Search - Gris Gris :: For the Season

Recommended to anyone into the psych scene

Aquarius Records | San Francisco | 12/11/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Talented Oakland guitarist/vocalist Greg Ashley's Gris Gris gang is back, with a fab sophomore album mostly recorded at a cabin in Texas belonging to Greg's parents. So it's not garage rock, it's cabin rock. Probably good that they were presumably far from any neighbors since this quite often one dang noisily feedback-filled and fuzzed-out freakfest that might have gotten the cops called -- and who knows what manner of illict substances fueled the recording sessions, with which Gris Gris wouldn't want to be busted? Maybe The Man would mellow out knowing that the noisy rave-ups co-exist on this record with plenty of catchy melody and jangly folk and relaxed droniness and other good stuff.



Although "Ecks Em Eye" starts the album off with a free jazz warm-up with Funhouse saxophone, the Gris Gris' psychedelic trip soon passes through the overgrown, shadowy backyards of bands such as Pink Floyd and the early Stones ('specially on the fake raga of the title track). Ashley & Co's retro-sensibilities venture even further into total oldies territory on "Medication #4".



More current artists that this sometimes reminds me of (or whose fans I think might also like this) include Mudhoney, Greg Weeks/Espers, Comets On Fire, and Devendra Banhart, a little. Definitely recommended to anyone into the psych scene today, and cabin rock of course. With songs with titles like "Big Engine Nazi Kid Daydream" and "Down With Jesus" these guys aren't ever gonna have hits, but in my little world they should!"

Big Daydream

Aquarius Records | 11/17/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Hmmm.... Neo-psychedelia, garage rock revival, eastern music, folk, psychedelic yodelling, jazz, and just rather buttery-smooth music that'll take you through a trip early The Rolling Stones and Pink Floyd fans will undoubtedly enjoy. For the Season, in my opinion, is one of the greatest psychedelic rock albums in the past 10 years. It's kind of funny how the lyrics seem to be a complete oxymoron of what the music represents... for instance, in "Big Engine Nazi Kid Daydream", you'll hear happy and rather worshipful guitar-playing, upllifting music while the vocals sing, "Don't recieve us, down with Jesus." First six songs are actually one large 24 minute suite, the next collection of six songs afterward being normally represented as single songs, but do they sound normal? Hell no.



For the Season begins in a jazz, screaming fit, screaming horns blasting away, and gradually you'll hear the drumming start to hold a beat and it gets louder colliding with another large part of the album, organs, with vocals erupting, smooth but angry shouting but singing, "Ecks em eye!" "Down with Jesus" sounds extremely happy actually, but later in the song, tempo rises, the music ascends and you can hear quiet shouts in the background. Quickly the first half of the album ends, "Year Zero" with a steady bassline that soon rises to the next part of the song, anthemic and spiteful, going quiet again to the great bass/keyboard hook. Next half begins. "The Nonstop Tape" proclaims the aformentioned psychedelic yodelling echoing against itself making one vocal note seem to last 15 seconds at least as music crashes and grinds against itself with a feeling of insanity, at least for me. Strangely the next song sounds like the song "Sleepwalkers", a 60's love song..... I think. Slow hypnotic begins the chilling "Pick Up your Raygun" and then the music stops for a second with even more haunting guitar picking up and the singing about fathers wearing masks, you'll have no idea without lyrics, the condition I'm in. From the laid-back ashes of "Mademoiselle of the Morning", an extremely warm and cuddly song with extra jingles and taps in the chorus for even more of that nice sound, comes the Eastern sounding music of "For the Season", which ends the album beautifully but with also a loud and layered part in the middle of the song, it gets faster and more intense until it collapses in on itself and creates a new harmony and ends the album with soft and powerful haziness."