An Overdose Of Heavy Psych
July 1997 Reviewed by DJ Johnson 
These two CDs have a lot in common in that they both offer trippin' 60s
psychedelia, either fabled or never heard of, most of it long lost in
time. As I understand it, the difference between "lyte" and "heavy,"
according to Arf Arf and just for purposes of this particular topic, is
that "heavy" is wilder and fuzzier. True, there are far more tunes with
stun-gun fuzztones on the "heavy" disc, but it seems to me the major
difference is that the tunes on "lyte" are more meticulously pop-structured
and sometimes Beatles influenced, while the "heavy" tunes are influenced
much more by the balls-out no-rules American garage crowd. If you measure
light and heavy in terms of powerful surrealism, there's nothing light about
the "lyte" disc. All of this music causes the head to fall back and
the eyes to flutter. Damned good stuff.
"Heavy" CAN melt your brain if you're not careful. Powered By Love's self-titled song is nuts enough before the break, but then all instruments scatter and the vocalist makes a bid for the loony bin with wild cackles and moans. I feel like that sometimes. There's so much great mind-fuck music here that it's hard to single stuff out. Even the turkeys are interesting. Then there are the discordant sounds and musical switchbacks of bands like ESB, whose "Mushroom People" reminds me of when I was one. If you need just a bit more pop structure (and you don't have the other CD, which is dripping in it), you'll find some in The Kollection's "Savage Lost" and Kindred Spirit's "Blue Avenue," which appear back to back. The disc concludes with six tracks by an extremely primal and decidedly non-psychedelic band (I never figured out if it was Fire Birds or 31 Flavors, or if they were one and the same), which seems way out of place but is at least interesting.
Arf Arf continues to become one of the more interesting archive labels. I'm still heavily into their New England Teen Scene comp from earlier in the year, and I think I'll be stuck on these two discs for quite a while, too. I'm always up for a good mind trip. © 1997 - DJ Johnson |
"Lyte" begins with a 25 second "bonus track" that is basically silence slowly
building into a very faint tone that empties off into the second track. I
don't get it. Oh well. You know what I DO get? A lot of great little psych
tunes with strong pop sensibilities that don't skimp on the trip-factor.
Misty Wizards' "It's Love" rides on wonderful sitars and jangly clean electric
guitars for an eastern meditational sound. Stretch the range-measure from
there to the nearly structureless acid trip imagery of The Chimps' "Fifth
Class Mail," which echoes off the walls like the sounds of medication time
at the asylum, and you'll have a fair idea of what to expect from "Lyte."
There are some strays here, too, mostly strange tracks attributed to no one
in particular and presumably used as backing for other projects. Again, this
is some of the trippiest stuff.
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