PSYCHEDELIC MONSTERJAM

To the uninitiated this frankenstein might sound like 80 minutes of incessant jamming but to those long haired freaky people obsessed with the first two classic Guru Guru LPs " UFO " (1970 ) & " Hinten " ( 1971 ) this amalgamation of two concerts from the summer of 2003 was a godsend. It was the first time that Mani Neumeier ( drums ) and Ax Genrich ( guitar ) had played together in 30 years! Although Nuemeir, keeper of the Guru Guru, flame never completely emancipated himself from spaced out psychedelic excursions throughout the post Genrich Guru Guru years ( particularily on albums such as " Shake Well ", 1993 and " Wah Wah ", 1995 ) this is the close as it will ever get from a full blown classic Guru Guru lineup resurrection despite the absence of original bassman Uli Trepte who is replaced here by Dave Schmidt, a veteran of a number of adventurous psych groups.

Nuemeier, Genrich & Schmitd as they are collectively known blast their way through 80 minutes of mindblowing experimental music here including 3 improvisational adaptations of early Guru Guru tracks. Although the Guru Guru tracks are easily recognizable the overall focus here is on free form spaced out improv so it shouldn't really be considered a classic Guru Guru reunion per se although it is hard to consider it otherwise because the whole thing nods back to the innovative spontaneous jazz mentality that the early Guru Guru albums were rooted in. If you are one of those vestiges of that era you might be a little bit dissapointed at times. First off , they're playing with updated instruments and not the primitive contrived electronic devices that made Guru Guru sound so weird & wonderful both live and in the studio ca. 1970-71. While the adventurous spirit is still here don't expect a version of "Stone In " or " Electric Junk " that you might have heard back on the earlier studio and live recordings. Also, those who have not bothered with Guru Guru for 30 years might be taken aback by Nuemeier's world music aspirations that started to become increasingly evident from 1973s " Don't Call Us We Call You " the final Guru Guru album on which Genrich played save for a brief appearance on "Mani und seine Fruende" from '75.

No matter, if you are fan of spaced out, drugged out psych explorations regardless of what quadrant of space and time you have emanated from Psychedelic Monsterjam is a timeless Krautrock gem. Unfortunately a physical copy of the CD might be difficult to locate. Limited to only 500 copies it is readily available for legal download on a number of sites on the web. Go nuts.

The band's name as shown on both of the recordings they released is NEUMEIER GENRICH SCHMIDT. They named this, the first release "Psychedelic Monsterjam" after the series of live "Monsterjam" events in Wurzburg, Germany in the early 00's. They were involved in the first two events which were held at different venues and 2 months apart. The tracks here are taken from both live shows they did in 2003, the first in June at Cafe Cairo, and the second at Club AKW in August. Man what a draw these guys would have been. How long had it been that Mani and Ax played together in GURU GURU? 30 years?

So we have the drummer and lead guitarist from early GURU GURU, then enter the young guy Dave Schmidt from ZONE SIX, ELECTRIC MOON and many other projects, infusing some passionate energy with his spacebass. Love the picture of the guys in the Bio here. We get nine tracks worth almost 80 minutes. All but the three GURU GURU tracks they cover are spontaneous and furious improvs. These guys were on fire! They went into this with the idea of playing in the style that GURU GURU did on their "UFO" and "Hinten" albums. Yeah they did.

Man this is a lot to take in, but I had such a blast with this one. How about covering GURU GURU's "Stone In" and then following that up with their own "Stone Out" in the same style! Those two make my top three as Ax absolutely shreds on "Stone In" while "Stone Out" has a lot of distortion and builds before kicking in hard and ending with laughter."Moonlight Flight" right in the middle here is my other top three at almost 12 minutes, but it's hard not to be blown away by "Electric Junk" at over 18 minutes, or the 11 1/2 minute "Next Time See You At The Dalia Lhama".

To open with a song called "Bong" and then to end with "Mushroom Moon" just seems appropriate doesn't it? 4 stars for this raging jam.