Moon Duo are a Space Rock/Psychedelic Rock group from San Fransisco. They manage to blend the style of Spacemen 3 with bands such as Clinic and Spiritualized. This mix is incredible. If you're a Spacemen 3 fan like myself, you will love this. The opener sounds like it belongs on Playing With Fire. The song structures are exactly the same as to what Spacemen 3 had, one of the differences here is Moon Duo's lighter sound, as to Spacemen 3's heavy, deep, distorted textures. Noting this, the guitar work on this album is beyond what I expected, they have so many riff's going on throughout each track.
The album begins with the thumping 'Seer'. With it's distorted keyboard riff and steady drumming, it allows the vocals to follow the same progression as the keyboard and electric guitar. I love the sound the produce, with the synthesizer on the left and the organ sounds on the right. This last for just about seven minutes with the heavily delayed vocals and repetitive drumming.
As the album progresses, the music doesn't displease me, it doesn't fade off.. the sound is still in effect. You just wish that Moon Duo would try and go for a chorus, rather than make these tracks of, bliss.. but with very little variations. 'Scars' is a good example of this.
The next track 'Fallout' absolutely pounds your ears, sending shivers down my spine.. It's almost as if Spacemen 3 are having a reunion. This track is by far one of the best on the album due to the increasing Noise and distortion which they use to cover up the lack of a song structure.
So what you have here is 8 tracks of Space Rock jamming, with heavily effected vocals. It could be improved in a number of places, but for what we have, it's a very good Noise album.I would have liked to hear further song structures and something more melodic. Where Spacemen 3 managed to capture the ears of so many, Moon Duo try and replicate the sound, but they fail to grasp the melancholy reverb and drone like aspects of music. Never the less, this is a solid album and one of the noisiest from 2011.
~Eddie
7.6
