Reaper’s Scythe is a heavy one but it is ABSOLUTELY worth listening to

Genre: Psych-doom/Proto-metal

It isn’t October yet, but it sure can feel like it, provided that you have a cold room equipped with a speaker to chill in. Green Lung has been present since March of 2019 and they are one of the leading bands of the UK’s underground music. What they play is mostly a mixture between psychedelic rock and proto-metal, but I don’t think I can dumb their genre down to just those two.
Green Lung will come out with a full new album, Black Harvest on October 22nd, but the band made sure we have something to listen to before the summer ends.

Well, first of all, I would like to draw your attention to the band’s previously published music because this album and in it this single will be a followup to those. The wonderful artwork is also worth mentioning, take a look at Black Harvest’s design, it is brilliant. The theme is the same, their music represents the beautiful (sometimes terrifying) and rich British folklore, magic and some other pretty occult stuff. Have a listen here, this is the new single:

Reaper’s Scythe is a complex song with tons of references, I will do my best to explain all of them but I highly advise listening to it just for yourself first.

The first 26 seconds of this song are pretty chill which makes the real start much more epic. This melody comes back later at 2:37. The lyrics are starting out with something epic too,

“Reap what you sow”

a saying which means something like this: you will experience the same bad things that you did to other people. The full lyrics will send chills down your spine, they paint a picture of hopelessness and dread.

“Set the watchfires a-burning This Kindling Night For the psychopomp has taken flight”

After the refrain the song mentions a creature, the psychopomp, which is Greek for ‘the guide of souls’. This big winged, scary looking creature is a guide for newly deceased souls from the Earth to the afterlife. Pretty sinister if you ask me.

“By the corn rigs they’ll see him Send up the crows Welcome, He Who Walks Behind the Rows”

The next to appear is He Who Walks Behind The Rows. This enigmatic demon was created by Stephen King, I’m sure everyone heard about him already. He Who Walks Behind The Rows doesn’t take form as anything that could be described. He manifests himself as a couple of things, but the most important part is this: He influences the corn-fields and the people around Him. He can see and hear everything, he can control everything.

“Hooden, on a pale mare He’ll ride” “See the Pale Rider He’s sharpening his blade See the Pale Rider Now he’s calling out your name…”

Hoodening is also mentioned, this was a tradition in Kent, south-eastern England. The meaning of this tradition is argued so I’ll leave this as something for you to look up. You can decide what you interpret it as.
The pale mare and the pale rider are in my understanding a reference to the last one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. His name is Death, what a surprise. He’s commonly portrayed with a scythe.

“Now hear us as we gather round the shrine We’re singing out John Barleycorn must die”

John Barleycorn is a Scottish folk song about a man who is the personification of barley and the beverages made from it, beer and whisky. In the song he suffers through the stages of the harvesting of barley. Pretty dark for a folk song, isn’t it? Well it is theorised that this figure was used in the wicker man ritual in which a big wicker man was burned, sometimes with a live person in it as a tribute to the gods.

Ugh, if you read this far, I am so proud of you for this song is brilliant but heavy. It is really a treasure and a procedure to figure out all the references.

This track is a good example of how good Green Lung’s lyrics and songs are. If you are listening to them for the millionth time you will still find something you haven’t noticed before. Until the full album comes out, listen to their other creations for they are impressive as well.

Listen to Reaper’s Scythe here:

If you haven’t heard Your Psyche Is Showing from Generous Gods yet, what are you doing?

Genre: Psychedelic rock

Generous Gods, a band you will instantly fall in love with just released their new digital 45! It is perfect for lovers of psychedelic music and also for people who just started getting into the genre! I was fortunate enough to hear from them personally so you can too. Firstly, you can read an interview and then a review of the songs.
Get your loudest speakers because even your neighbours will want to hear the whole thing! Let’s get into it!

How would you describe your band?
Hi, nice to be speaking with you today! We’re a bring-your-band-home-to-mother type of group if your mother lived in Haight-Ashbury in 1967, nearly named you Saffron, regularly protests human rights, and enjoys vacationing in Santa Fe while wearing obnoxiously large turquoise jewelry. Generous Gods is a revolving cast of characters each adding their personality, ethos, and life experience to the music thus creating our little slice of southern-psychedelic heaven all right here in the warm sunshine of Atlanta, GA. 
 
What are your ultimate goals with your music?
We got no goals, aside from relentless expression, defeating oppression, renouncing possession, defying suppression, and offering the occasional suggestion. We’re careful to be mindful of that last one though. Being on The Ed Sullivan Show would’ve been a thrill or hanging out with Nico at The Dom in the East Village would’ve been cool, but I think we missed our chance. 
 
Were there any bands or performers who really inspired you? If so, who are they? 
Stax Records, The Animals, The Golden Dawn, Love, Nina Simone (her Pirate Jenny from ’64 is mind shattering), David Bowie, The Stones, 13th Floor Elevators, Jean Knight, The Troggs… Lots of novelists and poets and entertainers and scientists that we admire and respect outside of music as well. We would read an astrophysics book before most music biographies any day – they tend to reach farther than music biographies allow for. We did enjoy Keith Richards’ autobiography, ‘Life’ though. Confessional and went deeper than skin. Open G does funny things to a person’s mind. 
 
What would you like your music to mean to people?
Well, we don’t really know – that’s a hard thought to hold in your head. We hope it’s something to them, that’s better than nothing, but what that is, we won’t understand it or even care to really. Music is subjective and it’s appreciation can be terribly dynamic. Certainly is for us ha. Music maybe doesn’t mean any particular thing to you, but it’s rather a timestamp or indicator of what you were going through at that point and that’s where the meaning is derived. Socrates probably said that. 
 
What inspired you to start making music of your own?
Well, music has been a creative pathway for us for some time now. It’s an idiosyncratic endeavor, music. You want to be there when it works and it’s hard to run from when it doesn’t – we often find ourselves in both instances. We’re from Georgia and there is a staggeringly rich musical history here: Otis Redding, Ray Charles, Gladys Knight, The Spontaneous Generation, Ma Rainey for god’s sake.. it’s mystifying. It’s in the live oak forests, the Chattahoochee River, the streets of Atlanta, and the coastal waters off St. Simons Island. Hard not to be inspired.
 
Is there anything you’d like to add? Maybe a message for the readers?
Generous Gods loves it’s listeners, money is fake, aliens are real, your ego will betray you every chance it can, fall in love with a person who loves to read, everyone should have to work in the service industry at some point, ‘The Big Lebowski’ is the apogee of American cinema, Jupiter’s moon Europa, likely has giant sea creatures living in it’s 100 mile deep ocean, and you should listen to our music through the prism that we’re blissfully out of step with modern music and that’s ok with us. Thanks for having us! Be well, Hedi – peace and love!!!

Well aren’t they just so kind? I don’t know about you but their answers made me want to hang out with them and their obnoxiously big turquoise jewelry wearing mothers. They create a unique atmosphere. And this shows on their music too! If you haven’t heard their two new songs yet, here’s a link so you don’t have to look it up.

Let’s talk a bit about the first song, Snake Oil! The melody will surely have you dancing in your living room. From the first second, this track sounds very catchy and indeed it is! The refrain is very memorable, it will be stuck in your head and I’m sure you won’t mind. At about one and a half minutes there is a short guitar solo which blends into the song well and is very melodic.

The next and last song is very tuneful. A part of the lyrics just before the refrain can be heard a couple times, this really makes you fantasise about screaming ‘Just lean in closer, I’ll tell you what was left unsaid!’ at a concert with your friends. I promise you don’t need a drop of alcohol to have a good time while listening to this masterpiece. In the beginning of the song we can hear a melody that could have been played on a sitar, it carries through the song and compliments the guitar’s theme. The vocals in the refrain create a harmony that is very nice to hear.

To sum up, Generous Gods really created something that will be stuck in your head and make you dance. Their new digital 45, Your Psyche Is Showing is -i promise you- worth listening to.

You can listen to Your Psyche Is Showing here:

 

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Composition
4/5
Production
4/5
Lyrics
4/5
Performance
4/5
Album cover
4/5

Samsara Blues Experiment’s latest album is a bittersweet end

Genre: Stoner rock/Psychedelic blues/Indian raga

The German trio announced that they are putting their music career on hold in order to take a break or even stop working together. Before doing so, however, Samsara Blues Experiment came out with an EP that will launch you into another galaxy and take that ride with you. 

When I came across End Of Forever the first thing that caught my eye was the artwork on the cover done by Jessica Rassi. Let’s take a look inside too!

The first song, Second Birth, is the longest track on the whole EP. Right from the start you could imagine travelling by a spaceship or looking at the galaxy form a whole new point of view. The guitars and drums create a nice atmosphere, which is deepened by the keyboards. In the fifth minute and part of the sixth minute of this masterpiece, you can notice some Pink Floyd vibes, which aren’t at all surprising since Pink Floyd was and will always be one of the biggest influences on the neo-psychedelic genre. The second half of this song becomes much more definite, it’s like the track is slowly forming and taking a more solid form. It is not as atmospheric anymore, it travels through air and fills your head. The bass is absolutely worth paying attention to.

The second track, Massive Passive is a much faster one and the vocals play a bigger part in it. It starts off small and soft and with time this too grows to be an absolute masterpiece. The lyrics suggest that this is nothing less than a love song of some sort. The main idea is this: our world became a cruel, one you cannot change, in the past you had security and people to turn to despite the fact that everybody around you seemed crazy, but now technology came between people and healthy relationships, even with yourself. Depressing, isn’t it? If not else, this song will absolutely remind you to do a social media detox if possible.

“And when I was scared I knew I still had you, I had you to turn to while everyone around us had gone insane.”

Well let’s cheer up a bit, in the EP’s middle you can find a track that will bring hope to the melancholy of the last song. Southern Sunset is -no doubt- a love song. Featuring elements of nature, the lyrics paints a moving picture of a woman and a relationship. Not letting the previous song sadden you, it states that you can disconnect from reality and create your own world without insecurities and worries, so let’s do just that while listening to Peter’s vocals!

The next song is also the title of the EP. This track is a less positive one, discussing the popular psychedelic rock topic of realities and dreams. At about the three and a half minute mark, a very interesting lineup of instruments starts building on each other. The guitar solo is nothing less than immaculate.

Orchid Annie on the other hand, is a slower and somewhat more positive track. When reading the lyrics, a feeling of bittersweetness rises and stays till the end of the song. At about 3 minutes nearly every instrument used plays a different melody creating an outstanding composition. At 4:35 there is a change of pace and melody out of nowhere, which makes you think and slowly makes its way to your soul. It becomes faster and more desperate by the minute. There are solos in this song but my descriptions really could not do justice to them, please listen to the whole thing as this is, in my opinion, one of the more intricate songs of Samsara Blues Experiment.

Orchid Annie is technically the last song on the EP but there is one more bonus track, Jumbo Mumbo Jumbo. A cathartic instrumental jamming which will indeed be stuck in your head for the rest of the week. It is less of a wishful goodbye, like Orchid Annie, but it is undoubtedly a worthy end. The melody of End Of Forever comes back for another appearance.

Samsara Blues Experiment most likely knew that this was going to be their last album for a while so personally I take this track as a goodbye they played with full force.

In conclusion, End Of Forever is an emotional roller-coaster that is absolutely worth taking. Samsara Blues Experiment will be missed but the music they have given to us will make up for their absence.

Listen to End Of Forever here:

 

 

Composition
4.5/5
Production
4.2/5
Lyrics
3.8/5
Performance
4/5
Album cover
4.8/5