Wild PlacesHoly River Family Band : Earthquake Country (S,rec.1998-2000,re.2003)**°°
This release is more on the acoustic / song oriented side compared to the related Spacious Mind group releases. Most of the inspirations on the first half of this release are more dark mirage-like in a melodic sense, with some gothic use of voice on two tracks. It has less inspiration with sound creativity. Being musically inspired from a more mirage-like darker-centred-vision-sound various songs are musically build around it. Another attention I found already in the intro of "the bitterroot trail". After that all remaining tracks I found more successful, because here the music itself is much more direct, and inspired with more clarity. First we have "Forget", with a beautiful jazzy flavoured acoustic mood with fingerpicking guitar, warm electric guitar arrangements, handpercussion and warm voice, with some flair of exotism in the acoustic guitar improvisation. Also the track after that, "Bibleman's.." continues to explore this beautiful mood. It includes a beautiful improvisation, some female vocals, some wahwah guitar effects. Also the last track, "Suffering/Robert" is musically very interesting for its combination of use of instruments (+text & vocals) and for its varied acoustic psych evolution. A strong closer. Some of these tracks I will surely give some deserved attention.
PS. The title comes from the unreleased final Grateful Dead studio album.
Goddamn I'm a Countryman RecordsJens : Standing in the trees / gifted by the leaves (S,rec.2000,rel.2003)***
This is performed in a good combination of West Coast style with a psych folk touch, played using soft handpercussion, various acoustic and electric guitars, background sitar, murmuring vocals and second female vocals, sweet organ, and is song oriented. This style of approach is fine, but I think it still might have been restricted a bit too deliberately for a consistent sound. It could have been better with more contrasting styles, at least in vocals. For me it loses a bit of its convincing honesty in inspiration, and that's a real shame, because the songs and mood and general arrangements, I really like.
