Aqua Nebula Oscillator Friday the 13th Review by Gary Hill
There is a lot of hard rock built into this beast. Yet, it also has plenty of space rock. The atmosphere is often creepy. Psychedelic rock is a frequent element here. Overall, this is an unusual, but quite effective disc.
This review is available in book format (hardcover and paperback) in Music Street Journal: 2016 Volume 2 at lulu.com/strangesound.
Track by Track Review
Spiritus Mundi
This starts with some weird sounds and ghostly operatic vocals. It turns toward a real haunted house kind of vibe as it continues. Then it gets into noisy electronic psychedelic territory. A theremin (I think) screams over the top. It gradually moves forward as a noisy bit of chaotic weirdness. Some sections are more musical than others. Later it coalesces into some more atmospheric oddity with a man shouting over the top. That segment makes me think of Hawkwind just a bit. It turns to noisy jamming from there. This segues into the next cut.
Riot Coming out of the previous one, this is part Electric Wizard and part Hawkwind. It’s a cool rocker.
Turn On Stretching out from the previous tune, this feels like a cross between Blue Cheer, the MC5 and Hawkwind. It’s another killer rocker.
Human Toad Hard rocking music, this is part psychedelia, part metal and part space rock for the first section. Then a false ending gives way to the return of just the bass. Drums join along with whispered/spoken vocals. It begins to gradually rise up from there. Eventually we’re taken into some killer psychedelic jamming from there.
Innocent Tu Seras Incandescent Sound effects from the end of the last song bring this into being. It moves forward like something from a science fiction movie. Three are some echoey spoken vocals in French as this works to more mainstream psychedelia.
Kill Yourself This pounds out into psychedelia meets space rock jamming. This screamer is very much like the punky side of Hawkwind. There is a trippy section at the end with spoken words. That really seems like Hawkwind.
Jungle Man Psychedelia and Hawkwind like space rock merge on this number. It’s energized and a little raw.
Bloody Orgasm (The Forgotten One) The sounds of a woman having pleasure permeates much of this cut. It has a fast paced, but noisy psychedlia meets space jam at its heart.
It's Now or Never More of a pure psychedelic rocker, this has something that again seems like theremin to me. It’s a rough around the edges cut in a lot of ways.
Up to the Sky Air raid sirens and flak start this. As music joins it is quite psychedelic. It’s a hard rocker that’s pretty cool and rather weird.
Tu Seras Roi This is a bit more mainstream psychedelic rock. It’s got plenty of weirdness going on, too.
Lucifer This hard rocker is another that has a lot of Hawkwind in the mix. It’s a stomper, but also very much space rock. It dissolves to more trippy space rock later with some cool jamming.
Ready to Fly With space jamming and spoken processed vocals, this is another that’s a lot like something Hawkwind would do. It works out to a cool psychedelic rock jam later in the track. There is some weird music at the end that feels a bit like a polka.
