YOLK

Between the fringes of avant-rock and zeuhl, lurks Yolk with its intense and dynamic rhythms that propel back and forth, repetitive but not exhausting. One band that came to mind when listening to them was Bondage Fruit with their special brand of tribal, mantra zeuhl.

The opener track, Snaky Eye Ball, is angular and angry; the music at its core, reminds me of punk. Amidst all the madness, between the avant-jazz sax, metal-ish riffs and overall insanity there lurks a punk structure and spirit. In Hapiness Roof, a zeulhish flavour comes in; a groovy rhythm takes over with female vocals chanting, reminding of Bondage Fruit (particularly the first album). This style is prevalent throughout the album, sometimes in various forms, but the pattern and basics are always there. In Deprime A Bord, there's some cool use of the sax in a Miriodor-ian way in the entourage of zany melody with wacky vocals. Apart from the zeuhlish elements there are some folk/gypsy references such as heard on A Little Shot In Your Moon, Keep The God and Scathodick Surfers that bring to mind that kind of avant-rock. That is reinforced by the use of violin and the guitar backing it up as heard in that track. Keep The God is also quite varied in itself, with many different styles appearing throughout it, all done very well and very naturally as to not even notice. On Metaliban the music, while still tribal-like and pattern-repeating, gets a psychedelic twist. More Icon starts out less intense than the rest of the tracks, but has an hypnotizing swirling melody that gets on layers as it goes and accumulates energy in the process. This is a fabulous track that shows how to create an efficient repetition with enough ideas to keep it going without being too much or boring. Like in Deprime A Bord , the ninth track Flying Undershot mixes repetitiveness, tribal-zeuhl with the RIO-esque bumpy-frisky sax. This is a very well done track that shows their power at fusing influences from the various colours of the RIO/avant-rock rainbow. It is the last track, MMMC, that is the real treat of this release; psychedelic and mesmerizing, it is a long piece (almost 12 minutes) that will get you into a trip and is a perfect ending for this album.

To sum this up, this album is one great ride, an entertaining album with a high dose of energy, relentless and will leave you exhausted at the end. If you like Bondage Fruit, you will fancy this as well most probably. Fans of zeuhl-influenced music and avant-rock, if you like crazy musical tribal-like experiences, go for this. Not an essential album, but in my opinion, worth getting. It is a very good addition to my collection. For PA rating matters - 3.75-4 stars.