THE DEATH AND RESURRECTION OF KRAUTROCK: AUM

"Modern, aggressive psychedelic wall of sound incorporating polymetrics and occasional Viking funeral rites; hailing from the 23rd century where rock is dead, Seven That Spells returned in time where its still possible to change the tragic course of the boring history."

Here's my introduction to the band Seven That Spells. These are the first and the last and the only words on the album.

Satan.. satan... satan... satan...

I don't know what these guys want from the poor guy named Satan but he's obviously not interested. This joke won't get the reader warmed up, but I'm okay as long as you continue reading. At this point someone stopped reading. Therefore I'm not so OK anymore. Let's proceed.

I've read and heard little about this band. I downloaded this one on christmas, they set the albums on the bandcamp account for free for one day or so. Wish I downloaded more albums! They're a space rock band, similar to a newer band I've listened to a year ago called Earthless, but for me, Seven That Spells are much better. They're not that brainless, to say it in the most wierd way that I could possibly choose.

The first track called "In" made a great impact on me. The repetitive cool guitar riff and the drumming. They are totally rocking out. The first thing you should know about this band is, they generally don't have strict song structures. It's generally one main guitar riff or rhythm, and on top of that, everyone's jamming like crazy. And these are truely talented people. The most obvious one is Niko Potočnjak, the guitarist. He rules his guitar to make psychedelic noises all over the place. Amp noises, guitar noises, everything counts. You can hear the Jimi Hendrix inside him noising around. There's not a single soft soloing on the album. Every solo on this album yells "Look at me I'm trippin!". The bass lines are so hypnotic. The drums never fail on bringing the energy. These musicians are top notch. They really can deliver some crazy jamming.

The second song, called "Aum" starts on a power chord hit on an interesting rhythm. For my own musical taste, I wish there were some more chord changes, as they're the "keys" to get the song on a more interesting form. I think this is an intended choice to gain more psychedelia than a structured song. The song gets on a different mood at the minute of 16. Cool jamming.

The third song, called "Zero" is mostly a chaotic guitar and amp noise, and nothing much. Nothing ever changes. If you guess this would end after a few minutes, you're terribly wrong. This will continue for 19 minutes. On this moment you should guess that this is no music for sitting with the glasses on (intelectual mode on) and caring about every little detail and change on the music. You can't do that here, because it simply doesn't change. It's just noise. I don't know if this gets you on a trippin mood easily, as I wasn't. I'm sure almost anyone would prefer any other song on the album to this one. Normally, I'm not the type that likes something like this, but now, I still don't like it. Haha, cruel.

"ROOOOCCKK IIISSSTTT KRIIIIEEEEGGG" is the name of the next song and the yelling at the very start of the song. It's much more structured than most of the stuff you hear on the album, and that bass line and the drums and the screaming guitar and the... This is a real trip. With "Aum" and "Rock Ist Krieg" these guys easily show that they are great at creating epics. Just listen to this one, this is a killer.

The last song is a reggea song, with soft feelings from start to the end. I'm just joking, this is another rocking out. It's called "Out". It's very similar to the first song, so it works easily on closing up the album. Satan... satan... satan... he's still not interested though. "Go away please!" he yells in my mind.

I had no intentions to give this band another chance till today, as I was pretty much convinced that they're just talented guys tripping out with noisy instruments and cool production. It's not a surprise that they are actually that itself. But they have this energy, cool riffing and total capability on their instruments. Those make this band worth-a-listen. This album is an exciting starter of a concept trilogy. Now I don't want to wait till the next christmas to hear more of this band...