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Progressive Rock CD Reviews

The Sonic Shaman

Tribute to Lemmy (double vinyl)

Review by Gary Hill

This vinyl double album is dedicated to the late great Ian "Lemmy" Kilmister. Don't expect music that sounds like Lemmy here, though. That said, much of this definitely calls toward his work in Hawkwind. This is more along the lines of the kind of music Øresund Space Collective does. instrumental space rock. Of course, OSC's Dr. Space is part of this project. I like the fact that there is a wide range of sound here from mellow electronic stuff to things that are nearly metallic.

 

This review is available in book format (hardcover and paperback) in Music Street Journal: 2017  Volume 4 at lulu.com/strangesound.

Track by Track Review
Side A

         
7 or 7 or Not

The opening piece here takes up one full side and weighs it at almost 18 minutes long. It starts with mellow jamming that's part space rock and part fusion. It grows upward gradually from there. This gets pretty involved and trippy as the volume and intensity increase. As with most space rock, nothing here changes quickly. The piece evolves gradually, getting pretty hard rocking as it does so. There are great bits of instrumental madness from keyboards and electric guitar at different times. This is pretty awesome stuff. It's got a lot of Hawkwind packed into it, but is even spacier, if that makes sense.

Side B
          

Sam's Gopal

The second side comes in mellow also and works upward quickly from there. It drops down a bit as it moves forward to some seriously spacey stuff. There are definitely elements that make me think of some of Hawkwind's mellower, spacey stuff. This is mellower and much closer to electronic prog. This is about 13 ad a half minutes long, and it's quite cool and trippy.

Freaky R&R

At less than seven and a half minutes of length, this is one of the shortest cuts here. This is a smoking hot rocking tune. It's definitely more on the rock side, even leaning toward heavy metal at times.

Side C
      

Ravi In Space

This is another side long epic at over 17 and a half minutes of music. It comes in with definite sitar sounding psychedelic space music. It gets more purely rocking as it moves forward. The contrast on this song is fairly stark. There are some particularly mellow sections. Yet there are movements that are among the hardest rocking of the whole album. I really love some of the guitar instrumental work around the six and a half or seven minute mark. 

Side D
        

Stoned Dead Your Clever

 The final epic is almost 18 and a half minutes long. It comes in heavy and hard rocking.  It really does wander into the direction of heavy metal later in the piece. This is the crunchiest jam here. Yet, it never loses sight of the space rock element.

In The Kitchen

This is a bonus track that's less than three minutes long. Acoustic guitar leads this out of the gate and holds it nicely from there. While the acoustic guitar is the main factor on this piece, there is still plenty of space rock here.

 
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