THE SPACIOUS MIND

Trail Records have developed a good reputation over the years to seek out and find artists that for some reason or other isn't as well known as they deserve to be, and in The Spacious Mind they have added one more jewel to their roster. Fans of progressive and psychedelic rock are obviously all too aware of this, as I understand that the first print of this CD sold out fairly quickly. A second run has been done though, so there is still a chance for fans of this kind of music to get hold of this CD. Knowing the market for physical CDs these days, I rather suspect that a third run will not happen though, so those who know and know their space rock will have to make a relatively quick decision on whether or not this is a CD they should get hold of. For my sake I'd say that this is a CD that is pretty high up on a must buy list for fans of this kind of music.

It's not known who exactly was involved on the particular songs. You won't run into surprises though I'm sure, as the core quintet remained stable over the years. This will include Henrik Oja, Thomas Brännström and Niklas Viklund (guitars, bass), Jens Unosson (keys, electronics), as well as David Johansson (drums). More than 60 minutes of mellow space rock are given, featuring a great amount of dreamy relaxed moments overall, just in opposite to a more heavy loaded Hawkwind drive for example. So this is a nice selection mirroring very inspired trips, something suitable for a free-flowing laid back listening session most likely.

Euphoria, Euphoria makes my day especially, the soaring guitars are impressive, the organ is backing the flow in an amazing manner. Concerning the title track you may be inclined to start a competition, as there is a studio and live version given. I'm going for the latter, although being shorter, the driving and mesmerizing groove, the guitars are acting absolutely wonderful. In the same way regarding the following Pink Floyd inspired Spirit Roots. When it goes for some future band activity, according to the cover picture, there might be some light after the tunnel? Come what may, 'The Drifter' is a highly recommended new entry to THE SPACIOUS MIND realm.

"In The Land Of Roses And Snow" is such a cool piece of psychedelia like something out of mythology like The Game Of Thrones for example. We get this monologue throughout with this off-set distorted voice as he describes the story. Just really engaging as what sounds like pump organ and e-bow pulse away along with buzzing synths.

"The Cave Song-Garden Of The Dwarfs" opens with percussion and atmosphere as experimental sounds help out and there's no melody. We get a beat before a minute as strummed guitar joins in and tin flute. A folky instrumental really but experimental.

"Upon Which Areas May The Circles Be Drawn?" is a monster. Eventually we get guitars crying out, almost screaming as a relaxed beat and bass supports. Soon the guitars are relaxed and I could listen to this all day. It starts to pick up around 4 1/2 minutes but then settles back as the guitars sort of cry out over and over as the bass continues along with spacey sounds. Drums beat faster in the background after 10 minutes. Just gorgeous. It picks up again at 12 minutes with some distorted guitar this time helping out. The last minute is guitars and synths crying out over and over as the bass and drums stop.

"Euphoria, Euphoria" might even be better than the previous song. What is it about the sound here? It's all so beautiful, I'm so moved. Love that calm as well after 5 1/2 minutes, so much atmosphere and again so moving. Some brief spoken words then it picks up some after 7 minutes. Guitars start to cry out after 11 minutes. This has to be right up there as being the best back to back songs in Psychedelic music.

"Sweetness To The Lord" and all I can say is amen to that. This track is quite experimental with all kinds of different sounds coming and going. Some brief vocal melodies end it.

Sweden's best Psychedelic band right here, the stuff of legends.

"The Prophet Am I" is my favourite song on here. I was actually pretty excited the first time I heard this song and I was hoping for more as I spun the rest of this record. It opens with what sounds like a ram's horn which makes sense I suppose considering the title. A beat kicks in and builds as yelling(preaching?) can be heard in the background. It turns heavy at 3 1/2 minutes but not for long as a strong psychedelic vibe takes over. The heaviness will come and go though and I love that sound. Vocals will also come and go on this one and they echo before 11 minutes which sounds pretty cool. The guitar is on fire 11 1/2 minutes in. "House In The Country" reminds me of the picture of the band sitting outside of an old house in one of the liners of another album. This one is heavy from the get-go with distant sounding vocals. A lot of noise to my ears.

"Interplanetarian Love Machine Pt III- The Final Solution" is almost 20 minutes long. Heavy stuff early on as the guitar solos over top. The organ starts to run after 2 minutes. It settles around 5 minutes as the vocals arrive, then it kicks back in as the vocals continue. I really like the guitar 7 minutes in as the vocals have stopped. It settles again with vocals after 8 1/2 minutes before kicking back in hard at 12 1/2 minutes. This continues until after 16 minutes where it still kicks ass but it's more stripped down. It starts to wind down to the end. "The Closer You Get To The Sun" features plenty of atmosphere and intricate sounds including percussion and water sounds. Reserved vocals before 2 minutes then it starts to get heavy after 3 minutes but it settles back again late to a spacey atmosphere.

"Outlaw Mutation Boogie" is over 19 1/2 minutes long and it's the closer. It's divided into 5 sections. Strummed guitar and nature sounds to start but man this does not sound right as distant vocals join in. He's almost drowned out by the nature sounds and it's annoying to me. It all seems to mesh together and not in a good way. A change before 6 minutes thankfully with stressed vocals and a rhythm that builds. Cool stuff. We get an Eastern vibe to follow then the birds are back again. A change before 12 minutes as strummed guitar takes over with vocals. Folky is the word and I like it! Vocals stop as it becomes quite spacey until 17 1/2 minutes in when we get hit hard with heaviness and it's uptempo. It ends with spoken words including "I hope this trip is a good one."

I was hoping that as well but for me 3 stars fits the music and I'll turn to one of their other albums when I want to hear this great Psychedelic band. One of Sweden's best.

Continuing their sombre and, at times, sinister vibe of their previous album 'Rotvälta', Swedish space rockers The Spacious Mind seem to dive even deeper into the black pool with 'Tonen'. Released a year later, the album consists of two long installations simply called part one and two. Listened to in their entirety on cd, the audience will have a hard time pinpointing the exact moment the waters shift as the music comes across as one brooding piece.

The very start of the album tips it's hat to the preceding release with those same Navajo rhythms, sounding like dry rattlesnake scales being shaken up inside a wasp's nest. It adds a raw and caveman feel to the proceedings, and when coupled together with the sluggish tempo of the guitars, the overall sonic impression is that of deep hypnotic atmospheres with the touch of an old Indian's heart.

Whereas 'Rotvälta' slowly but surely moved towards a rocking catharsis, that at the very end of the record seemed to cleanse the mystic and enigmatic irresolution of faux Navajo rhythms and howling guitar effects, on 'Tonen' something else stands in it's place. The catharsis is still there albeit in the form of a heartfelt and shimmering organ that suddenly injects itself a little over halfway into the second piece. Prior to this monumental moment of release, the music trots around in a hazy existence with wind-like guitar effects and a build up effect akin to a psychedelic take on Godspeed You! Black Emperor. This organ driven moment of release is just about as beautiful as a waterfall of sapphires, and the way it wraps it's lips around the somewhat unfriendly nature of it's surroundings is damn near a stroke of genius.

The downside to this album is that it can feel very long. 46 minutes of slowly unravelling music that only once in a while shows signs of progression. During the first side though maxing out somewhere over the stratosphere with a lightning bolt of cacophony, where drums and guitars run amok and create a blistering unmelodic jolt of noise and racket......yet that's about all you get from the rock palette. Everything else feels like a brooding gel of experimental bits that I personally get a kick out of, but I have to be in the mood for it. It's not an album you can throw on the stereo any time of the day and be bewildered in that oh so magical way. I can't imagine cooking dinner with it playing in the back - likewise do I sense a distinct difficulty in spinning this during some adult gymnastics - that is unless you've bagged one of those urban witches that spend most of their time barefooted at raves dancing like an ecstatic medicine man.

It worked just now though. I was engulfed by sunlight out on the patio with a clear view of dozens of bumblebees flying around like the drunk teddybears they really are. The music was deeply engaging and made me sweat even more than the white stinging rays, and after surrendering myself completely to the warm haze of the Indian ways - the lingering guitar winds and rattlesnake jitters - suddenly the organ jumped in and literally threw me thousands of feet in the air, with goosebumps ablazing and an orgasmic look on my face. 3.5 stars.

Second last in line on this Swedish crusade, we find The Spacious Mind and their wonderful Rotvälta. This album opens up the doors to the mish mash of ideas that made Germany such a tantalizing place for musicians during the 70s. I love the straight forwardness of this album. It doesn't pretend to be something it's not. It's not an album from the 00s - nor is it a modern take on Saucerful of Secrets, even if it at times does give off certain whiffs and scents of that particular Floyd album. It is just music from the moment - in the moment, without the benefit of doubts, ulterior motifs and second guessing.

Dark embryonic hovering organ textures - like shadows of wolves galloping round a fire lit cave. If the music is the bonfire, all other aspects here: the shadows, smoke, warmth and the strange behaviour of the organic moving orangy light - those are indeed mirrors emanating from the images of your mind, whenever you put this remarkable album on.

It's like being shot back into the start of the 70s - feeling the aural cosmic Krautrock bliss of the early Tangerine Dream albums such as Alpha Centauri and Atem. It's all there in the hanging carpet like synthesizer tapestries that ornament this record - so much that it is almost unbearable. I said almost so don't worry, the overall atmosphere here is perhaps the most fertile for these swampy worms of synths. They shoot the listener directly into the marshlands, where this record spends most of its time frolicking in soft tribal drumming, recalling Nick Mason's flirtations with the shamanistic ways of the beat, back when he looked like a cocker spaniel with a moustache.

Other things that clearly speak about the Krautrock of yesteryear are the sticky spider web guitars mumbling curiously above the snail pace beats. I often think of Manuel Göttsching when he played with The Cosmic Jokers. On Rotvälta the guitars do have that sticky icky feel to them, - that is when they're not put to use in an entirely different manner - now snarling barking away with the poise and balls of a German Rottweiler. These barks are much in the same vein as you'd hear on LA. Düsseldorf or the more rhythmic guitar ventures in CAN's live outings. It's all there on display in this Swedish serving - detailed, sprawling, nuance-filled, sharp, tangy, metallic and atmospheric in nature. Everyone of these traits are all played like they belong to the band themselves - like it's their own thang. I only hear the similarities in this record, because I've been listening to Rotvälta on and off for about 6 months now. I don't think the band intentionally set out to make music in any sort of mould, - no, the image of a free spirited musical collective playing around with whatever sounded and felt good at the time of recording seems far more likely, than a bunch of perfectionist Krautrock fans jumping in the studio to create their homage to their favourite acts from the 70s.

This thing evolves slowly over the coarse of the 6 different sections. You travel across mighty open planes with Navaho drumming, snake skin beats, the odd guitar glissandi - picture perfect and quite beautiful in contrast to the swampy organs. Then towards the very end, it feels like a giant flower opens up in the music - like one of those rare orchids, that take centuries to develop enough courage and life-lust to come out of its Sleeping Beauty sleep - finally greeting the transparent white moonlight and the calm cold winds of the night. The music turns for the more floating wafting presence - backed up by the first "real" rock drumming, and then we're in for a sonic eargasm finishing this cosmic endeavour off in the most astonishing way conceivable. It's like everything was building up towards this point in the record - like a mountain climber crossing the rocks and cliffs - to be at the top of the world where he can tie every knot together and finish his ethereal spider web - just like this band actually. They just climb mountains through their music. 4.5 stars.

The Cinnamon Tree offers a relaxed, if not slightly doomy mood - a highly concentrated start with great accentuated organ and playful guitars. This is not that rocking really. So they don't break sweat at the beginning I'm sure (except it was a very hot evening). This is not meant as defining the quality of course, rather the atmosphere in general. Directly fading into E6 THE SPACIOUS MIND continue relaxed chilling for a while until the trip escalates for the first time.

The middle part is partially hypnotic krautrock flavoured and step by step the song reaches for the fulminant peak at the end when the rhythm section really awakes. Taken from the 1994 album 'Organic Mind Solution' The One That Really Won The War has become a band's live standard. Linking to the former song they build up some crashing walls of sounds but always fall back into a new gliding phase once more. The last puzzling minutes surprisingly offer synths and driving percussion contrasting.

Although I've already heard space rock music which is more inspired I have to admit that this release holds a proper SPACIOUS MIND performance. It pictures the band's experimental character and will please every fan - 3.5 stars.

"Distant, Oh So Far...Better Go Right Away" is the 21 minute opener. I was surprised after the band was introduced and we get the smattering of applause how bombastic they are here. They come out with guns blazing but for me it doesn't work. A lot of noise though, it just doesn't sound good. It settles around 2 1/2 minutes.This is fairly pastoral really. I like the bass after 4 minutes because it makes the sound a little meaner. It gets fuller before 10 minutes before it starts to settles again. Kicks back in after 14 1/2 minutes with some wild guitar.

"Me And A Tree And The Sigh Of A Leaf" is also around 21 minutes. It opens with guitar sounds and is laid back. The tempo picks up and it gets fuller 12 minutes in. Drums 16 1/2 minutes in. "The One That Really Won The War" is around 18 minutes in length and is the final track. More of an ethnic vibe on this one.The guitar starts to make some noise after 4 minutes.

A pretty good album that is fairly laid back overall, but for me it lacks something.

"Part 1" opens with spacey sounds that build, drums can be heard in the background. It's getting louder before 3 minutes as abrasive guitar sounds join in. It settles some before 6 minutes. Very spacey. "Part 2" isn't as spacey and a bass line comes in joined by drums. It's really laid back and mellow here.The guitar joins in tastefully after 3 minutes and piano follows. It starts to kick in after 6 minutes. Nice. This is amazing ! They're ripping it up ! It starts to wind down after 13 minutes. Check out the mellotron-like storm that comes in after 14 1/2 minutes. "Part 3" has such a beautiful beginning like the calm after the storm really.The organ floats, synths wash and the guitar is picked. Sounds to get louder after 3 minutes then it turns dark and experimental late.

"Part 4" is where the percussion comes in followed by electric guitar soundscapes. It kicks in at 1 1/2 minutes to a gorgeous trippy melody. Love the guitar with the spacey background sounds that get really loud then calm right down. "Part 5" has these spacey organ-like sounds as some heavy guitar comes in. It kicks in at 1 1/2 minutes as the guitar starts to wail. Unbelieveable ! Best part of the album for me. It stops before 8 minutes ! Then turns spacey.Tambourine-like sounds end it with strummed guitar. "Part 6" has a haunting soundscape that takes over as the tambourine fades away.This is dark and laid back. This eerie mood ends after 3 minutes as some gentle guitar comes in. It's building then it settles back to end it.

An absolute treasure that will sit on the shelf with the other Psychedelic gems I admire.

The album opens with some applause as the band comes in softly and slowly on this first song called "Upon Which Areas May The Circles Be Drawn ?" from the album "Garden Of A Well Fed Head". Sounds start to slowly build. This is fairly slow paced and trippy with lots of dreamy and spacey sounds. Beautiful. It blends into "Jam" where this sound continues until it settles around 7 minutes and the spacey vibe leaves. Drums start to become prominant and the tempo picks up until we get another calm after 11 minutes. It's spacey late as it blends into "The One That Really Won The War" from "Organic Mind Solution". The guitars and drums start to dominate and this sounds incredible. It settles before 11 minutes and blends into "Interplanetarian Lovemachine Part III" from "Mind Of A Brother". Great sound here as it builds. Gorgeous sound 7 minutes in. Solo organ to end it as it blends into Euphoria Euphoria" from "Garden Of A Well Fed Head". The organ continues as guitar comes in gently. It's very psychedelic 2 minutes in. Drums 4 minutes in as it builds.They continue to jam.

This is laid back, repetitive, psychedelic jamming at it's best. A special album.