Frying Tonight

Currently receiving no end of constant rotation in the car at the moment is the snappily-titled compilation ‘A Monstrous Psychedelic Bubble Exploding In Your Mind Volume 1 – Cosmic Space Music’. Curated by The Future Sound Of London’s alter-egos Amorphous Androgynous, it does exactly what it says on the tin. No less a musical visionary than Noel Gallagher mentioned it in his end of year best of list and regardless of what you think of his own particular brand of retro rock, this compilation is the real deal. I’m quite excited by the prospect of another Oasis album, cos if the monobrowed dwarf’s magpie tendencies are anything to go by, it promises to be an absolute cracker. Fingers crossed.

Here’s three taster tracks from Disc 1. I could’ve picked anything to give you a flavour of the album but, really, if you ain’t got this album yet, well, blah blah blah, etc etc, slevver….

No. It’s not Kasabian. Keep reading.

First up, a track by Pop Levi called ‘Blue Honey’. This track sounds like a strange long-lost cousin of Stevie Wonder’s ‘Keep On Runnin”, but with Robert Plant on vocals. It’s extremely heavy on the hammond (maaan) and sounds like it was recorded round about 1972. Imagine my surprise then when after a bit of GoogleWiki-ing, I discovered that Pop Levi is a Liverpudlian who only started making records 5 years ago. Lauren Laverne (mmmmm) tipped him for big things in 2007, but so far the world and all it’s riches still awaits him. Shame, as if Blue Honey is anything to go by, his work has been seriously overlooked. I’m off to play.com as soon as I finish typing this.

Uh huh!

As something of a musical historian, I am more aware of Betty Davis. Soul siren from the sixties and seventies, she was known as Betty Mabry until marrying Miles Davis. Clearly, Miles’ own brand of don’t-give-a-fuck freakydom rubbed off on his wife. The fact that she ‘knew‘ (cough, allegedly) Sly Stone and Jimi Hendrix only enhances her reputation to this writer. She is one little minx! ‘If I’m Lucky I Might Get Picked Up‘ is a raw throated paen to the joys of one night stands. “Raunchy dancin’…I’m shakin’ my fanny!” In the West of Scotland that means a whole different thing, but we know what she means, eh boys?

The Betty Davis track segues into a track called ‘Mountain Machine’ by a band called Mountain Machine. Rather embarrassingly, my ignorance of the underground knows no limits. This lot are currently on the go, with an album out and a MySpace page and everything. Acoustic guitars fight for equal billing with some Moog-y sounding effects, backwards guitars and a fuzz toned riff that could be Black Sabbath in their hey day. This track is an instrumental, with the focus firnly on the mental part. Download it, turn it up and fry your ears. Then get on down to play.com where you have at least 3 new purchases to make. See you there!