GARDEN OF A WELL FED HEAD

There's some early works from the cosmic hippies of Sweden on this vinyl! The first side begins with "In The Land Of Roses And Snow", which is a poem intoned over a confusing wall of sound. After that we pay a short visit to the cave of dwarfs! Though these are OK tunes, I must admit that it is after these two tracks when the music which makes this LP an 'exelent addition to any prog music collection' begins.

"Upon Which Areas May The Circles Be Drawn?" is a slow drifting voyage through a blues scale, upon which the band paints their colors with e-bowed guitars and other instruments listed in the line-up section. "Euphoria Euphoria" resembles the drawing hidden within the album sleeve, which is an endless fractal of expanding pleasure, which morphs to an extremely chaotic and beautiful collage of "Sweetness To The Lord".

This recording was released only as a vinyl, with a number of 600 copies. I bought mine signed copy directly from the guys of the band, after their wonderful gig at Helsinki.

Right now I'd rate this as my third favourite studio album from these incredible Swedes. "Rotvalta" from 2005 is my favourite followed by their debut "Cosmic Minds At Play" from 1993. This one is from 1996 and I was so happy to see those two epics on here "Upon Which Areas May The Circles Be Drawn?" and "Euphoria, Euphoria" giving us almost 30 minutes of amazing music from those two songs alone. I say this because my favourite live album from them "Do Your Own Thing But Don't Touch Ours" from 2002 has both those tracks on it and they are a huge reason why I love that live record so much. There's quite a few ethnic instruments on here plus the usual incredible guitar leads, spacey synths and prominent bass.

"In The Land Of Roses And Snow" is such a cool piece of psychedelia like something out of mythology like The Game Of Thrones for example. We get this monologue throughout with this off-set distorted voice as he describes the story. Just really engaging as what sounds like pump organ and e-bow pulse away along with buzzing synths.

"The Cave Song-Garden Of The Dwarfs" opens with percussion and atmosphere as experimental sounds help out and there's no melody. We get a beat before a minute as strummed guitar joins in and tin flute. A folky instrumental really but experimental.

"Upon Which Areas May The Circles Be Drawn?" is a monster. Eventually we get guitars crying out, almost screaming as a relaxed beat and bass supports. Soon the guitars are relaxed and I could listen to this all day. It starts to pick up around 4 1/2 minutes but then settles back as the guitars sort of cry out over and over as the bass continues along with spacey sounds. Drums beat faster in the background after 10 minutes. Just gorgeous. It picks up again at 12 minutes with some distorted guitar this time helping out. The last minute is guitars and synths crying out over and over as the bass and drums stop.

"Euphoria, Euphoria" might even be better than the previous song. What is it about the sound here? It's all so beautiful, I'm so moved. Love that calm as well after 5 1/2 minutes, so much atmosphere and again so moving. Some brief spoken words then it picks up some after 7 minutes. Guitars start to cry out after 11 minutes. This has to be right up there as being the best back to back songs in Psychedelic music.

"Sweetness To The Lord" and all I can say is amen to that. This track is quite experimental with all kinds of different sounds coming and going. Some brief vocal melodies end it.

Sweden's best Psychedelic band right here, the stuff of legends.