HIGH TEA

The first official album by MADEMOISELLE MARQUEE what I know. It was the debut release of Cat On The Moon Records, her independent label. The years before she offered recordings more privately and posted several trippy videos on the web. Avant-garde artist Sarah Ellissa Marquee from Scotland is really special - don't know if anybody is able to capture and to enter her private cosmos. First of all - music is not the only way to express her mode of thinking. She is a painter and photographer too. And lyrics are published on her website and on myspace which are transfigured, encrypted - a lot more for me as I'm not a native english skilled person. But this alone might not be a surprise at all.

I have already listened to a bunch of music which is deeply plunging into experimental psychedelic and space rock. But this tops it all (so far). Not to say that 'High Tea' is disconnected from reality completely. It would be quite suitable for science fiction movies for example. All such which avoid too much action and are full of melancholy though - where astronauts are looking down to mother earth through this small bull's eye when gliding in the orbit - maybe doubting about the adventurous trip or the meaning of life in general. Lost in reverie but not drifting into triviality - rather a collection of spaced out sounds which are not quite earthbound.

Opium Spades shows MADEMOISELLE MARQUEE acting with a voice which comes even near to singing in a common sense. And she overdubs a lot with the result of multiple rhythmic and soloing guitars plus some ambient patterns evolving in waves. Something way-out with druggy references according to the song title. This fades into Salvia, one of my favourites, making use of the krautrock veterans Günther Schickert and Manuel Göttsching with guitars which have a repetitive behaviour. Beautiful, melodic, well thought out on a sophisticated technical level.

The following songs are meandering soundscapes based on many variations and provided with lots of effects, delays and echoes for her voice or coming from the electric guitar. Wait - do I hear some organ snippets on Optical Astronomy? - I'm not sure ... When you're expecting rocking components then you will fail - okay, we have one candidate with the short Cremola Foam which is provided with sampled percussion. The Eclipse Reversal is made by many synth effects and reaching hard for the Tangerine Dream style. With the last Untitled song MADEMOISELLE MARQUEE closes the circle. This is coming up like a hidden track first with some minutes of silence. After that the theme of the first track is reopened. So if you are in the right mood you can use the repeat function and let this play again and again and again ...

'High Tea' flows off the beaten path. Was sure I already made my ultimate hallucinogenic experience many years back - but in terms of that I obvisiously was wrong. After listening to this incredible album I'm wondering if the story of psychedelic and space rock must be enhanced by a new chapter. This are sounds not exactly like but reflecting the spirit of the 'Kosmische Musik' - this time nearly reduced on one instrument (if you don't count the voices). I honestly won't promise to listen to the full length album over and over again because more than 60 minutes are a little bit too much in one go for me. But I will surely come back to some of these exceptional songs from time to time when I'm in the appropriate mood.

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