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The Hellacopters Disappointment Blues (White Jazz/Fusion III)
Centrifugal Force Matter (Uforia/Fusion III) The madrigal music of Centrifugal Force's 1993 EP, Excerpts From Matter (Vol. III), was a pleasant surprise, but five years down the road and the debut album finally out, Colin Doroschuk's sprawling music/dance project-in-progress seems unwieldy. It's not so much that his olde English prog-folk crosses the line from Eric Matthews to Jethro Tull, but more that his ambient/techno side is so much better. Man With Too Many Hats? 7/10 (Chris Yurkiw) At Café Campus this Friday, Nov. 27 Wayne Kramer LLMF (Epitaph/Sonic Unyon)
Tales Interstellar Memories (SIT)
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Pete Rock Soul Survivor (Loud/BMG)
Let's hear it for the Chocolate Boy Wonder. The man from money-earnin' Mount Vernon, NY, has produced an album showing that a true love for hip hop music and a tuned ear can result in a very good thing. Produced entirely by Rock himself, it houses a multitude of lyrical contributors (Method Man, Beenie Man, Large Professor, Kool G Rap, Prodigy, Common, Black Thought and so on), complimented by the tried-but-true microphone styles of Pete himself. From the soulful odes to girlfriends past and present, to the return of C.L. Smooth, the complex basslines and inevitable bounce are all here. It's hard to make a record this tight, so pay close attention to what's going on. This is the standard for the next level of hip hop production. Get inspired. 9/10 (Scott C)
Praise Hell Satan! It seemed the horned one has sent us minions who are hell-bent on putting rock 'n' roll back on the map. I'm talking real rock 'n' roll... you know, the type with guitar solos and lyrics about getting fucked up. Although this seven-song EP doesn't blow as much smoke as the first two LPs, it sees the Hellacopters displaying restraint in their cranked and loaded delivery and that's not bad. The cover of Motörhead's "Speedfreak" is stupendous, but the title track shows the Hellacopters are more than ready to take over. 9/10 (Johnson Cummins)
The former MC5 guitar slinger has finally put out a live album showing off his incredible talent at improvisation, a trait that his previous band were experts at. Wayne gives us a lot of extended jams, sounding like Ornette Coleman brushing shoulders with Chuck Berry. The two MC5 songs, "Poison" and "Kick Out the Jams," seem more like poltergeists, and the album would've benefited from their exclusion, but out of all the slew of pre-Christmas live albums this is the one to get. 8/10 (Johnson Cummins)
Permit me to quote the liner notes of Jean-Luc Hervé Berthelot's one-man spacemusik diary. Here are some of the cosmic tourist traps that this deranged frog claims to have visited in the good ship Paradonka: "Xakhantra FairyTown, burning alive under the blue glare of Tanzharän... Tschysark, the hidden capital city of Aléyra's Cluster... and of course the glistening city of Prynshiarka, throne of the Galaxayan Imperyum!" I guess he forgot to mention the record store where he bought all those Tangerine Dream records he's ripping off, but that's right here on Earth, and how could this ball of mud ever compare to "the purple shades of Aldebaran's Nebula?" 6.5 (Rupert Bottenberg)