THE FATE OF OLD MOTHER ORVIS

Here’s a trio of guys who can’t seem to decide if they want to be a post-rock, psych, or Krautrock band, so instead they combine all three. The Future Kings of England may not in fact be future kings, but I like their style. Think a little bit of Godspeed You! Black Emporer (or Explosions in the Sky), throw in an awful lot of ‘Wish You Were Here’-era Pink Floyd, and you pretty much have these guys pegged.

The opening track “Dunwich” is one of those Floydian songs, with lots of slow, building guitar and keyboard drone with a couple of crescendos that make you realize they are actually trying to be innovative, or at least not completely derivative.

“Mustard Man” includes lyrics and sounds a bit like a mellower version of the hard psych band Dead Meadow. I’ve no idea what the song is about – perhaps the weird Canadian dude from the Mustard Man Adventures. And maybe not. I don’t think you’ll hear many psych-like tunes with post-rock overtones and a mandolin though, so you should probably check that out.

With “Bartholomew’s Merman” the band goes back to ‘Wish You Were Here’ on guitar and keyboards, with the exact same sort of slow tempo and lack of concrete focus that made that such a strong album.

And if you ever wondered what a mandolin and banjo sound like on an Explosions album, “Children of the Crown” is the song for you.

Nearly half the album is taken up with the title track though, and this one is a lengthy and sometimes stalled-out affair that seems to be an attempt at a space-rock/experimental epic. It falls just a bit flat due to the unnecessarily long stretch of keyboard noodling, although the trippy keyboard passages are decent enough.

I was a bit disappointed by the lack of anything really powerful or groundbreaking on this album, although like I said earlier the inclusion of mandolin, banjo, some autoharp and even a dulcimer (although I’m not sure where – it’s in the liner notes) make for a departure from more traditional psychedelic music. I will say that these guys seem to have a talent for composition, even if they don’t have much discipline. Maybe with time. I’d say this is about a 3.499 effort, but not quite up to the level of essential, so I’ll go with three stars and hope they stretch themselves a little more next time. Recommended for fans of GY!BE, A Silver Mt. Zion, modern psych, and possibly just the musically curious.

peace