From what I know of the writing staff of Ave Noctum, and such is the spread out geography that I’ve met surprisingly few of them, I guess I was the ideal candidate to review this album. Whilst many of the staff consume a diet of black and death metal for breakfast, I’m as likely to start the day with a healthy portion of Yes, Jethro Tull, or Hackett era Genesis, musical morsels that would have corpse faces sneering and gurning even harder then usual.
And so it fell to me to cover this latest release from Californian prog merchants Djam Karet, a release that boasts a single instrumental track of over 47 minutes, and is called ‘The Trip’; maybe it won’t be as New Age as I first feared, and it could rival Sleep’s ‘Dopesmoker’ in intensity? Sadly, no. Instead my first impression was right, and ‘The Trip’ is just that, three quarters of an hour of instrumental noodlings. Please don’t get me wrong, the musicianship displayed here is immense, with each of the bands 5 members taking on multiple duties, with flutes, bouzoukis, and mellotrons fleshing out the sound, the musical soundscape stitched together with suitably ethereal samples of birdsong, running water, and other trippy staples. Solid duty is done too with an Ebow, an electronic bow designed to draw unearthly sounds from the electric guitar, a standout feature on Scott “Wino” Weinrich’s ‘Premonition 13’ album. About all that was missing was a Theremin, but that sound was in part created with synths and keys.
What to me, this album lacked was some sort of hook to draw in the listener. Different sections of the album had different characters, each reminiscent of bands of the past, and could easily have been separate songs, rather then part of one rambling whole. Scattered throughout the album were obvious homages to early Pink Floyd, the jazzy guitar of King Crimson, or the choral samples of Genesis, but with nothing to hold them together, it didn’t gel for me. Yes I could admire the skills on show, but at times it sounded like self indulgence. It might well be that Djam Karet’s ‘The Trip’ will be the soundtrack to accompany future encounters with The Camberwell Carrot, and if I were 20 years younger and still a fan of the then legal mushrooms, this album would get some plays. As it is, it just rather washed over me like the background music for any number of incense selling stalls in Camden.
(6/10 Spenny)
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