MAGMA [AKA: KOBAÏA]

Magma's debut album sees them playing in what is essentially a jazz-rock fusion vein with vocals in their invented Kobaian language. The music here takes much more inspiration from free jazz than most fusion does - in fact, I can't thing of any other band that goes to such lengths to fuse rock and free jazz aside from Zappa and the Mothers on Weasels Ripped My Flesh, or perhaps Third-period Soft Machine. (Though on balance I think Magma sound a bit more like the former.) Vander would eventually lead the band in an altogether different direction, but this early double album shows that before they invented their very own genre of music Magma were an accomplished fusion unit, more than capable of holding their own in that field.