Following on from their critically acclaimed 2004 album,
Blue Cathedral, Comets On Fire have just unleashed their 4th release, a 7 song long player entitled
Avatar on 8 August on Sub Pop records.
This is a band who have performed with Growing, Wolf Eyes, Sonic Youth and Dinosaur Jnr amongst others. The band would not have sounded out of place in the late 60s and early 70s with a strong psychedelic feel.
This album made me want to fly to the States, rent a 66 Thunderbird whilst wearing a white vest, jeans, cowboy boots and hat and hit a hot dusty road where snakes, cayotes and hitchhikers would be my only companions. Or just maybe go to a Deep South town, find the nearest redneck bar, stick this on the jukebox and drink Jack Daniels.
The influence of bands such as Hawkwind and the Butthole Surfers are clear in this offering. The band originate from Santa Cruz, California and the laid back nature of this State is not lost on Comets.
The third track,
Lucifer’s Memory, conjured up images of Jim Morrison tripping out—no bad thing at all—and is a ballad with some balls. A great track.
The band have all spent time away from Comets doing their own thing, to come back to Comets refreshed and ready to carry on the indie psychedelic rock that can be heard here.
This is by no means an innovative album and the band are far too heavily influenced by music of three decades ago to be startlingly enjoyable but from the moment I pressed play and
Dogwood Rest kicked in I felt like closing my eyes and let the music wash over me. This was trippy and you may find yourself wanting to pick up a kaleidoscope to look at all the pretty patterns and colours whilst listening to this album.
The band’s site has no downloads to listen to, which is a shame, and
their Myspace page has no tracks from this album. Sub Pop and the band really should do something about updating their sites.
