ELECTRIP

Crazy, not very serious, jazzy, psychedelic, mildly original. These are all attributes that come to mind when listening to Xhol Caravan's Electrip. And quite a trip it is. A trip to the minds of the musicians in this German band. Minds that have good ideas, but fail to fulfill them.

The sax and keyboards play in a free jazz like way and sometimes ascend into madness with some weird, insane bits. The drums with their messy, dirty sound, complete the 60's psychedelic sound of this album. This album mixes between the psychedelic traits of several late 60's bands with the jazz-rock qualities of other bands. The result is an interesting sounding album, which has sometimes difficulties in deciding which way to go. They switch from a more traditional 60's psychedelic sound on Electric Fun Fair to a freer jazz tune on Pop games. And even in the same track itself you'll hear this same switch. Most of the stuff is instrumental, except some annoying singing in the long track Raise up high.

While entertaining, this album does not amount to much, and it is a shame. A shame because this band clearly has potential, and they have developed an interesting concept here that combines different two elements, but it works only in the two first tracks and then I lost interest. They do know to play well and create exciting music (like in those two first tracks) and this is what makes me value this album despite its flaws. Overall, a nice album to listen to, reminisce, and enjoy its originality where it is expressed, but not much more than that. 3 stars.