LOOP

If you prefer symphonic and compositional splendour, this album won't be for you. The music we're looking at here is one (or two) chord songs that sacrificed melody for groove and composition for jamming. But if that doesn't scare you then you might need to check out this album as this band managed to get their grooves going like no other. They have a very solid rhythm section at the core; the repetitive drums and bass are very prominent and keep pounding at an entrancing mid-tempo pace; layers of guitars, wahwah, reverb, fuzz, feedback and other effects cast a hazy blanket over them. The whispered shoegazer vocals complete the dazed and out worldly vibe.

Fans of Guru Guru, Amplifier, early Hawkwind and other rocking space-psych-kraut hybrids might find a lot to relish here. The band used to be quite popular 20 years ago but has been kind of forgotten in the huge vault of rock history. But fear not, they sound ageless, fresh and groovy as they ever did. I much enjoyed revisiting their catalogue for reviewing them and would recommend this album as their major achievement. 4 psych-rock stars

Except for Too Real to Feel there is not much here that I would recommend to anyone but the most fervent Jesus & Mary Chain fans, which I'm sure are thinly spread here :-)

I was a bit surprised to find Loop on the PA pages. When this came out it reminded us of The Stooges and Jesus & Mary Chain. Two bands that are not very prog I would say... But Loop takes their trip miles beyond the limited horizons of J&MC. Only the sound is reminiscent. In fact, at the end of the 80's, Loop was one of the last indie bands to emerge from the UK that could stir up some emotions in me. Together with Spacemen 3 they made psychedelic space rock for the new age. Spaceman 3 was a bit more diverse and more rock song oriented. Loop was a much more droning affair. I don't know if there is a relation but the first two albums of Monster Magnet do have a strong echo of the sound here.

If you ask me to describe them now I'd say the create an irresistible hypnotic mix of 1969-Stooges, 1970-Can and a bit of 1971-Hawkwind. Heavy on sustained guitars, delay and wahwah pedals.

The interesting thing about this album is that at the time of its release, I didn't know next to nothing about space rock and kraut. I was raised on symphonic prog and I knew just 2 songs from Can and that one from Hawkwind. But thanks to this very album this was soon to change. I started to investigate Can because the original CD issue had an 11 minute cover of Can's Mother Sky. And Hawkwind was soon to follow because of a Brainstorm cover that Monster Magnet did a few years later.

Or how indie can bring you back to the prog dynasty. A really good album but probably of little interest to prog fans.