PYRAMID

A friend showed me this CD and asked my opinion. After some spins all I could say was: I don´t get it! And I still don´t. Sure enough it sounds a lot like many, many bands from the early 70´s period when the mix of ambient/electronic sounds and psychedelic jams a la Ammon Duul (the first one) seems to be in vogue, specially in Germany. There is even a lot of talking about who recorded what, who were the musicians on it or even when it was recorded (some saying it was a "fake" krautrock CD made in the 90's!). To me it looked like some semi-pro musicians on acid decided to play whatever came in their minds during the studio time. Ok, not as crazy as a lot of things I´ve seen in my time with progressive music , but boy, is it boring!

I guess some people will find Pyramid enjoyable, or something like that. And although it does have some instruments I love (like mellotron waves by the last part), and I do believe those musicians , whoever they are, are good, to me this sound landscape is far too abstract, pointless and lacking any discernible melody line to grab my attention. 33 minutes of something I won´t miss a second without it.

Rating: 1,5 stars. This is really for krautrock fanatics and completionists.

This is a weird case of an album.

If this album was really released in 1976 as many claim to be, it would have been released in LP of course. But then, it would be a one side album? With a whole side empty? Hummm, it seems a fake date to me.

I may accept that was recorded in 76 and released in the cd era tough. But there's no info available on the web, especially with a common name like this.

Music? Well, the album is boring. Krautrock kinda of silly jam music. Everybody that knows me seems to know I don't like this kind of music and I don't even conside Krautrock a sub genre at all.

Just the one 33 minute track on this satisfactory little album.

Unlisted in any Krautrock discography that I've seen - probably because it's another of those 'hoaxes' released by the mysterious Tony Robinson, engineer in Dieter Dierk's studio in an attempt to make a few quid on the sly during the early 90's krautrock revival. It doesn't matter. All that does is the music.

One way or the other, Pyramid don't sound dated at all and will be loved by fans of 'The Cosmic Jokers' There's lots of mellotron, synths and some very attractive guitars which are never too overpowering.

15 minutes in and a super jam kicks off with 'Saucerful of Secrets' drumming, 1975 keyboards and some excellent high pitched guitar. Things calm down towards the end with some beautiful Floyd, mid point 'Echoes' guitar being played.

Not much wrong with this if truth be told. Somehow, however, it doesn't feel like a four star album. I can't put my finger on it.

Is this defending the dawn of Krautrock?

'Pyramid' consists of one long 33 minute track named Dawn defender. Mellow ambient spaced out sounds are dominating with a decent rhythm work - trance pure partially remembering at the AMON DÜÜl 2 Yeti jams. The track once is interrupted by a heavy psych part for some minutes but in the whole the song is meandering with its own special mood. First of all the spacy guitar work is to remark. Nothing is known about the way the band worked out the music. Is it recorded on the fly or reworked with overdubs?

For me it's secondary that this one is announced to be a hoax in the meanwhile. The obscure british label named 'Psy-Fi' is expected to be responsible for that. 'Pyramid' seems to be originally recorded in the early 90s by engineer Toby Robinson of the german Dierks studio. The british musicians are still unknown and therefore provided with fantasy names and a seventies german krautrock background because of a little revival of this genre at that time.

Hoax or not - it doesn't matter - the music is definetely fitting into the krautrock category. Mysteriously and rare per se, musically not spectacular but a solid production with a nice mix of psychedelic and electronic ingredients.

It would be really interesting to know what musicians are responsible here. Recommended - 3.5 stars for this compelling effort.

As written on the back of the cd release: "Personnel Unknown: hammond, electric guitar, bass guitar, drums, mellotron, mini-moog, electric piano and tibetan bells" this is obscure music, played by unknown musicians.

The cd release features only one track: 33 minutes Space/Kraut music very reminiscent of Popol Vuh's "In Garten Pharaos" period, featuring a lot of cymbals in a generally "Aztec" or "Inca" mystic atmosphere, that means in a way that this has nothing to do with blues or rock music conventions or clichés, this is in fact a very avant-garde point of view of what would "New age" involve in the future: The contradiction of two types of New Age music: Easy Listening and Mind Music... This is definetively Mind Music..

As I personnaly like this album very much and as I do often listen to it, I would personnaly rate it 2/5 as it sounds to underproduced (Sometimes amateurish), this kind of album would only fit to collectors and Die-Hard fans of German Kraut bands and wouldn't be entertaining at all for the non-Krauthead..

4/5 for the music 2/5 for the "Collectors/Fans only" category..