Praising A Peopled Musical Garden...And Technical Errors

Goddamn Monday. It can be a right bitch. Today is something else though; it’s one of those Mondays when even your computer, a nonplussed automaton, wants none of it. Everything is “not responding”. So sorry People’s Temple. I really wanted to write up something special about your excellent record that you just put out on Hozac Records, Musical Garden, that I managed to snap up this weekend. The way the band sways from modern day garage rock nonchalance to 60s woozy pop, like high fives between John Dwyer (‘Fast Thrills’), Ray Davies (‘Male Secretary’) and Bobby Darin (‘I Heard You Singing’) over a beachside prawn cocktail, really impresses. No song reach three minutes yet all feel fully realised. This is how you do it, King Gizzard – focus and integrity can still be imbued into tracks that experiment and are brimming with fun. But that’s all I can do, because this "not responding" shit is for the birds. Time to step away and enter the Musical Garden… Grab this great lil record here.

Brainwashing The Masses

I was a massive fan of Sons of Stone, the debut longplayer from Lansing, Michigan psychers The Peoples Temple (check out that post here), and I'm glad to say that they are prepping for something equally as mind bending. back in July they released a 7" on HoZaC called Looter's Game (you can listen to the title track below), yet it was just to get the masses salivating for their sophomore LP - wait for it - More For The Masses. See what I did there? Hmmmm... Riffing off their cultish namesake, this record intends to brainwash more acolytes to the cause. They are touring the West Coast of the US right now, would definitely be worth catching.

Peoples Temple - Looter's Game

Sons Of Stone

I havent really had anything going around the record player from great label HoZaC Records lately, which I thought strange - then I received this little cracker. Sons Of Stone is the debut LP for a Michigan band called The People's Temple (nice connection to Jim Jones, love it!). This is similar to The Paperhead record I harped on about last week in that the sound these guys have mastered is so steeped in vintage late 60s/early 70s psych folk rock that its hard to fathom this album not coming out of a time capsule, alongside Marty McFly's Almanac (although that was in 1955 - but time travel is a finicky thing...). This is psych rock at its most languid and lethargic, laying serpentine grooves over tracks like 'Sons Of Stone' and 'Led As One' Just when you thought it could be ground down any further, along comes 'Sons Of Stone Revisited'... Yet the best part about these tracks is that there are riffs here, riffs that will latch on to you for days. Yet this isnt a epic listen - with fourteen tracks on here creating an album of 40 or so minutes, and with lots of variety in amongst the throwback jams. But its not just that that makes this essential listening - its the vitality of it. A lot of bands mining the back catalogues of yesteryear sound like retreads - The People's Temple sound like they are actually living it. And they are two sets of brothers, who may or may not be telekinetically linked. Either way, forget about the Followill's - along with Pontiak's Carney Bros, Ill follow this People's Temple into the jungle and gulp down the Kool Aid...


The People's Temple - Sons Of Stone