impossible to describe this music, it's the 'after everything now this' cd recorded by the bands double from a parallel universe, a universe where the same attention to details resonate as a fixed law as much as in this universe where 'the church' are a space rock band but there's an ambience here that is unique as far as church recordings go, an inner space rock band with an electronic dance vibe.
many people seem to ignore this as a church album, i guess because of the remix feel it has, yet, i feel it has the same originality that every church album has, it is indeed from a parallel universe far removed from the original 'after everything now this.'
yes the lyrics are the same, but the treatments change it completely and it is a real shame i have never seen this show live, i'd imagine that guy coming on-stage and making that announcement at the beginning of the cd. its perfect really, a small club, people in their purple and black velvet suits, psychedelic flowers and lights, everyone under the influence of some inter dimensional ergot. figures dance and smile, swirling around as the band plays these strange hypnotic sonically enhanced songs.
i can't play individual tracks on this cd, it is always played straight through, there's so much continuity in the flow it's worthwhile listening unbroken, a live gig from another universe.
i find its best played at night, make yourself comfortable, light a candle, smoke that spliff, this is a very spliff friendly record.
i don't know how this was made, but it's made with a lot of love, care and thought.
i'm in this club, the aromatic herbs fill the dense atmosphere with a sweetness, the crowds all smiling and moving slow, swaying to the music. a girl with a cat mask offers me a blue drink with sparkling red bubbles and it tastes of fresh mint and honey. the church are on stage but they are completely different, steve bearded and with very long hair, wearing a white robe like jesus, marty in a black suit rocking out on a red twelve string electric stringed instrument that almost could be a guitar, there's peter knoppes swirling around with an afro haircut like jimi in a frilled shirt and a guitar that radiates warm rainbow like light. tim is wearing a sergeant peppers uniform and plays drums and keyboards.
the girl in the cat mask says her name is 'pandorax' and she dances like a flower child through the crowd, grabs my hand and takes me into the thick of the people where everyone is dancing in some sort of personal bliss. some people sit on the floor, some wander around naked in fluorescent body paint.
the journey down to the front takes ages as we stop and speak with people, we pass gene spliced hammer head sharks, unicorn women, people with scales and lizard tongues reptiles kissing the sensual octopi beings serving healing treatments, like an episode of dr. who all manner of creatures packed into a small intimate space dancing and overwhelmed by the music. sound comes from everywhere, stabs of keyboards attack you from the skies, people look up and see space, the stars, steve's voice sings 'when your gone.'
you and cat girl are in a black hole of light, everything swirls around you as your locked in to the experience of sound. oh it's overwhelming, there is no you anymore, there is no cat girl, there is just that music, you are suspended in an isolation tank, super heightened sensory awareness, empty space as that base floats notes like a gleaming path right back to the cats eyes. you can feel the light around your fingertips, the aura of being outside your body for a moment. there's ayahuscian moments in the music, it's a journey there and back, i like where the cd takes me, i like the bit where steve says, in distorted command, 'alright' into 'night friends' that music is commanding and it grabs you, yeah it's tribal and futuristic, not our future but the parallel universes.
fuck this cd is beyond me, it's beyond, it's really unknown territory, it's incredibly brave to release this and i think despite the fact a lot of church people had a problem with it, it rates as one of my favourites and the more i play it, the more i love it.
also how generous are the church, i mean there's two discs on this cd, each one brilliant and packed with brilliant songs. what other band gives us so much?
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