Today's Soundtrack: 5/2/2008

Matmos - Supreme Balloon
Y'all don't even know... I took a spin down River Road for the 22-minute title-track Gesamtkunstwerk on this all synthesizer-all the time wonder and was expecting to jump the space-time barrier at each turn. I am so into it, I even spelled "Gesamtkunstwerk" right the first try. Soooo good, approximating what God feels like when he walks out of the salon after cashing in a forgotten 60-minute massage gift-card.

One of my co-workers made an MTV Cribs parody video of his sister-in-law's new house house, soundtrack: Jack Johnson, 311, Olivia Newton-John, Candyman, Nelly, G. Love and Special Sauce, a rap song utilizing "The LSU Fight Song," Nelly again (Nelly holds up surprisingly well over time) , DJ Jazzy Jeff and The Fresh Prince, Queen

Evangelicals - The Evening Descends
OK, I thought would be some nice, jangly, cleansing indie rock instead of the post-everything, come-children-refract-thru-mine-groovy-prism, garage Kundalini business it is. Epic in scope, internal in focus - I think I totally love it! It's the all-time greatest album of right this very second ever! KA BOOM! MIND EXPLODED!

Ya Ho Wa 13 - Penetration, An Aquarian Symphony
So, OK, children of the universe, let's meet the mothership where it lands. This is the recently reissued record by the late 60's Los Angeles cult/commune/health food store proprietors The Source Family and their nudist-shaman Father Yod (eerily aka Jim Baker. Not Jim Bakker, or is it...). Sky Saxon of The Seeds was a member, John Lennon was a patron, and Father Yod was many things, but not much of a hang-glider, meeting his end in an accident doing just that in Hawaii in the mid-80s. It has moments of blistering mind-expanding glory, but like most things "cult," the story is much juicier than the reality. Evidently enlightenment was but a Tibetan prayer bell away back then.

Acid Mothers Temple & The Melting Paraiso U.F.O - Have You Seen the Other Side of the Sky?
I think this Japanese group might be a commune as well. I have never really gotten that deep into them, because they already have 10,000 records you have never heard when you get there, and have likely released four more withing your first hour.

and um, Jesus! This is why Julian Cope is my hero. Not only did he write Japrocksampler, an exhaustive tale of Japanese psychedelia I have yet to get my hands on, but has compiled a comprehensive website on the subject. Sayonara, and see you fuckers on the other side...