GIRLRLS !

3.5 stars really!!!

Unchanged line-up and an even uglier/tackier artwork than on the debut album, Eiliff's second album is a tad more on the prog rock side than its predecessor, recorded the year before. One of the few things that did change is that keyboard player Brüninghaus is not only playing organ, but ha also plays electric piano and saxman Kalveran has not only a tenor sax, but an alto sax as well. It might seem relatively minute changes, but they will make a difference in this album, in terms of interplay and composition.

Opening on the 6-mins Eve Of Eternity, Eiliff seems to have listened to some more Focus, (although both groups were more or less contemporary) and you'd swear they'd be copying Finch has that group not yet been recording. King Of The Frogs is another example that Eiliff should never be caught singing. Not only are the vocals catastrophically bad, but while they're on, the rest of the track's production simply sucks as well. After two verses, the singing stops for a narration backed by a free-jazz improv, before picking up again. The album's best track Journey To The Ego closes the first side in a brilliant hard drivin' jazz-rock manner and one of the album's best moment.

The title track opens the flipside and is easily the albums' most Canterburyan track, eyeing at Soft Machine and Nucleus, easily the album's apex, especially once into its slower torrid middle section and its slow build up to the original riff. The 9-mins Hallimasch is unfortunately plagued with those awful vocals (and again the recording production of the rest of the group being botched), but once over with them (as if a chore), the track opens up into a red-hot groove with Najedepour (guitar), Kalveran (sax) and Brüninghaus (el piano) exchanging excellent lines and solos that Secret Oyster wouldn't disown.

While this second album is marginally better than the debut, it is most likely that Eiliff, like many other kraut-jazz-rock groups, were probably most at ease in concert and surely with their bassist not singing. While neither album are essential, prefer this album to their debut and maybe check G O D's Encounter of The Third Kind, the Bremen broadcast being much too short.

EILIFF's second album (same lineup) is really more of the same with shorter overall tracks though. I do like this one a little more mostly because of the final three tracks which guarantee this to be a 4 star album.

"Eve Of Eternity" is uptempo with organ and drums before the rest join in quickly. It settles after 2 1/2 minutes as the tempo continues to shift. "King Of The Frogs" is ruined completely by the vocals and lyrics (kidding, haha) and the spoken words 1 1/2 minutes in make me want to laugh. "Journey To The "Ego" has some atmosphere and sax early before it kicks in 1 1/2 minutes in.This sounds really good especially the piano. Guitar a minute later and the bass is prominant. Sax is back after 5 minutes.

"Girlrls" has a very "in your face" intro before it settles with sax before 1 1/2 minutes. Drums and guitar come in as it becomes powerful again. Keys arrive as it lightens. Good track. "Hallimasch" has this dramatic intro and the percussion and experimental sounds take over. Spoken vocals 2 1/2 minutes in and then it all stops and a new soundscape takes over with prominant guitar coming in at 4 minutes. It changes again 5 1/2 minutes in. This is catchy with guitar leading the way.

Another strange one from EILIFF but that's it's biggest charm.

First of all let me say this album sounds more and more unified, polished than their creation on stage. EILIFF were an authentic heavy jazzy keyboard-based German psychedelic outfit based upon a deep, strict rhythm party. My first EILIFF was their live album "Close Encounters With Their Third One" featuring three of their repertoires via this studio album "Girlrls!". It's quite interesting for me to compare their studio material with one on stage. The titled track, "Hallimasch", or "Journey To The Ego" in this album is shorter and sounds more refined than in the live one released later ... makes sense really, but I'm afraid I would miss something addictive, immersive this time.

Guess they would have launched condensed sound and material because created in a studio. Every track is pretty fantastic indeed, and I love repetitive, convoluted melodic reincarnation style especially in the titled one. On the contrary, remarkably surprised at kinda pop / catchy atmosphere in the first two songs (actually I've got absorbed in Rainer's incredible excessive keyboard works in "Eve Of Eternity" perfectly ... one of my gems). Obviously on stage the performers could grab the feeling of the audience, who should be merged together all around, and play music for driving themselves crazy pleasant. Yes via a studio recording we cannot touch the same addiction like the stage, of course.

No suspicion this album is fascinating, nonetheless.

Eiliff's second album finds the short-lived Krautrock unit sputtering and stumbling on that whole difficult "second album" thing. Their debut was extremely strong, but it's clear that they'd expended all their best ideas here; Girlrls! feels more like a jam session than a cohesive album compared to the debut, the band workshopping new ideas but not giving them that much polish. There's too much here which just comes across as empty noodling; album opener Eve of Eternity has some nice organ, though it takes way too long to actually properly get going. Not outright incompetent for those who just want a bit of a psych-tinged jam, but far from essential.