Posts Tagged ‘billy anderson’

Album of the day: Queen Elephantine – Garland Of Skulls

Posted on Tuesday, September 6th, 2011

Lovingly pinched from The Sleeping Shaman: There comes a point when listening to a record becomes more of a religious experience than a musical one. Queen Elephantine’s 10th release is one such experience. Indy Shome and his merry musicians from the NYC have once again crafted a singular flowing piece of belching doom chords, ringing Middle-Eastern tanpura twangs and neo-gospel vocals to accompany the thematics of Tibetan Buddhist mythology.

A short release for a full length, Garland of Skulls wastes no time in dragging you across a floor of distorted bass for 30 minutes plus. The simplistic bass riffing becomes so repetitive that before you know it the record has nigh on finished and you’ve been swallowed up into a hypnotic trance for a half-hour! It’s sometimes difficult to tell with such long and disjointed pieces of instrumentalism, quite what is written and planned songverse, and what is simple improvisation to fill in the gaps.

Vocals are few and far between, and when they do surface it sounds like a trio of lonely church-goers praying to the dead at dusk inside a cavernous and isolated cave. It’s certainly far from cheery on all accounts as half-riffs drop down off-kilter, like tombstones collapsing under the humid weight of damp smoke in a deserted graveyard. When drums do kick in and some form of tempo is set, the tanpura (a sitar-like creation) becomes the instrument of mystery, shaking off conventional string arrangements to create a nervous ambience; uncertain and eerie in its textures.

Continue reading: Queen Elephantine ‘Garland Of Skulls’ CD 2011 review | The Sleeping Shaman.

Tags: Album of the day, billy anderson, Concrete Lo Fi Records, Garland of Skulls, Pete Green, Queen Elephantine, The Sleeping Shaman
Posted in 2011, Album of the Day, Roadburn Recommended | 1 Comment »