ARBORESCENCE

Ozric Tentacles makes some of the purest, most mind-blowingly awesome space rock ever. Whereas bands like Tangerine Dream specialized in cold, empty voids, and Pink Floyd did psychedelic trips, Ozric Tentacles makes straight-up, muscular, energetic space rock- no voids here, just swirling masses of guitar, synthesizers, and bass, kept in reality by drums, making something, as Stephen Colbert would say, cooler than a cucumber in sunglasses.

Astro Cortex is a fast-moving extravaganza, peaking in an orgasmic blend of stunning effects backed up by distorted guitar around 3 minutes in. Next comes Yog Bar Og, which is in the same vein as the previous track, but somewhat less of a freak-out. Lots of impressive synthesizer and bass work here. Then comes the title track, which is a lot more relaxing and pastoral than the hyperactive monsters that came before it- this could almost pass as one of those "sounds of the rain forest" CD's. Al Salooq has a distinctly world-music feel, thanks to the middle eastern instrumentation. Dance of the Loomi is anchored by a pulsing bass line, with various noises circling around in the background- in fact, this can describe a lot of Ozric Tentacles music. Myriapod picks up where Astro Cortex left off, being a bold, guitar-led psych-space jam. There's a Planet Here is another song along the lines of what we heard on Al Salooq, minus the mid-east stuff- still has the cosmic feel, but it's not so fast-paced. And finally, Shima Koto concludes the album in a blend of the hyper and relaxed styles, with generous amounts of East Asian feel slathered on, as you may have guessed from the title. So, Arborescence is a very good album by a talented band, who makes a uniquely satisfying brand of psych/space prog. More than worth is, especially taking into considering the amazing cover- which currently happens to be my computer's desktop image. I'd give this 4.5 stars, rounded up to five because of the style of this- the very essence of pure, unapologetic space rock.