Captcha Records will reissue two stellar releases from the Japanese psych band Kikagaku Moyo, making the group’s self-titled LP, as well as their Mammatus Clouds EP, available on limited edition vinyl this coming September 2nd! The quintet, whose name means “Geometric Patterns” in Japanese, began operations in the summer of 2012, and with a sitar, theremin, and woodwinds amongst their instrumentation, they dig deep into the well of underground Japanese psychedelia, sure to amaze fans of groups like Flower Travelin’ Band, Taj Mahal Travellers, Far East Family Band, etc.
Kikagaku Moyo opens with the stunning “origin” story of “Can You Imagine Nothing“, which features female vocals full of amazed wonderment as they imagine a time even before the cosmos’ first beginnings, a time when there was “no light, no darkness, no…no nothing”; and with sitar and woodwinds in full effect, the track casts a lush, jam-happy vibe full of pastoral vibrations. While the band does this gentler side of psych with seeming musical ease, they also know when to drop the hammer, like on the cut that follows, “Zo No Senaka“. Here, a distorted guitar-line is slowly carved up into ear ripping notes that tear thru the audio space, building the track’s searing tension, before launching into the stratosphere on a blazing, skyward journey…only to later burn back down to earth on a funky, flame thrower groove, complete with strident and haunting vocal freak-out, as well as chunky guitar pyrotechnics.
Throughout the five tracks on this album, Kikagaku Moyo uses the dynamic differences between heavy metal and the more arcadian side of 60’s psychedelia to travel between heavenly and hellish sonic trip realms, and nowhere is this more apparent than on the record’s third cut, “Tree Smoke“. Strummed and shimmering guitar-lines meet sitar in a warm, jet-black night, with bass and drums adding buoyancy to the bucolic proceedings, but as the listener ascends upwards, atmospheric conditions grow stormy when the track shifts between wonder and terror, before unleashing an obliterating, bass-heavy barrage of lightning and thunder.
The band’s fascination with geometric patterns is, as drummer Go Kurosawa reportedly explained to Captcha Records, a desire to “use sound to recreate passages in nature where natural geometric patterns appear”, and this shines thru on “Lazy Stoned Monk” when the sounds of falling water provide a cave-like acoustic backdrop for reverberating drones, and the song’s rapt and blissful guitar meditations. The album closes with the slow burning sun rise of “Dawn”, and, here, an initial chiming guitar-line, and the more caustic freaked-out growl that follows, would sound right at home on Mercury Rev‘s trip masterpiece, Yerself Is Steam, before the track concludes by erupting into a sick sitar jam, and heavy metal face melt!
