Strange things are happening………………..Out now on Germany’s purveyors of the finest cosmic sounds, Sulatron Records, is the spellbinding debut album from Italian Psychedelic adventurers Sherpa. For those of you who are familiar with the usual heavy Space Rock/Krautrock output of the label, Sherpa’s astonishing first LP Tanzlinde is somewhat of a stylistic departure, it’s not a brain frying mission to the outer planets of our solar system or a white knuckle ride to the centre of the mind propelled by motorik grooves but a more gentle trip inspired the rugged Apennine Mountains, Eastern cultures and lost ancient song…………………… bursting the borders of music genres, it’s a beautifully constructed modern Neo-Psychedelic record where you can hear the influences/inspiration taken from “classic” Psychedelia, 70s experimental Progressive Rock and the more organic, lysergic Krautrock from that era with Sherpa tapping into everything from Popol Vuh to Robert Wyatt and all points in between allied with a strong flavour of Eastern traditional music. Mixing modern Psychedelia with Eastern influences, Sherpa have created an intoxicating blend of music that PsychHeads will be blown away by but is sufficiently grounded as not to frighten the Indie kids……………fans of bands such as Temples, Tame Impala, MGMT and other more chart friendly Psych influenced acts will also find lots to love here.
Tanzlinde is a real grower……. with it’s translucent sounding psychedelic swirl, it becomes better and more intense with every listen. There is a woozy somnambulist vibe about the record, it’s hazy psychedelic shimmer more than evident on tracks such as ‘Elven’, ‘Dubinuska,’ ‘Tanzlinde’ and the wonderfully atmospheric ‘Of Coke And Steel’ Opening with drones and cascading guitars ‘Sherpa’ builds into a full blown Bill Laswell style Eastern headswirler with Arabic female devotional wailing spinning around a pulsing Sahara desert blues groove, and the Laswell comparisons continue with the beautiful ‘Big Foot’ where East meets West in a bustling Cairo street market. Sherpa’s debut LP is stunningly accomplished and it’s twelve tracks radiate with the same special fragile beauty of all the best blissed out psychedelic records. We are currently deciding what our favourite records of 2016 are and Tanzlinde is sure to make the cut.
Tanzlinde is out NOW on CD with the vinyl due to land on 16th December. Released by Sulatron Records and available from their web store, the usual online distributors and your local turned on, tuned in and tripped out record store.
No comments:
Post a Comment