One of my great personal finds of the last decade was Light Year, whose aptly named album Reveal the Fantastic, brought about a new combination of sounds I'd never heard before. In my notes for that album I referred to Light Year's sound as a combination of Mahavishnu Orchestra and the Belgian group Cos. The ferocious fusion of the former meets the higher pitched singing and insouciant manner of the latter. And while researching the album, we learned that the San Francisco based Light Year was involved in Mingo Lewis' Flight Never Ending masterpiece.
And now 10 years after that release, comes yet another archival find. Being that it's (likely) from 1975, the heavy fusion standards of the day were still accepted. And sure enough, Hypernauts of the Absolute Elsewhere is clearly a follow-up to their debut. Excellent in every way, and their patented sound remains. Perhaps there's a bit more funk than prior, in particular 'The Legend of Myth', which points to the times. And there's no mind blowing 20+ minute epic here, though 'Firebird' has the same gravitas, at half the length and represents the album's best number. The first part of '3:30 Tomorrow' is a fairly dull drum solo, though it atones itself with some lightning fast guitar from Randy Sellgren to close off the album. In conclusion, if you loved Reveal the Fantastic, then you'll also want Hypernauts of the Absolute Elsewhere.
Ownership: CD: 2020 New Music-Green Tree. Was sent along with Time of Commotion (thank you!). Comes in a single digi-pak with poster booklet insert. It's about as informative as Time of Commotion's liner notes, and is more esoteric than useful. Minor gripe, as it's just great to have music like this still coming at us.
No comments:
Post a Comment