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KEMIALLISET YSTAVAT - Kemialliset Ystavat

KEMIALLISET YSTAVAT - Kemialliset Ystavat
Fonal
CD // £11.99
FOLK / AMERICANA
Released: May 2007
Catalogue Number: FR-50

There's a certain responsibility that goes with being one of the lynchpins of a certain scene or other, the God-like Jan Anderzén is one such lynchpin and under a variety of different pseudonyms and in countless acts he has created a musical language all of his own. Over time his sound has been re-appropriated by other artists (most notably others on the immense Fonal label) but he has still managed to retain the 'best' of the world of Finnish psychedelia, with the releases of his psychedelic-folk troupe Kemialliset Ystävät towering above all else. Anticipation runs pretty darned high then for this latest album from Anderzén and friends and rather than make the high quality selection of chemically-enhanced oddness we'd expect from the band, they have instead coughed up one of the finest moments Fonal, and the Finnish scene in general have ever turned their hand to. It's also one of the most peculiar albums I've ever been lucky enough to hear - but don't let that scare you, this isn't peculiar meaning unlistenable, this is peculiar meaning exciting, original, worrying, enjoyable, fun and gloriously exciting. The self-titled album erupts in a crumbling wail of analogue synthesizer, rustling percussion and gurgling throaty wails - this is the BBC Radiophonic Workshop re-imagined at midnight on the top of a sacred hill as druids march, chanting with every step. I can almost smell the cheap incense and hear the screams of a sacrificial virgin as she struggles to pull her hands free of the knotted rope which binds them. Before long the dimension is melted away to reveal the revellers in percussive, tribal beauty with guitar strummed and various drums beaten in time before the album trips and falls into the utterly wonderful free-psych soup of 'Tulinen Kiihdytys' a track that I would very readily have played at my funeral. It's hard to explain how much this album has jumped out at me - it's like hearing ten Sublime Frequencies records playing at once, or a whole bunch of radios all tuned into different stations, all tuned into a different country altogether, but the way it is all framed, the way it is all mixed never feels too dense or too impenetrable. Jan Anderzén has done that almost impossible of things and made something which should sound totally unlistenable sound inclusive and enjoyable, and like Captain Beefheart before him, he's made it rock, hard. There are rhythms here, motifs, tunes even but it's all disguised in a smoky opium den of noise, drone, chanting vocals and patchouli. This album is a William Burroughs book put into wordless music or a narcotic dream set to beats and it is as important and as essential as anything to come before or after. For me, it really doesn't get much better than this - totally breathtaking in every way. Buy it.

• Tracks on KEMIALLISET YSTAVAT - Kemialliset Ystavat:
• KEMIALLISET YSTAVAT : 02
• KEMIALLISET YSTAVAT : 03
• KEMIALLISET YSTAVAT : 01

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