.

  • Music - Soundcloud

    Jeff Gburek – Corduroy Cascade

    June 24, 2021 - By 

    Jeff Gburek · Corduroy Cascade Normally, I’m more than happy to present works from Jeff Gburek and those associated with his music because the quality is high as it comes to experimental or other such avant-garde music. This, however, is a departure from what I’m used to hearing from him, and to say it’s a stunning one is putting it mildly. The track weighs in at under 8 minutes, but is more a lush, truly acid-folk-inspired work. There are elements of projects like the American psychedelic folk band Changes, Coptic/esoteric period Current 93 (without the rambling), and a great lo-fi…

  • Music

    Makoto Kawabata, Richard Pinhas, Manongo Mujica, Juan Luis Pereira, Hiroshi Higashi – Alturas

    June 3, 2021 - By 

    What we have here is an experimental music supergroup.  Makoto Kawabata and Hiroshi Higashi of acid-psych lords Acid Mothers Temple team up with the legendary guitarist Richard Pinhas (famed as the leader of the band Heldon, and still very much active under his own name).  Joining them are two musicians from Peru in Manongo Mujica and Juan Luis Pereira who fill out this psychedelic soundscape. For some context regarding this release, read these notes for the band’s Bandcamp site: When Acid Mothers Temple and Richard Pinhas visited Lima for the first time, in November 2017, to participate in the experimental…

  • Music

    The Myrrors – Borderlands

    May 30, 2021 - By 

    While reading an excellent blog called The Fragmented Flâneur (I highly recommend subscribing to it, psych fans), I came across a review from a band whose words I admire a lot, but had forgotten about.  The Myrrors are an outfit from Tuscon, Arizona who manage to blend together the noisiness of White Heaven, the hypnotic dirges of Ghost or even modern masters like Kikagaku Moyo, and a violin, adding a touch that would have fit in perfectly with the Third Ear Band. Invest a few moments reading The Fragmented Flâneur’s review and then sink into these otherworldly tracks. It’s worth…