RACKET SCIENCE

Someone at All Music Guide described this band's music as "perfect for the avant-prog fan's vacation at the beach", and that pretty much hits the target of what Forever Einstein's musical statement is all about - eclectic musicality with an overall weird tone of experimentation and filled with easy-going dynamics. This easy-going dynamics is mostly due to the use of elements from lightweight pop-rock, bluegrass and surf in their basic mixture of jazz-rock, psychedelia, rock-oriented RIO and late 70s Zappa. Their instrumentation follows the power-trio structure, but their sound is more subtle and constrained than your regular power-trio's tendency, usually trying to show that they don't need to be more than three to be really powerful. Not with Forever Einstein: they do prove that their compositions and performances can be genuinely interesting (and by interesting, I mostly mean weird.) while retaining a sense of control through their input. The result is the clever use of deceptive naiveté as the main nucleus for their demanding instrumental excursions. Demanding without showing it off: just like their technical abilities, the musicians are constantly focused on exercising a constraining control upon the potential neurosis that invades most of their performances - the complexity is made more obvious in the tracks' frameworks than in their actual deliveries. "Racket Science" is the only album I own from this band so far, but I've been so positively impressed that I'm looking forward to complete their entire catalogue into my personal collection. Anyway, let's go for the repertoire. Track 1 is slightly dissonant, but mostly funny and lighthearted, almost frivolous, including some wicked counterpoints in a funny fashion. Track 2 doesn't go too far from this trend, although there's certainly a more pronounced closeness to a sort of CCR-meets-punk. Track 3 surpasses the previous two numbers regarding candor an easy-going vibes, despite its menacing title. Track 4 is the first one to bear intriguing sounds in a prominent fashion, while track 5 provides what seems to be a hint of melancholy, with its clever use of subtleties and empty spaces among the concise guitar chords and drum rolls - pay attention to the intelligently delivered guitar solo, very Frithian indeed. Track 6 pursues this same direction taking it a bit further, with their mixture of softened 80's KC, psychedelic rock and country. Track 7 lightens things back up, before the weirdest section of the album emerges: tracks 8-10 really epitomize the band's most prototypical direction. Track 8 displays an extroverted mixture of funky- fusion, surf and psychedelic prog, while tracks 9 and 10 procure to sound generally more disturbing than usual, but always incorporating a healthy dose of surf and/or bluegrass. I can sense in track 10's main theme some resemblance with Don Caballero's playful side. Also, the closing improvisation feels very tight and intriguing - arguably, it is the album's highlight. Track 11 sounds like a surf-infected Boud Deun, while track 12 closes down the album on an ethereal note. "Racket Science" is a great prog item, and I totally recommend it as an experience for the uninitiated.

This album, Forever Einstein's fifth, has their third bass player, Kevin Gerety, who replaced Jack Vees, who replaced Marc Sichel. While Gerety's playing is similar to the previous bassists (probably because Charles O'Meara, who has now dropped the C.W. Vrtacek alias, wrote all the bass lines anyway), he adds an acoustic bass to the mix (I like acoustic bass). O'Meara himself has moved almost entirely to electric guitar, instead of the amplified acoustic and electric sitar used on previous albums (although both can still be heard here). This unfortunately gives him a more conventional sound than on earlier albums.

The songs themselves are more developed than those on the first two FE albums (which I am more familiar with than the third and fourth), and sound more like traditional prog than quirky ideas stretched into song length. And the songs are generally longer. And so are the song titles, always another bit of entertainment from FE.

So there is a tradeoff from the early albums. Better songwriting, but not as interesting guitar tones. But it's still a great album.