...........War Sucks

With ex-Spacemen 3 mainman Sonic Boom's Spectrum outfit currently on tour in America, there's also a new four-song EP from the group, which includes at any given time Sonic (a/k/a Pete Kember), Randall Nieman, Nolan Watkinson, Iain Worrall and Roger Brogan -- for the EP the musicians were Sonic, Watkinson and Brogan. "[The band is] sounding the best it has since S3 days," Sonic told me last year in an interview, and on the evidence of the four new recordings here, it's clear that devotees of the classic drone-and-fuzztone Spacemen 3 sound, equal parts hard skronk overdrive and blissed-out dreampop, will have precious little argument with his assessment.

War Sucks is issued on Detroit Space Rock City's venerable Mind Expansion label (not so coincidentally operated by Nieman, who is also the main force behind psychedelicists Fuxa) and arrives in an eye-popping Ivan Liechti sleeve based on the zig-zag "Razzle-Dazzle" deception camouflage employed by the military back during the first two World Wars. (Vinyl fans, the 12-inch edition of the EP, featuring colored wax, will be available in May.) The title track, of course, is a cover of the Red Krayola song from 1967 debut The Parable of Arable Land, and yes, fans with long memories will recall that two decades ago S3 tapped that same LP for a brilliant interpretation of "Transparent Radiation. Spectrum's treatment of "War Sucks" is appropriately apocalyptic, a nightmarish upriver journey into a mélange of feedback, clipped guitar chords, horror-flick organ and screeching/whorling sound effects, plus Sonic's trademark echoey/doubled vocal incantations. When the Krayola first recorded the song the Vietnam War was raging; clearly some songs were tailor-made for rediscovery by new generations.

Elsewhere, "Razzle Dazzle Mind" is a thundering instrumental copping some well-worn Stooges riffs (much like early S3 did with its own material) and ramming ‘em through a synth sieve; reportedly a vocal version is being prepped for inclusion on Spectrum full-length, due later this year. Then comes a segued pair of tunes, Laurie Anderson's "Walking & Falling" (from her 1982 LP Big Science), and Spectrum original "Over and Over." The former tune suits the band perfectly; unlike in Anderson's quirky version, Sonic's murmured/recited vocal meshes well with the backing music, a neon-lit cocoon of gently pulsing aquatica. And as it slowly eases into "Over and Over," don't be surprised if you find yourself drifting back to S3 Playing With Fire days; the tune's purposeful throb, delicate fretboard pluckings and steadily rising keyboard drones mark it a direct descendant of PWF's Sonic-penned "How Does It Feel?"

Significantly, War Sucks also hearkens to some of the work Sonic was doing under the Spectrum moniker in the early ‘90s, in particular his first post-S3 release, 1992's Soul Kiss (Glide Divine), and 1994's Highs, Lows & Heavenly Blows. And as the first "proper" Spectrum-the-band release in ages - last year's Indian Giver was a collaborative summit with Jim Dickinson - file War Sucks under a big "welcome back" banner: some things never go out of fashion.
From; Blurt Online



Links;
Spectrum - War Sucks [ep]
Spectrum
Spectrum @ MySpace
Mind Expansion