CHILD OF THE FUTURE

Child of the Future is Motorpsycho's 13 full length studio album. It is also one of their shorter albums at just over 37 minutes. It was released as a celebration of the bands 20th anniversary and was only released on vinyl. It has a somewhat rough edge to the production almost giving it a live feeling. The mixing is done so as to not let anything stand out above anything else and this works to the album's benefit in some aspects, but works against it in others.

Some of the tracks have a definite psychedelic and space rock style which is helped along by the fuzzy production and flat mixing sound like in the tracks "Riding the Tiger" and the multi-tempo track "Whole Lotta Diana", which actually makes the track very 70s like (as the layered vocals of Jefferson Airplane or the instrumental jamming of Hawkwind). In this manner, these songs sound more loyal to the old space rock and krautrock styles. In other places, you get that cleaner hard rock sound as in "The Ozzylot (Hidden in a Girl)", the vulnerability of the more mellow and psych-acoustic "The Waiting Game" or the complexity of "Mr. Victim".

Another standout is "Cornucopia ( . . . Or Satan, Uh . . . Something)" which leans toward a complex progressive piece along the lines of a Heavy Prog track with some really awesome bass, piano and vocal stylings. You would almost swear you were listening to some early pre-"Joker" Steve Miller Band with the "rough around the edges" feel.

I'm not really sure why this album has only received a few reviews that gave it only an average rating. It may have something to do with the album's availability. I find the album unique and interesting, the songs are much more interesting than on some of their more alternative sounding albums. I especially love the rough sound of this album, almost like it was recorded more off- the-cuff than some of their slicker recordings. It gives the album that authentic space rock and psychedelic feel overall. I understand that this rough sound isn't for everyone, but I think any pure psych/space rock aficionado would love the sound of this album. No, it's not the band's best, but it is definitely better than average, so I give it 4 stars and consider it another one of Motorpsycho's successes.