The Source

German mag Jazzecho has a review of The Source's sophomore effort. Fellow Trønders The Source are well known among us psychonauts for their collaboration with Motorpsycho at the 1995 Kongsberg Jazzfestival as documented on "Roadworks II - The MotorSource massacre".

Here is the review, unfortunately only in German:

Trygve Seim & The Source - The Source

Auf ihrem zweiten ECM-Album kehrt die norwegische Band The Source zu ihren Ursprüngen zurück. Seit der Gründung der Band im Jahre 1993, als Trygve Seim, Øyvind Brække und Per Oddvar Johansen allesamt noch Musikstudenten am Trøndelag-Konservatorium in Trondheim waren, folgen die drei Musiker treu ihrem damals gefaßten Grundsatz, jedes Konzert vollkommen anders zu gestalten. In der seither verstrichenen Zeit haben sie wildeste stilistische Kollisionen provoziert und bei diversen Gelegenheiten mit überraschenden Partnern zusammengearbeitet: mit Dichtern und DJs, Raï-Sängern und Rappern, Konzept- und Performance-Künstlern und sogar mit Eishockeyspielern.

Es gab Begegnungen mit den Rockmusikern von Motorpsycho sowie den klassischen Musikern des Cikada String Quartet (dokumentiert auf dem im Jahr 2000 erschienenen Album "The Source And Different Cikadas"). Die überwiegende Mehrheit ihrer Auftritte absolvierte The Source aber als Quartett. Und für dieses Format wurden im Laufe der vergangenen dreizehn Jahre auch die meisten Stücke geschrieben. Für das Album "The Source" wurden nun einige dieser live sehr häufig aufgeführten Werke endlich auch im Studio eingespielt.

Die ungewöhnliche Besetzung mit Saxophon, Posaune, Baß und Schlagzeug erinnert natürlich an einige andere Ensembles mit selber Instrumentierung (etwa an John Tchicais New York Art Quartet, die Gruppe von Archie Shepp und Roswell Rudd oder Albert Mangelsdorffs Quartett mit Heinz Sauer), unterscheidet sich von diesen in kompositorischer Hinsicht allerdings grundlegend. The Source greift auf außerordentlich wohlkonzipiertes Material zurück, das von der Band, die zugleich sehr frei als auch sehr präzise ist, mit Witz, Feuer und Flair interpretiert wird. "Die Tatsache, daß wir kein Akkordinstrument in unseren Reihen haben, gibt uns sehr viel Bewegungsfreiraum und ermöglicht uns, die Musik sehr viel offener zu gestalten", meint Trygve Seim.

Auf "The Source And Different Cikadas" und Seims Soloalben "Different Rivers" und "Sangam" demonstrierten Saxophonist Trygve Seim und Posaunist Øyvind Brække bereits ihr wachsendes Interesse an "fernöstlichen" Klangfarben. Ihre Phrasierungen erinnerten gelegentlich an die Töne von Bansuri-Flöten, Shakuhachis und Duduks. Auf diesem neuen Album tauchen diese Sounds vor allem in den beiden von Schlagzeuger Per Oddvar Johansen geschriebenen Stücken "Tamboura Rasa" und "Mmball" auf. Letztere Komposition war schon auf "The Source And Different Cikadas" zu hören und wurde auf nachdrücklichen Wunsch von Produzent Manfred Eicher umarrangiert und neu aufgenommen.

Das Album insgesamt ist jedoch weitaus "jazziger" als seine Vorgänger. "Der Großteil des Materials stammt diesmal von Øyvind, und er ist in mancherlei Hinsicht mehr im Jazz verwurzelt als ich es bin", meint Trygve Seim. "Als wir die Band 1993 gründeten, hörten wir sehr viele Aufnahmen von Ornette Colemans Quartett mit Dewey Redman. Das Ensemble war für uns definitiv ein Vorbild und hat uns nachhaltig inspiriert. Wir spielten damals sogar Songs von dieser Band. Ich glaube, einige der jetzt von uns gemachten Aufnahmen haben eine ähnliche Energie."

Trondheim II

Trondheim fans will be treated to a juicy two night run of shows to start the "BH/BC"-tour with! A second hometown date has just been announced. The show will take place on April 24, 2006 at Samfundet. The first Trondheim show takes place on April 22, compare the tour-schedule!

Many thanks to Vegard!

The Art Of Sysyphus Vol. 35

Motorpsycho's "Devil dog" (off of "BH/BC") is featured on the CD that comes with the current Eclipsed magazine, a German music mag for the art - progressive - psychedelic - classic - hard - rock niche. The CD is called "The Art of Sysyphus Vol. 35". While this CD is mainly of the interest for the most die-hard collectors among us it should be mentioned though that it also features an unreleased King Crimson live track: "The court of the Crimson King" recorded live at San Francisco's famous Fillmore West, December 15, 1969. Motorpsycho has covered King Crimson's "21st century schizoid man" & "Starless" in the past.

Motorpsycho to play Haldern Festival

While we are still impatiently waiting for the spring tour to get underway another date can be added to festival/summer tour: the band will appear at the 22nd annual Haldern Pop Festival. The festival will take place between August 03 & 05, 2006. Tickets can be purchased via above banner, they are 47 Euro & there are no one-day tickts available. With a capacity of 7000 the Haldern Pop Festival appears to be one of the smaller festivals. Besides Motorpsycho the exquisite line up includes Mogwai, Lamchop, Element of crime (the festival's "house"- band), Kante, Vashti Bunyan & others.

The band is also confirmed to headline Oslo's Øyafestival to be held a week after Haldern. It's kind of difficult to predict a schedule around these two dates -- maybe they'll be one off performances. There is a good chance though that the band will play more dates in August. For instance it wouldn't hurt to keep an eye on the Lowlands Festival's line up (to be held August 18-20) where the band has appeared in 1997, 2000 & 2002. Maybe they will fill up the weeks between Haldern & Lowlands with a couple of more festival or headlining shows.

Motorpsycho have last toured Europe's festival circuit in the summer 2002, when they took their collaboration with Jaga Jazzist on the road for seven shows & recorded "In the fishtank" in a dutch studio.

Summer 2006 tour

Visit the MotorpsychoNews main page here!


Updated schedule for Motorpsycho's festival/summer 2006 tour:

August 04 - Haldern Pop Festival, Rees-Haldern (GER), tickets, webcast?
August 05 - ?
August 06 - ?
August 07 - ?
August 08 - ?
August 09 - ?
August 10 - Øyafestival (program for that day), Oslo (NOR), tickets
August 12 - For Noise Festival, Pully (near Lausanne) (CH), tickets

Festival tour info article (MP-News).

See the 2006 Concert Chronology Part II for setlists!


Spring tour 2006 schedule here.
The band also plans to play a fall tour.
2006 Concert Chronology Part I here.

Halden finally confirmed

The long-rumoured show in Halden, 27.04.2006 is now confirmed. Motorpsycho will play at the familiar Samfundet. Apparently there is no on-sale date for tickets yet. The concert will take place the day after the band will play the sold-out Rockefeller -- put together these shows will probably be one fantastic two night run.

One month before the tour will start the tour-schedule still thickens.

Thanks to Abstract.

Intro review

Thorsten Schmidt, dedicated Motorpsycho fan & always a regular of the touring family whenever the band plays a show somewhere in Germany or Holland, reviewed "BH/BC" for Intro.de, a free German music mag. Intro has always been very supportive of Motorpsycho. Nice work there Thorsten -- I am looking forward to meet you in Rostock! :)


Motorpsycho
Black Hole / Blank Canvas
(Stickman / Indigo) [27.03.06]

Es rockt wieder. Endlich! Statt Beach-Boys-Süßigkeiten gibt es von den Norwegern Volumen satt auf zwei CDs verteilt. Genug der musikalischen Experimente mit Jazz, Pop und der analytischen Komposition an sich. Am besten sind Motorpsycho immer dann, wenn sie einfach die Instrumente nehmen und unbekümmert loslegen. Mehr The Who als Pink Floyd, mehr "Trust Us" als "Phanerothyme". Erstmals sind einem Motorpsycho-Album die kompletten Texte beigefügt, es gibt schließlich einiges zu erzählen. Nach dem Ausstieg ihres musikalischen Weggefährten Gebhardt, der sich künftig lieber HGH widmet, wirkt der einzige Akustik-Song des neuen Albums wie ein Gruß an den sympathischen Freigeist - ein klares Statement von Bent Saether ist es allemal, wenn er singt: "it's so much easier to move with the changes / when all the daemons are let out of their box / the love cult self-imploded fat / and bloated throwing rocks." Für den Rest gilt: "Lautstärkeregler sind zum Anschlagen da, und Amps müssen krachen!" Saethers Bässe rumpeln rau und massiv, Snahs Gitarrenwände sind schier endlos und sämtliche 17 Tracks mit einer Energie intoniert, die man in dieser Masse und Intensität fast nicht mehr erwartet hätte. Und die dadurch umso mehr Herz und Seele erfrischen. Es tauchen auch gute Bekannte auf. So geht der "Devil Dog" mit Moondogs "All Is Loneliness" jagen, und Marie Antoinettes weltfremde Kuchenspende in "L.T.E.C." wird als lässiger Barracuda-Blues zelebriert. Captain Snah ist in Höchstform, seine Spielweise ist mal ungestüm und übersteuert, mal trocken und angenehm reduziert. Dann wieder singt und soliert er sich dermaßen losgelöst durch die epischen zehn Minuten von "Before The Flood", dass J. Mascis oder Neil Young ihre wahre Freude daran hätten. "Kill Devil Hills" ist zunächst ganz unschuldig als fluffiger Popsong getarnt, entpuppt sich aber plötzlich als teuflische Rockoper. Furioser Highspeed-Jazz trifft wehleidige Ballade, überraschende Soundspielereien ("Triggerman") echten Stoner-Groove: Während das Schlagzeug in den neuen Songs komplett von Bent eingespielt wurde, erhält das hypnotische "You Lose" seinen schwebenden Rhythmusteppich vom Niederländer, Freund und anstehenden Tourschlagzeuger Jacco Van Rooij. Ein großer Song. Eine großartige Produktion - eine grandiose Rückkehr.

A rough English translation can be found here.

In other news: The press release as well as many Norwegian reviews have already pointed it out -- apparently the band has decided to cut back on promotion this time around. They won't do any interviews (save for two with the Japanese press). However, the motivation backing this decision remains in the dark, particularly since it is pretty obvious there would be a lot of things to talk about. Here is a little article from renowned German music mag Visions, which informs its readers that there won't be a lenghty feature about the band due to this policy.

Motorpsycho will embark on their first major tour of Europe since 2002 within less than a month's time!

Know your bonus single!

Motorpsycho's new album "Black hole/blank canvas" has been out domestically since last friday & it's seeing its "international" release today. Stickman Records' mailorder has already been all over the place since last week's wednesday anyway. There are many -- mostly positive -- reviews to be digested. Instead of featuring a review of my own MotorpsychoNews will have a closer look at the extra song which can be found on the bonus single which is available with the limited edition of the CD version of "BH/BC".

I am proud & honoured to present a guest feature-article by fellow Psychonaut & Deadhead Rolf Klausen. Rolf lives & studies in Trondheim & he is the keeper of the files of our beloved ongoing "Motordead research project". Rolf keeps a blog too. This is his first (and hopefully not his last) contribution to MotorpsychoNews.

Thank you so much Rolf -- I think you deserve an award for this post!

Connect The Dots (Or: The Bonny Lee Mystery)
by Rolf Klausen

On December 8, 2003 Motorpsycho played the song “Bonny Lee” live for the first time. It was a 4-minute dirty rock'n'roll tune, and for some reason it was assumed to be a cover song. In this guest post on Alex' blog I will try to sum up all the mysteries that are surrounding this song, mainly because the song is now officially released on the limited edition of Motorpsycho's new album.

When this song appeared, the more nerdily inclinded of us psychonauts went out investigating. What was this song? Someone said it was a cover, and everyone else believed it, apparently. Allmusic.com revealed to us that a guy named Hank C. Burnette released a song called “Bonney Lee” on his album “Hot licks & fancy tricks”, so we thought “Yeah, that's gotta be it.” No one had heard this supposed original version, we just assumed. This theory got more support when we saw that Burnette also had recorded “I'm a king bee”, a song often played by the Grateful Dead in their early days. Knowing that Bent is a huge fan of Grateful Dead, we reasoned that Bent had probably found this album somehow via Grateful Dead. Also, on Burnette's album there was a song called “Sugaree Sugaree” which perhaps is inspired by or related to the Grateful Dead song “Sugaree”?

Well, so far so good. This could just be coincidences. Then it dawned on me: “Bonnie Lee” is also the name of a character in the Grateful Dead's song “Wharf Rat”! The song is a story about a man named August West who spent half his life in jail for a crime he didn't commit, and after getting out he becomes a drunk. The story is told from the point of view of a nameless “I” who talks to August West, who tells him his story. It's a very sad song, but still it contains a hope for better times to come. Anyway, the song ends like this (Pearly is August's wife or girlfriend):

Pearly's been true, true to me, true to my dyin' day he said,
I said to him, I said to him, "I'm sure she's been."
I said to him, "I'm sure she's been true to you."

Got up and wandered, wandered downtown,
nowhere to go but just hang around.
I've got a girl, named Bonnie Lee, I know that girl's been true to me.
I know she's been, I'm sure she's been true to me.

So Bonnie Lee is the girlfriend of the “I” in the song. By this point we were (as far as I can remember) still assuming the song Motorpsycho played was a cover, and the plot seemed to thicken. Maybe this was a Motorpsycho original? Further evidence came in the summer of 2004, when MP played the song again, and at Bad Bonn, June 11, Bent said, before the song: “It's a new thing. It's very new.” By this time the song has evolved into a long spaced-out, dreamy prog-rocker – and it's pretty obvious now that it is indeed an original, and not a cover. I can't remember how long we thought it to be a cover, but now, after the release of “BH/BC”, we know it's an original, since it's credited to Bent Sæther.

But the story doesn't end there. Because early in our investigations we discovered something really weird. Using the almighty Google, I searched for “Bonney Lee” and found this webpage, which appears to be some kind of list of family members of the Bonney family, probably intended for people who research their ancestors and make family trees. On this page we can find this exciting piece of information:

Viola Lee BONNEY
She was married to George Andrew WILSON in 1927. Clerk of Court Office
Virginia Beach, Princess Anne Co, VA
Marriage Register 1853-1938, Page 130

What's so exciting? I'll tell you: “Viola Lee Blues” is the name of an old folk song, which the Grateful Dead turned into a huge psychedelic rocker. The first line goes: “The judge decreed it, the clerk he wrote it.”

Now, see: according to this page "Viola Lee Blues" is a derivation of an older song called “99 Year Blues” - and further: “Julius Daniels came from Denmark, SC and recorded this song in Atlanta in 1927. He was one of the first southeastern bluesmen to make records. A version of this song was adapted to become "Viola Lee Blues" by Cannon's Jug Stompers, covered by the Grateful Dead.”

See the year 1927? Yeah, same year as Viola Lee Bonney got married. Coincidence? Hard to tell! If you want to hear an original version of "Viola Lee Blues", go here!

So, to sum it up: we got a real person named Viola Lee Bonney – married to a clerk of court office – then we have the song “Viola Lee Blues”, about a clerk in a court office – and now, “Bonny Lee” by Motorpsycho.

The references examined above seem even more striking when depicted in a visual chart (click to enlarge):


A huge pile of coincidences? Or is Bent the god of creating references to other bands & songs?
It's difficult to draw any conclusions!

Off-Topic

For most of us it's "BH/BC"-day today (I won't receive my copy until next week though), but what the heck, I need to get something completely different off my chest anyway:

If you happen to live in Berlin/Brandenburg or if you happen to be in the city for whatever reasons, make sure to not miss this show:

More basic information here.

"BH/BC" reviewed

As the album reviews keep pouring in it already becomes clear that "BH/BC" will be an album that will harvest highest critical acclaim. You can read, post & discuss the various reviews in the UnOff's discussion forums, respectively in the media forum!

So far, bad reviews have been few & far between. One review stands out as particularly undifferentietaded & it has spawned quite a few pissed off comments so far. The review is full of cheap puns on the band & we'll have to thank The other Anders for going the extra mile & giving the translation a shot. For a good laugh here it is:

____________________________________________________

Duo, I and Motorpsycho (* -- see below for notes)
by Martin Thronsen

Then Motorpsycho were here again - not only as a duo, they are also back in megalomania-land with yet another double album.

It's a very visible pattern, when one paper receives a release before all the others, that the score on the dice often ends up suspiciously high. The rest of the herd of reviewers follow. The result, some would argue, is that the record company has more or less managed to direct reviewer consensus.

I think this is what is happening with this album. "Black Hole/Blank Canvas" is not far from ending up as a huge and important album in Norwegian rock history, something it is not by any means.

So, how does it sound? Dark, overwhelming and in some degree excessive, like previous double deckers like "Demon Box" and "Timothy's Monster"? Or do they have a go on softer, more concise and immideate tones like "Let Them Eat Cake" and "Phanerothyme"?

I guess you can say that it has ended up as a double dose of gold and pebbles side by side, even if it after all is a little bit more daring than their last album, "It's A Love Cult".

Bent Sæther, who for the occasion also has picked up the drum sticks of departer Gebhardt, screams and whistles(**) his way through compositions containing a lot of things; heavy, riff-based stoner sounds, westcoast rock, emo, psychedelia, pop, you name it - Motorpsycho is there.

It stretches from the bent out of shape to the beautifully grandiose to the sparse to the rumbling to the noisy. From Elvira Nikolaisen(***) to Captain Beefhart and back again, if you like. And it is not necessarily anything negativ in such a leap, as long as the content grabs you. I do not experience that it does so very often here, and under any circumstances not often enough to justify this double mastodon.

And then I it doesn't really matter anymore.

(*) It's a cheap pun based on a cildrens song called "Du, Jeg og Vi To" ("You, I and the Two of Us")

(**) To emit a shrill, sharp, high-pitched cry, as some birds and other animals.

(***) Current Norwegian singer/songwriter with some success right now
____________________________________________________

If you like you can drop Martin Thronson a mail here, telling him what you think of the review.

Meanwhile, Stickman has been really ambitious with the mailorder as "BH/BC" already starts arriving at people's places -- even as far away as Canada -- so expect your copy very soon!

Anti-press

JTR pointed out (thanks!) there are new press pictures over at Stickman's site. I did expect them using new press pictures sooner or later now that Geb is gone. Well, here they are. And while there is some beauty to them they certainly make one wonder: what kind of party did they attend the night before the pictures were taken? ;-)

Not that any dedicated Motorpsycho fan would need a reminder -- but hey, this week will finally see the release of "BH/BC"! Be sure to pre-order your copy of the limited edition triple CD in book-format!

Rostock show added

With many thanks to Stickfrau, here comes another concert-date: Rostock (Germany), April 30, 2006 at Mau Club (capacity 900). Motorpsycho has never played Rostock before.

This very date makes for some very convenient travelling for the Copenhagen-Rostock-Berlin run: there is a reasonably priced bus between Copenhagen & Berlin & it happens to stop in Rostock. Of course I will have to abandon my intended off-day in Copenhagen (Walpurgisnight!) but who wouldn't trade that for a Motorpsycho show?! See you there! :-)

See the updated tour-schedule here. It's very likely we can cross either Gothenburg or Halden off that list because at one point the band will have to take an off-day -- it's already one hell of a tight intinerary. Which band plays seven shows in a row anyway? Amazing!

Hamar show confirmed

Motorpsycho will play Hydranten in Hamar (Norway) on April 25, 2006! Tickets will go on sale Friday, March 10! I added the date to the tour-schedule. The tour will kick off April 22, 2006 in Trondheim (Norway) & will wrap up May 14, 2006 in Darmstadt (Germany).

Thanks to Roar Johannessen.

Complete "BH/BC" artwork

Paul Caspers was so nice to scan the artwork of his promo-copy of "Black hole/Blank Canvas" -- thank you very much, Paul! If you want to know how the "BH/BC" artwork really looks like go to this post (or just scroll down to the post before "Gent & Bergen reviewed"). Of course, this is potential spoiler material, so if you want to be suprised do not scroll down. Let me just say that it's really beautiful.

In other news, the norwegian newspaper Dagsavisen ran the first Norwegian review of the new album today. Apperently we are talking a raving review: the record gets six out of six stars & the review concludes it's their best record ever. Thanks to The other Anders.

The new album will be out March 17 -- pre-order your copy at Stickman Records!

Gent 02.09.1993 & Bergen 16.04.1999 reviewed

Check out Rolf Klausen's review of the Gent (Belgium) show/recording from September 1993, here. It's part of his newly inaugurated blog "My mind has left my body", which is dedicated to reviewing Grateful Dead shows/recordings. Hopefully he'll keep interspersing the occasional Motorpsycho review.

Reviewing recordings like that is a lot of fun & provides important information to collectors & people who are interested in the evolution of the live-band Motorpsycho. It would be great to eventually collect all reviews (most of which have yet to be written) in one place.

Incidentily I wrote a review myself the other day for the previously mentioned recently surfaced Bergen 1999 recording:

Artist: Motorpsycho
Date: April 16, 1999 (Friday)
Venue: Garage
City: Bergen
Country: Norway

Setlist: The Witch -> Step Inside / Heartbreaker-> High time / Feel / Superstooge -> The Wheel / Psychonaut / You lied -> Black To Comm -> Not Fade Away -> Back To Source tease -> Black To Comm // S.T.G. -> Young Man Blues // K9

Line up: Bent, Snah & Geb

Time: 117:35
Source: Minidisc in long play mode > CD-R
Complete: Yes.

Highlights: Step Inside, Heartbreaker -> High Time, Superwheel, S.T.G., K9

Comment: A solid complete audience recording. The very beginning is clipped but is provided by a second source that features only the first 12 minutes of the show. Listeners will have to be warned of some serious crowd noise – at one point someone speaks directly into the mic.

Review: Despite being recorded in long-play mode (mono) on Minidisc the recently surfaced recording from Bergen’s Garage sounds just good enough to be pretty enjoyable. It has a very up-front & direct charakter. Inevitably the unruly & rowdy Bergen crowd get’s their fair share of mic-time just as annoying as on other recordings from Bergen. The performance is mindblowing though!

During the first round of dirt-rockers (“The Witch”, “Step inside”, “Heartbreaker” “High-time”) the band grooves like fuck – it reminded me of how good songs “Heartbreaker” & “High time” actually are. The crowd allows the band to sweetly sing through “Feel” before we take off for the first major jam of the night: “Superwheel”. After six and a half minutes “Superstooge” enters the slowed down transition jam. Pretty soon the band develops a new theme to the jam driven by a bass-groove which they take to a Snah-lead climax four minutes afterwards, followed neatly by the opening notes of “The wheel”. Bent loses no time singing the vocals. It is here that someone speaks very annoyingly into the mic. After that the crowd overtalks the quiet first part of “The wheel”. Fortunately they are being drowned out on our recording when the band raises the volume again with a wonderful build up on rhodes before the mighty “Wheel”-riff is introduced into the jam, which also features some sequenzers or theremin-sounds as well as some great distorted keys (Snah?). They bring the jam home in classic “Superwheel”-fashion and the quiet outro, here with a spooky “S.T.G.”-like flavour, brings out the worst side of the Bergen crowd (those must be some morons there!). “Psychonaut” flies away on a deep lower-register solo & some monster Bent-takes-Hawkwind-to-the-next-level tractor grooves. “You lied>Black to comm” rocks with some funky interplay, heavy riffs & competently closes the main set.

Every fan will love the encore choices, particularly the second. A short but great “S.T.G.” (some remarkably different details in there) leads to a fun “Young man blues” before we are treated to a 23 min “K9” as second encore. And just as a couple of months ago at the very same venue (10.10.1998), when they played the first known version of an all-hell-breaks-loose noisy “K9” jam, we get that noisy type of beginning to the jam again tonight. As opposed to the jam back then they soon take it down though to enter more classic (i.e. “RW1”-like) spheres, first with a spacey fabric of keys sequenzers & delays before confidently devoting almost eight minutes to a mind-bending version of the “The faster we go, the rounder we get”-jam. [By the way, some of my favourite “K9”s stem from Bergen. The following shows in Bergen (22.10. & 23.10.1999) should spawn one of the krautiest & most exciting versions in my collection.]

A great show hampered by some nasty crowd noise but ultimately the space wins on this recording & manages to thoroughly captivate the listener.

Complete "BH/BC" artwork: scans [spoiler]

...first "BH/BC" review

...in Piranha, a free publication by the big German electronics-mediamarket-chain Saturn. It's their CD of the month, which is quite a considerable promotion.

Black Hole/Blank Canvas

Wenn Motorpsycho aus Norwegen wieder ein Doppelalbum machen, kann der Weltuntergang nicht so nahe sein: "Black Hole/Blank Canvas" vereint alles Gute, für das die Band je stand: Lärm, Lieder. Und sehr, sehr lange Gitarrensoli. Wer ernsthaft über dieses neue Ungeheuer sprechen will, dem stellt sich (natürlich zum wiederholten Mal) die Frage: Wie erklärt man, was sie mit den Gitarren machen? Was ist ein Flanger-Effekt? Muss man ein Wah-Wah an der Leine führen? Und wie heißt ein Verzerrer, der doppelt so stark übersteuert wie alle von Menschhand gebauten Geräte? Antworten: Die Gitarren auf dem offenbar 14. Motorpsycho-Album klingen, als ob man 75 ganz besonders saure, zischende Brausebonbons auf ein Trampolin legt und schnell in Deckung geht Als ob man eine große Menge Qualitätsmilchschokolade auf hoher Hitze bis zum Sprudeln kocht und dann den Kopf reinsteckt. Und, tja, das waren jetzt mal nur die Gitarren.

Allzu oft findet man sowas nicht mehr, seit das Glasklirrende, Hektische, Amphetamin-New-Wavige zurückgekommen ist im neuen Rock’n’Roll. Die Trondheimer haben schon immer aus einer ganz anderen Welt gegrüßt - als eine Art Grunge-Band mit Hardrock-Hang, dann als ausschweifende, wollige Indie-Prog-Rocker, als Power-Pop-Outfit und blumenpfötige Mini-Symphoniker. Das Geheimnis, das Motorpsycho mehr denn je auf dieser Platte mirakulös vorführen: wie man verdatternde, umwerfende, atemlose Großmusik spielen kann, ohne spürbare Muskelkraft einzusetzen. Klar ist das Retro-Rock’n’Roll. Motorpsycho erinnern hier wieder an The Who, an Cream und Led Zeppelin, auch an die Beatles. Sie finden die Riffs, die keiner je gespielt hat, pumpen sich mit Sauerstoff voll und spielen den süßen Beat, machen Liebe mit den Stereokanälen. "Black Hole/Blank Canvas" ist das Beste aus allen Motorpsycho-Welten, eine rau geschleuderte Songplatte mit einem Herzrhythmus, den kein Lebewesen einfach mitklatschen kann. Motorpsycho haben ihre eigene Höhle, und da blinken alle Lichter.

"BH/BC" is currently on pre-order at Stickman Records.

Pre-order

From today on it is possible to pre-order "BH/BC" from Stickman Records. Preordering will bring the album to one's mailbox on the day of release ("[...]All pre-paid european orders will be shipped on Wednesday, March 15th and all german pre-paid orders will be shipped on Thursday, March 16th"). Plus, patronizing the label is a good idea anyway!

There will be a double LP as well as a limited edition triple CD box ("...in book-format") that includes a bonus audio disc. The bonus disc features the album-track "Hyena" (radio edit) & the non-album-track "Bonny Lee" (previously unreleased). The dirt-rocking number "Bonny Lee" is a cover song: it was originally done by the "one man rockabilly band" Hank C. Burnette & it can be found on his 1979 album "Hot licks & fancy tricks" (though called "Bonnie Lee" there). Motorpsycho added it briefly to their repertoire during the last shows they played with Geb in Japan 2003 & Europe 2004. There are numerous well hidden Grateful Dead references that come along with this cover choice (to be elaborated in a future post).

In the mean-time the new album has been very well received by those who listened to the leaked version & common consensus appears to be that this is easily Motorpsycho's best effort since 1998's "Trust us", to which I can only wholeheartedly agree! :)