Return to Part 1 Noisier than rock The decade at a glance The 1990s started in 1989 when the Berlin Wall came down. That event marked the end of the Cold War that had marked 50 years of worldwide proxy wars and a nuclear arms race. Coincidentally four months earlier the very same city. Berlin had held the first "Love Parade" a festival of electronic dance music attended by one million people. Two years later the Soviet Union would collapse altogether. In 1992 the treaty of Maastricht created the European Union that spent the next two decades expanding and absorbing former satellites of the Soviet Union. During that decade the whole world (with the exceptions of a few small countries) converted to capitalism (even Russia and China) and most of the world also converted to democracy. The USA system had won the Cold War the USA was left the only superpower and all the countries were struggling to emulate its winning system. The number of wars around the world decreased rapidly as dictators were forced to retire. The new world order yielded an era of global growth on a scale that had never been witnessed in the world. Asia in particular staged one of the most spectacular economic booms in history with China leading the way (China had been one of the most isolated communist countries until the early 1980s). Many in the West fell to the illusion of perennial prosperity. Many in the developing world sensed the end to poverty and starvation. The USA was rocked by one of the most influential inventions of all time the Internet. Throughout the decade more and more innovative software changed the way people lived their lives. In 1991 the World-Wide Web invented by Tim Berners-Lee in Geneve debuted on the Internet. From that moment on an endless stream of new companies progressively demolished the "American way of life": Marc Andreesen's Netscape in 1994 to browse the World-Wide Web; Jerry Yang's Yahoo in 1994 to search the Web; Craig Newmark's Craigslist in 1995 to serve the community; Amazon com in 1997 to sell books over the Internet; Al Lieb's and Selina Tobaccowala's Evite in 1997; Larry Page's and Sergey Brin's Google in 1998; Pierre Omidyar's Ebay in 1998; Shawn Fanning's Napster in 1999 (a system to share music files); Jimmy Wales' Wikipedia in 2001 a collaborative encyclopedia edited by the whole Internet community. A new economy appeared in the USA the "net" economy whose drivers were the "dot com" companies. By 1999 the US had 250 billionaires and thousands of new millionaires were created every year by an ebullient stock market. By 2000 e-mail had become pervasive replacing traditional ("snail") mail and even telephones as the main medium of long-distance communication. Bill Clinton the youngest president of the USA since John Kennedy elected in 1992 well represented the contradictions of the new era: he was the first "baby boomer" to become president. The economic expansion during his eight years was the longest in the history of the USA. The demographics had also changed significantly: the population of the USA was 280 million and most of the growth took place in the South and the West. The most populated state was now California with over 30 million people and Los Angeles (which a century earlies was a town of 100,000 souls) had become the second largest metropolis in the country. There were at the same time disturbing signs of social disease. In 1992 racial riots erupted in Los Angeles and other cities leaving 48 people dead. The USA intervened militarily in Panama (1989). Somalia (1992). Haiti (1994). Serbia (1999). Some of the problems of the previous decades had fathered worse problems. In 1989 Bush declared the "drug war" against hallucinogenic drugs (that was really a war against the drug cartels of Colombian and other "drug lords"). In 1992 street gangs were terrorizing entire areas of metropoles like Los Angeles. By the end of 1999 the World Health Organization estimated that 16 million people in the world had died of AIDS (more than half the victims being under the age of 25). In the USA that year actually marked the first decline of AIDS in the decade (17,000 people died of AIDS in 1998 versus 50,000 in 1997). In 1999 a new worrisome phenomenon took hold of the USA though: 13 students and teachers were killed in a high school of Columbine (Colorado) leaving 13 people dead. Internationally the security of the USA was not threatened by major powers but by a small group of terrorists. Al Qaeda led by an Islamic fanatic from Saudi Arabia. Osama bin Laden from his base in Afghanistan. In 1993 they tried to blow up New York's World Trade Center and in 1998 they bombed two USA embassies in Africa killing hundreds of people. The economic boom ended soon and with a bang. In April 2000 the stock market for high-technology companies crashed wiping out trillions of dollars of wealth. To mood turned to gloom when at the end of the year. George W Bush of the Republican Party became president on a technicality beginning one of the most divisive presidencies of all times. Thus the world and in particular the USA went through one of the most breathtaking decades in memory. Musically the 1990s saw the rock genres of the 1980s grow apart rather than fuse. Each of those genres (lo-fi pop industrial gothic roots-rock noise-rock indie-pop techno ambient etc) multiplied and evolved in a fashion largely independent of the others. The 1990s marked in many ways the revenge of the "province". While the "new wave" and punk-rock (and rap and disco) had been centered around the big metropolitan areas in the North and in the West the 1980s had slowly opened up to the rest of the country. By the time Bill Clinton became president (1992) the South for example had regained its grip on down-to-earth popular music slowly establishing a supremacy over the whole gamut: alt-rock pop and of course roots-rock. The 1990s were also the age of Seattle another relatively "provincial" center. There were perhaps fewer new genres created in the 1990s than in any of the previous decades but a few stand out: grunge post-rock trip-hop drum'n'bass glitch music. On the other hand both new and old genre diverged much more than in any previous decade de facto splitting rock music into a loose federation of subgenres. An involuntary catalyst for the commercial success of the new genres was the magazine Billboard that finally changed the way it ranked singles and albums by tallying actual sales at retail stores instead of using the industry-manipulated word of mouth. Suddenly rock outsold pop and "minority" genres such as hip-hop and country entered the charts. This in turn led the industry to invest more in these genres. New York's legacy 1990-94The influence of Sonic Youth was perhaps the most visible. Mostly unknown during the 1980s. Sonic Youth came slowly to represent "the" quintessential alternative band. An even more "alternative" act. Pussy Galore was a close second. No surprise then that a few of the new leaders emerged from those two bands. Bewitched were formed by Pussy Galore's drummer Bob Bert and recorded a boldly experimental work. Brain Eater (1990). Jon Spencer's wife Cristina Martinez led Boss Hog that re-invented party-music first on Cold Hands (1990) featuring Honeymoon Killers' bassist Jerry Teel and Unsane drummer Charlie Ondras and then on White Out (2000) both clever revisitations of rock stereotypes. Like Pussy Galore the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion was a bass-less trio playing careless amateurish skeletal and grotesque blues. The difference is that Spencer had dispensed with the "punk-rock" factor. A stylist of bad taste. Spencer carried out a postmodernist deconstruction of the blues first on the cacophonous and viscerally crude Jon Spencer Blues Explosion (1992) which was virtually an insult to the great bluesmen of the past then with the childish Extra Width (1993) and finally with the streamlined Orange (1994) which was in many ways his most accomplished (albeit not innovative) collection. These works contained psychotic rave-ups demented jamming and scary vocals which represented a "hip" kind of background music for the distorted values of the post-punk generation. The sophisticated sloppiness of Now I Got Worry (1996) and Acme (1998) the first Spencer album that featured a bass further diluted the original outrage and presented a more civilized (i e less beastly) con-man. New York which had been the birthplace of noise-rock had the most varied and crowded scene of noise-rock bands: the Dustdevils fronted by the unpleasant vocals of Jaqi Dulany; Babe The Blue Ox with the odd dynamics of Babe The Blue Ox (1993); St Johnny whose High As A Kite (1993) was derivative of Sonic Youth; Bunny Brains who delivered the creative chaos of Bunny Magick (1994); Versus whose Secret Swingers (1996) fused Television's transcendental acid-rock and Sonic Youth's atonal pop; Lotion with the mildly psychedelic Nobody's Cool (1996); Sleepyhead disciples of Sonic Youth who moved on to psychedelic folk. Overall noise-rock was a metropolitan intellectual affair relatively removed from the populist issues of the American heartland. The legacy of apocalyptic hardcore 1991-92 Chicago's noise-rock was heavily influenced by the subculture of hardcore and by Big Black's apocalyptic noise. Jesus Lizard summarized the style better than anyone else. The historical line-up of Scratch Acid vocalist David Yow. Scratch Acid bassist David Sims. Phantom 309's drummer Mac McNeilly and guitarist Duane Denison was the vanguarde of a new kind of hardcore punk-rock that had absorbed funk noise and industrial music. The EP Pure (1989) and the full-length Head (1990) were dramas of macabre hyper-realism immersed into urban neurosis as viewed from Yow's sick mind. Goat (1991) their most accomplished work found a magical balance between Yow's psychotic mumbling and screaming (and perverted visions). Denison's elegant vocabulary of grinding scathing sobbing lashing sounds and a repertory of ever-mutating epileptic rhythms. The quartet penned lugubrious visceral vulgar truculent abrasive nightmares. A less disordered and less pathological affair. Liar (1992) was still highly energetic sometimes chaotic and always galvanizing. The instrumental technique refined on Down (1994) stood as an impressive contribution to redefining the very essence of rock music. But their music was first and foremost a music of fear the fear of a young urban population whose life was reduced to a series of agonizing spasms. The central character of their stories a sort of mythological psychopath was the collective subconscious of that population. If punk-rock had been the sound of a battlefield the sound of Jesus Lizard was the sound of the wounded who rattled in the cold of the night. In nearby Minnesota. Flour the project of former Rifle Sport's bassist Peter Conway recorded albums such as Luv 713 (1990) that wed Big Black's violence with dance beats and heavy-metal riffs. Among the most oppressive followers of Jesus Lizard's convoluted power-rock were Missouri's Dazzling Killmen no less brutal but a little jazzier. The cross-fire between vocalist Nick Sakes and guitarist Tim Garrigan and the rhythm section's jarring movement molded the infernal atmospheres of Dig Out The Switch (1992). The band relished horror psychodramas of ferocious intensity an art that culminated on Face Of Collapse (1994). In Chicago. Jesus Lizard's main disciples were perhaps Shorty led by guitarist Mark Shippy and vocalist Al Johnson with the eerie violence of Thumb Days (1993). Unsane formed in New York by Jon's brother Chris Spencer and drummer Charlie Ondras concocted a dissonant and violent form of rock'n'roll that borrowed the sheer impetus of hardcore but emptied it of any emotion and melody. The catastrophic riffs hammering rhythms and uncontrolled vocals of Unsane (1991) performed glacial and relentless surgery on the body of a zombie. Cascades of atrocious sounds destabilized its songs and generated a form of hysterical tribalism. Compared with Sonic Youth the music was spasmodically tragic not calmly intellectual. Vincent Signorelli replaced Ondras (who had died prematurely) on Total Destruction (1994) another work drenched in superhuman angst another bleak claustrophobic painful vision of subhuman life. Even compared to the extreme sound of Big Black. Unsane's music was a further step down the stairway to hell and the damned weren't even crying anymore. San Diego's Three Mile Pilot a guitar-less trio of vocals bass and drums led by singer Pall Jenkins (Paolo Zappoli) revived Jesus Lizard's post-hardcore dejection on Na Vucca Do Lupu (1992) a brutal and passionate work and Chief Assassin to The Sinister (1994) a tortured stark and obscure testament. Kansas City's Season To Risk played similar heavy tortured music on albums such as In A Perfect World (1995). Los Angeles' Distorted Pony delivered the gloomy menacing super-heavy apocalyptic wall of noise of Punishment Room (1992) while Slug wed Big Black to an assortment of turntables and hip-hop rhythms not to mention the monster assault of two basses on Swingers (1993). San Francisco-based Oxbow fronted by nightmarish vocalist Eugene Robinson concocted an insane free-form collage of atonal instruments vocal rants noise punk energy and sheer nonsense on Fuckfest (1991) and especially King of the Jews (1992) and Serenade in Red (1996). After a long hiatus. An Evil Heat (2002) even included a 32-minute coda of musique concrete for distorted guitar and moribund groove. Glimmer Shine. In New York both Drunk Tank with the bleak Drunk Tank (1991) and Cell with Slo Blo (1992) further explored the edges of this style. These bands increasingly mixed noise-rock grunge and industrial music. Between noise-rock and feedback-pop 1991-95 Several bands took advantage of the harmonic revolution of noise-rock to craft personal introverted and disturbing styles. Broc's Cabin (1991) by Florida's Rein Sanction was bleak and ominous like a cross between voodoo and noise-rock. Indiana's Antenna formed by former Lemonheads' and Blake Babies' guitarist John Strohm evolved into Velo-Deluxe whose Superelastic (1994) better represented the leader's fusion of roots-rock power-pop the Velvet Underground and My Bloody Valentine. In Minnesota. Polara the project of 27 Various' guitarist Ed Ackerson bridged late Sonic Youth. Jesus & Mary Chain's feedback-pop and the "Madchester" sound on Polara (1995). In Los Angeles. Further produced Sometimes Chimes (1994) which toyed with Dinosaur Jr-like noise-pop. East Coast 1993-96 Later into the decade a new generation of bands came around playing non-linear dissonant song-oriented music and North Carolina (namely. Chapel Hill) was its epicenter. Polvo which were in many ways the leaders of this school resurrected Television's guitar counterpoint which straddled the line between neurosis and ecstasy between western existentialism and eastern transcendentalism but pushed it to the brink of cacophony and chaos. The effect was to give "atonal" a "subliminal" meaning. The intricate and repulsive guitar collisions of Ash Bowie and Dave Brylawski propelled Cor-Crane Secret (1992) inwardly while shifting and incoherent tempos lent the journey a Freudian intensity and twisted melodies plunged the "stories" into the realm of Alice In Wonderland. A more erudite effort. Today's Active Lifestyles (1993) was de facto a series of dissonant micro-concertos which in turn evoked a gallery of abstract miniatures not unlike Captain Beefheart's masterpieces. Exploded Drawing (1996) possibly their masterpiece perfected their manual of harmony. While the surface still sounded like a spastic version of Henry Cow the nonchalant and detached way with which the players secretly toyed with elements of raga blues and folk amounted to a jungle of improper signs to a semiotic disaster of the same magnitude as Arto Lindsay's and Mayo Thompson's most heretical endeavors. The more careful arrangements of Shapes (1997) revealed that the scaffolding of their sonic kaleidoscope bore psychedelic stigmata. Shunning the over-extended progressive/acid format. Polvo advanced the concept of noise in the format of the pop song more than anyone else since Sonic Youth. Boston boasted an equally original scene. Live Skull's vocalist Thalia Zedek and guitarist Chris Brokaw (ex-Codeine) formed Come to indulge in noisy Royal Trux-ian blues jamming and neurotic Neil Young-ian ballads. Don't Ask Don't Tell (1994) was a collection of nightmarish streams of consciousness. The Supreme Dicks were among the most intriguing practitioners of the aesthetics that equates "creative" and "primitive". The theatrical bacchanals of The Unexamined Life (1993) managed to combine ideas from the Holy Modal Rounders. Kurt Weill and Lou Reed. That kind of drunk dissonant folk music evolved towards the avantgarde and psychedelia on The Emotional Plague (1996) a vastly more ambitious work that resorted to sparse dilated and warped structures. Followers of Sonic Youth in and around Boston included Papas Fritas. Small Factory. New Radiant Storm King. Turkish Delight. In Pennsylvania. Latimer's LP Title (1995) was typical of Sonic Youth's nation-wide influence. Two of the most original bands were from Washington (and not coincidentally related to Unrest). Tsunami the band of ebullient singer Jenny Toomey played frantic and muddled roots-rock on Deep End (1993). Pitchblende the band of guitarists Justin Chearno and Treiops Treyfid molded a vehement and jagged attack on Kill Atom Smasher (1993). Modernism 1993-95 Ohio's Brainiac concocted a surreal hybrid of new wave and industrial music. Abandoning the punk-rock verve of their Devo-inspired debut album Smack Bunny Baby (1993) the short demented songs of Bonsai Superstar (1994) featuring new guitarist John Schmersal revealed a lighter gentler version of Pere Ubu the Pixies and Sonic Youth. Chaotic and retro` that album capitalized on those masters' innovations but thanks to Tim Taylor's naive synthesizer and to a childish aesthetics discarded the apocalyptic overtones. Hissing Prigs In Static Couture (1996) was a better organized madhouse despite the relentless frantic chaos. Atlanta's Pineal Ventana offered a bold mixture of improvisation tribal drumming saxophone drones and edgy screaming on Living Soil (1995). International noise-rock 1992-95 England was awash in Brit-pop but still managed to deliver some of the most creative bands of the era. Gallon Drunk was one of the most aggressive and intimidating outfits of its time. You The Night And The Music (1992) served rock'n'roll and rhythm'n'blues played by a pack of rabid wolves skewed tribal dances derailed by awkwardly distorted guitar and organ and by demonic changes of tempo and mood. The album revived the lascivious and sinister musical universe of Birthday Party the Cramps and the Scientists but in a more catastrophic setting and amid mutant echoes of Creedence Clearwater Revival and Bo Diddley. The slightly jazzier and more rational From The Heart Of Town (1993) featuring reed player Terry Edwards turned that wild flight of the imagination into a style. Therapy? unleashed another brutal work. Nurse (1992) a trip in a Freudian maze. The aesthetics of Jacob's Mouse was even looser. Their No Fish Shop Parking (1992) was a cauldron of noise-rock styles. The Faith Healers featuring guitarist Tom Cullinan imitated Pixies and Sonic Youth on Lido (1992). Prolapse specialized in angular and abrasive noise-rock which on the early albums such as Backsaturday (1995) sounded like vitriolic indictments of pop music. Boyracer behaved like childish hellraisers on More Songs About Frustration And Self-Hate (1994) that contains brief songs played with full-throttle clumsiness and clownish nerdiness. Rosa Mota unleashed the triple guitar assault of Wishful Sinking (1995). Beatnik Filmstars messed with the traditional song format in amateurish ways. The "Halifax school" in Canada was briefly a phenomenon. Representative albums were Love Tara (1993) by Eric's Trip which included Rick White and Julie Doiron and Jale's Dreamcake (1994). The group to emerge from this crowd was Sloan that from the noise-pop hybrid of Smeared (1993) a synthesis of the musical zeitgeist of the time to the Sixties tribute of One Chord To Another (1996) to the pop behemoth Never Hear The End Of It (2006) cultivated a fixation for the most naive form of melody. Switzerland's Sportsguitar. Italy's Uzeda and Germany's Blumfeld were Continental bands influenced by noise-pop. The best one was perhaps Germany's 18th Dye particularly on Tribute To A Bus (1995). Progressive sounds East Coast 1990-96 At the beginning of the 1990s. Phish more than anyone else established alternative rock on mainstream radio. Phish were more than just a surrogate of the Grateful Dead for the 1990s. They legitimized a return to the aesthetics of progressive-rock particularly on the East Coast. Blues Traveler were a simpler domestic rootsy version of Phish. Blues Traveler (1990) offered a judicious mixture of ballads and jams and the band would eventually match and surpass Phish's commercial success. Motherhead Bug was a bizarre orchestra (accordion trumpet saxophone percussion trombone violin piano) led by multi-instrumentalist David Ouimet that performed soundtracks for imaginary films. Zambodia (1993) was influenced by the music-hall the circus cartoons marching bands nursery rhymes. Sullivan's operettas. It was the equivalent of the Penguin Cafe' Orchestra for the new generation. Their offshoot Sulfur formed by Ouimet and vocalist and keyboardist Michele Amar carried out a similar work of stylistic collage but the mood of Delirium Tremens (1998) was tragic rather than comic and the atmosphere evoked Beckett's absurd theater. The Spin Doctors became stars with the jovial and catchy ditties of Pocket Full Of Kryptonite (1991) that recycled stereotypes of funk soul blues reggae and rock music. One of the leading groups of instrumental neo-prog came out of Boston: Cul De Sac. The lengthy tracks on Ecim (1992) bridged German rock of the 1970s. John Fahey's transcendental folk. Terry Riley's minimalism and Pink Floyd's psychedelic ragas. Their most innovative work. China Gate (1996) increased the doses of jazz and world-music thus achieving both a convoluted and a hypnotic state of mind. The narrative largely revolved around the counterpoint between Robin Amos' atonal synthesizer and Glenn Jones's post-surf guitar. On Crashes To Light (1999) that contrast enhanced with sophisticated arrangements became a slick texture that enhanced the melodic center of mass and even lent the music a spiritual overtone halfway between trance and fairy tale. New York boasted talented and innovative combos that descended from the prog-rock bands of the 1980s. The veterans who ran Run On drummer Rick Brown and bassist Sue Garner of Fish & Roses plus guitarist Alan Licht of Love Child and violin player Katie Gentile showed how prog-rock could yield engaging songs and not only difficult constructs. Start Packing (1996) was a festival of instrumental lunacy brainy hypnosis eccentric arrangements and lightweight cacophony that mostly stuck to the format of the pop song. The oneiric folk-rock of No Way (1997) inconspicuously raised on acid-rock and Indian music homaged the classics (Bob Dylan. Lou Reed. Neil Young) while steering away from classic rock. Nothing in these albums was obvious. Every note was where it was because "that" was not where it should have been if one were a traditional composer. Brown and Garner's vision of music was a place where we should (obviously) all have been but have never even dreamed of being. Still (1999) credited to Garner and Brown was de facto a late addition to the Run On canon. One of the most eccentric musicians of his time. Dave Soldier (the violinist of the renown Soldier String Quartet) organized the Thai Elephant Orchestra (2001) an ensemble of elephants playing large custom-made instruments and performing their own improvisations and some compositions by Soldier and others. He also organized the Tangerine Awkestra (2000) a vocal ensemble of schoolchildren performing free improvisation. Noise-punk-jazz 1992-95 God Is My Co-pilot inherited Half Japanese's miniaturized dementia. I Am Not This Body (1992) packed 34 brief childish dissonant pieces that parodied all sorts of genres. Their chaotic approach bordered on free-jazz cacophony and on party music for a madhouse. In San Francisco the Molecules formed by former Rat At Rat R guitarist Ron Anderson had already done something similar on Steel Toe (1991). Ditto for Love Child in New York and their Witchcraft (1992). God Is My Co-pilot's idea was pursued by Spiny Anteaters in Canada with the goofy amateurish Last Supper (1998). Outhouse in Seattle for example on Process Of Elimination (1998). Blowhole also in Seattle and featuring Amy Denio on Gathering (1995). Harry Pussy in Florida with Ride A Dove (1996) and many others. Chicago's Flying Luttenbachers the quintet of drummer Weasel Walter (the only stable member) saxophonists Chad Organ and Ken Vandermark trombonist/bassist Jeb Bishop guitarist Dylan Posa explored the punk-funk-jazz-rock fusion pioneered by the Pop Group and the Contortions as well as the epileptic noise-jazz of John Zorn on Constructive Deconstruction (1994) and Destroy All Music (1995). A new line-up recorded the even more spastic and chaotic Revenge (1996) the six-movement suite Gods Of Chaos (1998) and the free-jazz chamber music for cello trumpet clarinet violin and percussion of The Truth Is A Fucking Lie (1999) while Walter alone penned the delirious Rise Of The Iridescent Behemoth off Systems Emerge From Complete Disorder (2003). Chicago's Scissor Girls led by keyboardist Azita Youssefi and drummer Heather Melowicz devoted We People Space With Phantoms (1996) to a schizoid (and largely improvised) form of punk funk and electronic music. Boston's Debris were a punk-jazz outfit featuring horn players next to a power-rock trio and improvising chaotic jams in the vein of Frank Zappa and Henry Cow on Terre Haute (1993). Virginia 1992-96During the 1990s progressive-rock staged a come-back (although it had never truly disappeared) and mainly in the USA. Throughout the decade. Virginia and the Washington area were the epicenter with bands such as Echolyn whose Suffocating The Bloom (1992) contained the 11-movement suite A Suite For The Everyman and Boud Deun whose best album was probably Astronomy Made Easy (1997). They were typical of the genre derivative of the Canterbury school and of King Crimson. The most creative group was perhaps Bill Kellum's Rake. After the two lengthy improvisations of Rake Is My Co-Pilot (1994) that evoked a demented form of free-jazz rather than conventional prog-rock. Rake indulged in The Art Ensemble Of Rake (1995) four lengthy suites that ran the gamut from minimalistic repetition to distorted guitar workouts to blues bacchanals to bubbling Moogs to ghostly ambience. Intelligence Agent (1996) betrayed the band's stylistic debts towards Pink Floyd. Jimi Hendrix. Mahavishnu Orchestra and Can. On the other hand the most successful Virginia act was the racially integrated Dave Matthews Band whose collections such as Under The Table And Dreaming (1994) offered a sophisticated blend of jazz-rock world music folk and rhythm'n'blues. Solo 1990-95 More spices were added to the progressive-rock scene by New York-based instrumental virtuosos. Marc Ribot who had played with the Lounge Lizards. John Zorn. Tom Waits and the Jazz Passengers demonstrated his fluid style capable of bridging cacophony and melody in a smooth and swinging manner on Rootless Cosmopolitan (1990) featuring jazz masters Don Byron on clarinet and Anthony Coleman on keyboards and one of the few albums to evoke Peter Green's End Of The Game. Ribot followed that achievement with the minimalist noir jazz of Requiem For What's His Name (1992) and the relentless sonic (and frequently dissonant) assault of Shrek (1994). Nicky Skopelitis who had played with Anton Fier. Bill Laswell and Sonny Sharrock concocted a subtle form of ethnic funk-rock orchestrated for small multi-national ensembles on Next To Nothing (1989) and Ekstasis (1993) the latter featuring bassist Jah Wobble and Can's drummer Jaki Liebezeit. Blind Idiot God's guitarist Andy Hawkins penned the four abstract extended improvisations of Azonic Halo (1994) at the border between free jazz heavy metal and droning music. Buckethead. Brian Carroll's extravagant project specialized in a goofy fusion of heavy-metal funk and psychedelic music which he administered on Frank Zappa-esque concept albums devoted to cyberpunk themes such as Bucketheadland (1992) and Dreamatorium (1994) credited to Death Cube K. His best album. Day Of The Robot (1996) marked a more serious exploration of ambient and dance music. Despite a hiatus as Guns N' Roses' guitarist. Buckethead continued to reshape his futuristic funk-metal fusion on albums such as Monsters And Robots (1999). Cuckoo Clocks Of Hell (2004). Island Of Lost Minds (2004). Kaleidoscalp (2006). A unique case. Loren Mazzacane Connors devoted his career to a solo instrumental music that transcended stylistic boundaries particularly when it crafted abstract country/blues/gospel/folk meditations on Come Night (1991) and Evangeline (1998). A spectral purer zen-like quality amid a John Fahey fixation characterized the more ambitious multi-part suites of The Little Match Girl (2001) and Sails (2006). Just like in the previous decade a number of Frank Zappa alumni launched solo careers based on unique (and uniquely iconoclastic) styles. Ant-Bee. Billy James' project was responsible for one of the most crazed albums of the decade. Pure Electric Honey (1990) that wed Brian Wilson's flair for eccentric arrangements with Frank Zappa's passion for deviant dynamics and mixed up the result with techniques borrowed from musique concrete and psychedelic freak-outs. Lunar Muzak (1997) that collected veterans of the Mothers Of Invention (Bunk Gardner. Don Preston. Jimmy Carl Black). Gong (including Daevid Allen himself). Alice Cooper and Hawkwind (Harvey Bainbridge) was another madhouse party. The compositions of Mike Keneally whether the sprawling ones on Hat (1994) or the microscopic ones on Boil That Dust Speck (1995) whether the poppy ditties of Sluggo! (1997) his best album or the all-instrumental tracks of Nonkertompf (1999) sounded like sprightly fragments of rock operas. Gary Lucas was instead a veteran of Captain Beefheart's band. The swirling cyclical structures of Skeleton At The Feast (1991) overflew with otherworldly guitar inventions. Run On's guitarist Alan Licht concentrated on anarchic and dadaist noise with the lengthy improvisations of Sink The Aging Process (1994). Rabbi Sky (1999) and Plays Well (2001). King Crimson's bassist Tony Levin fused world-music and chamber jazz on World Diary (1995). Former Frank Zappa's and Missing Persons' drummer Terry Bozzio lived several lives in parallel performing solo drum improvisations such as the ones on Drawing the Circle (1998) as well as composing surreal symphonic music worthy of his master notably the two Chamberworks (1998) for drums and orchestra. Thinking Plague's guitarist Bob Drake recorded highly original instrumental albums of avantgarde roots-music: What Day Is It (1993) a post-modernist deconstruction of country cliches; Little Black Train (1996) a reckless venture into progressive bluegrass; Animal Medallion Carpet (1999) a wild ride down the dark but fascinating alleys of a very perverted musical mind one that evoked the lunacy of the Residents and of the Holy Modal Rounders; and The Skull Mailbox (2001) which focused on pop melody but Drake had enough imagination and enough perversion to turn each melody into a musical nonsense. West Coast 1990-91 Mixing demented novelty tunes and goofy instrumental workouts. San Francisco's Primus seemed to emulate Frank Zappa's versatile and iconoclastic irreverence. Frizzle Fry (1990) was typical of their capricious art: like an amusement park it was a combination of rollercoaster rides comedy shows relaxing strolls and childish games. The changes in speed mood and fashion were as abrupt as virtuoso thanks to the inventions of bassist Les Claypool (one of the all-time greats) to the quirkiness of former Possessed guitarist Larry Lalonde and to the monumental support of drummer Tim Alexander. King Crimson-ian instrumental convolution was offset by funny lyrics and a self-demystifying attitude. The intellectual puzzles became popular songs on Sailing The Seas Of Cheese (1991) and Pork Soda (1993) when the fusion of heavy-metal funk jazz and music-hall reached an almost mechanical efficiency. The trio's sonic exploration in Tales From The Punchbowl (1995) was more adventurous but also highlighted the limits of the pop format. Faith No More-associates Mr Bungle were inspired by Frank Zappa and George Clinton on their debut. Mr Bungle (1991). Seattle-based multi-instrumentalist Amy Denio led and collaborated to a number of bizarre jazz-rock projects in the vein of the Canterbury school notably the Tone Dogs whose Ankety Low Day (1990) was a quirky flight of the imagination and Degenerate Art Ensemble that straddled the line between jazz classical and rock. Tongues (1993) set forth her ambitious program of deconstruction of world folk music that can evoke Pere Ubu's abstract sonatas for accordion and synthesizer as well as Dario Fo's onomatopoeic theater. This led to a string of albums culminating in The Danubians (2000) that were dominated by Denio's bizarre phonetic wordplay and by her spirited accordion playing. With these works she proved to be a devil of a composer of an arranger of a performer and of a conductor. The same scene spawned Portland's Caveman Shoestore a guitar-less trio formed by vocalist and keyboardist Elaine DiFalco and by veteran jazz players Fred Chalenor (bass) and Henry Franzoni (drums). Their Master Cylinder (1992) ran the gamut from pop melody to Soft Machine-esque jazz-rock to dadaistic cacophony to Art Bears-esque lieder. The Thessalonians based in San Francisco and featuring percussionist Larry Thrasher guitarist David James and keyboardists Kim Cascone. Don Falcone and Paul Neyrinck performed live improvisations for electronic and acoustic instruments documented on Soulcraft (1993) that were the ultimate cybernetic-psychedelic ragas. Falcone's own Melting Euphoria were disciples of the Ozric Tentacles' cosmic-progressive rock. Zazen (formed by four veterans) added Eastern overtones to the style of Yes and Genesis on Mystery School (1991). International progressive 1992-96 In France. Philharmonie experimented with the unusual format of a guitar trio particularly on Les Elephantes Carillonneurs (1993). The creative and unorthodox aesthetics of the Canterbury school was revived by Xaal a French instrumental progressive trio whose most ambitious work was Second Ere (1995); while Volapuk continued the neoclassical school of Art Zoyd and Univers Zero with albums such as Slang (1997). Tear Of A Doll featuring guitarist Francois L'Homer fused progressive-rock punk-rock jazz exotica and noise on Tear Of A Doll (1996). Later Francois L'Homer relocated to Burma and started Naing Naing a project devoted to "music without instrument" as demonstrated on Toothbrush Fever (2004) for natural sounds computer and studio mixer. In Canada. Slow Loris' The Ten Commandments And Two Territories (1996) straddled the border between free-jazz and acid-rock. Sweden continued to enjoy a fertile progressive scene. For example. In The Labyrinth i e. Peter Lindahl blended neoclassical and ethnic music on The Garden Of Mysteries (1994). In Japan. Happy Family betrayed the influence of King Crimson. Frank Zappa. Magma and Univers Zero on their second album. Toscco (1997); while Koenjihyakkei the Magma-inspired side-project of Ruins' mastermind Tatsuya Yoshida eventually achieved a baroque complexity on Angherr Shisspa (2005). In Britain saxophonist Kevin Martin launched a number of projects that explored the unlikely marriage of jazz industrial dub and punk-rock. The three lengthy jams of Possession (1992) and especially the chaotic nightmares of The Anatomy Of Addiction (1994) both credited to God (1) were relatively old-fashioned excursions in mood reconnaissance and neurotic stream of consciousness; but Techno Animal a collaboration with Godflesh's guitarist Justin Broadrick unleashed the destructive force of Ghosts (1990) a meeting of Foetus. Karlheinz Stockhausen and Anthony Braxton and one of the most powerful works of its time; a vision that was matched by the brutal and visceral sound of Under The Skin (1993) credited to Ice. Techno Animal's Re-Entry (1995) instead delved into the claustrophobic darkness of ambient dub summoning the likes of Jon Hassell. Bill Laswell and Brian Eno. Tapping The Conversation (1997) a collaboration between Kevin Martin and Dave Cochrane credited to Bug crafted an obsessive sense of fear through a psychophysical torture of extreme hip-hop and dub deconstruction. Roger Eno attempted a music at the border between classical jazz and prog-rock with the ensemble Channel Light Vessel (featuring Kate St John. Bill Nelson. Laraaji. Mayumi Tachibana) on Automatic (1994) and Excellent Spirits (1996). Italian-Swiss guitarist Luigi Archetti debuted with the brief demential/dissonant guitar vignettes of Das Ohr (1993) and Adrenalin (1994) in the vein of Fred Frith but matured with Cubic Yellow (1999) that added sampling electronics and drum machines to Archetti's eclectic and surreal guitar soundscapes. After the electronic vignettes in the droning/microtonal style of Transient Places (2004). Archetti gave his most abstract and intense works. Februar (2005) an atonal "concrete" symphony in 14 movements. After 1991 when the Berlin wall fell. Eastern Europe developed a very creative brand of rock music often indebted towards the local folk traditions and often looking to the avantgarde. Uz Isme Doma in the Czech Republic were perhaps the most adventurous with their progressive-rock performed with punk-rock fury that freely mixed cabaret folk noise ethnic classical and dance music on albums such as In the Middle of Words (1990). Babel 1996-98 Towards the end of the decade the Babel of progressive-rock multiplied. In Boston. Bright's Bright (1996) bridged Cul De Sac and shoegazing. In Florida. Meringue mixed the verve and imagination of Frank Zappa. Captain Beefheart and Gong on the monumental Music From The Mint Green Nest (1996); while Obliterati's Havy Baubaus Inflience (1998) sounded like a meeting of the Art Bears and the Contortions. Ohio's Witch Hazel the project of multi-instrumentalist Kevin Coral indulged in a poppy and baroque form of progressive-rock on Landlocked (1995). An erudite form of instrumental progressive-rock was coined in Boston by Cerberus Shoal. The neoclassical suites of And Farewell To Hightide (1997) and Element Of Structure/ Permanence (1997) particularly Permanence sounded like Grateful Dead's Dark Star performed by a chamber ensemble. Deeper jazz and world-music undercurrents destabilized the two tours de force of Homb (1999) while the pieces on the transitional Crash My Moon Yacht (2000) sounded like collages. Mr Boy Dog (2002) both irriverently amusing and wildly creative in the tradition of Frank Zappa offered sonic charades that mixed Albert Ayler. Nino Rota. Sonic Youth and Pink Floyd while deconstructing world-music funk and free-jazz. The dense orchestration and inventive dynamics capitalized on three decades of progressive-rock. In San Francisco the Tin Hat Trio evoked the Penguin Cafe' Orchestra and the Lounge Lizards on Memory Is An Elephant (1999) with a mixture of tango jazz folk avantgarde and world-music. Helium (2000) was its cerebral counterpart a kaleidoscope of quasi-dissonant jamming pseudo-Balkan frenzy and atonal lounge melodies. Species Being penned the 11-movement suite Yonilicious (1998) an adventurous sonic odyssey through the musical genres. Florida's Big Swifty crafted the austere compositions of Akroasis (1997) around drones a` la LaMonte Young minimalist repetition a` la Terry Riley and microtonal techniques. Post-psychedelia East Coast 1990-96Psychedelic music was the single greatest invention of the 1960s and remained the dominant genre in the 1990s. The 1960s coined a number of psychedelic styles and they were still the basic psychedelic styles of the 1990s: the psychedelic pop of the Doors the psychedelic freak-out of the Red Crayola the psychedelic trance of the Velvet Underground and the acid jam of the Grateful Dead. Among the innovations introduced during the 1980s dream-pop and shoegazing were still popular in the 1990s. Far from merely plagiarizing the classics the most significant bands of the decade contributed to re-define the art of the sonic trip. Mercury Rev originating from upstate New York and featuring John Donahue on guitar and Dave Fridmann on bass achieved a synthesis of historical proportions. Yerself Is Steam (1991) was a psychedelic extravaganza that spanned three decades and three continents. Emotionally it ran the gamut from Red Crayola's anarchic freak-outs to contemplative/meditative ecstases in the vein of new-age music. Technically it blended and alternated pop melody ambient droning mind-boggling distortion oneiric folk martial tempos pastoral passages infernal noise and lyrical lullabies. Far from being merely a nostalgic tribute to an age. Mercury Rev's operation started with the hippie vision of nirvana on the other side of a swirling and chaotic music but tempered the optimism of that program with an awareness of the human condition and poisoned it with fits of neurosis and decadent atmospheres. The fantasies of Boces (1993) were even more variegated and imaginative veritable collages of sonic events. The dense and busy arrangements that owed more and more to Fridmann's command of keyboards and orchestration did not interfere with what was fundamentally a much gentler mood a distant relative of Kevin Ayers' fairy-tales. The progress towards a joyful and serene sound continued on See You On The Other Side (1995) which frequently embraced poppy melodies and facile rhythms whereas Deserter's Songs (1998) marked the zenith of their phantasmagoric orchestrations. Luna formed by Galaxie 500's guitarist and vocalist Dean Wareham. Feelies' drummer Stanley Demeski and Chills' bassist Justin Harwood specialized in shy tender whispered/conversational pop tunes best on Bewitched (1994). Minneapolis' Motion Picture achieved zen-like grandeur with Every Last Romance (1998). In Indiana. Arson Garden sounded like the Jefferson Airplane performing renaissance psalms on Under Towers (1990). Flaming Lips' lunatic pop influenced New Jersey's Tadpoles whose He Fell Into The Sky (1994) matched the demented grandeur of the masters the Wallmen in upstate New York. Jennyanykind in North Carolina. Mark Kramer's school of psychedelic pop continued to yield cauldrons of melodic oddities for example Uncle Wiggly's There Was An Elk (1993). Midwest groups tended to be derivative of 1960s' psychedelic-pop (Electric Prunes. Strawberry Alarm Clock. Blues Magoos) and garage-rock (13th Floor Elevator. Seeds). Notable albums of this kind were: Green Machine's King Mover (1993) in Minnesota; Outrageous Cherry's Outrageous Cherry (1994) in Michigan; Trunk Federation's The Infamous Hamburger Transfer (1996) in Arizona. Original Sins' bizarre leader. John Terlesky created one of the most irrational corpus of music ever recorded under the moniker Brother J. T. Albums such as Vibrolux (1994) and Music For The Other Head (1996) conceived composition as an utter mess. Mostly his "songs" were a hysterical rambling over cacophonous imitations of rock'n'roll. The longer tracks sounded like hippie music of the Sixties sucked chewed and defecated by a psychedelic black-hole. It was a (hazy incoherent deranged) mental state not an art. Rhode Island's Space Needle featuring keyboardist Jud Ehrbar were responsible for the titanic nonsense of Voyager (1996) an amateurish work that relished technological primitivism and mystical noise. The no less cryptic hodgepodge of The Moray Eels Eat The Space Needle (1997) indulged in instrumental prog-rock jamming ambient ballads and shoegazing ecstasy. West Coast 1992-96Medicine formed in Los Angeles by Brad Laner ex-Savage Republic's drummer but now on guitars and keyboards delivered Shot Forth Self Living (1992) a therapeutic shock that owed both to My Bloody Valentine and to Sonic Youth. Trance and noise were also the pillars of follow-up The Buried Life (1993). Seattle's Sky Cries Mary which had adopted an eclectic fusion of jazz funk world-music and acid-rock on the EP Exit At The Axis (1992) converted to hippie/new-age spirituality with A Return To The Inner Experience (1993) which blended Klaus Schulze's cosmic music. David Byrne's African polyrhythms and Nico's catatonic ballads thereby coining an anti-rethoric form of psychedelia one that was more an ambience than an ideology. Their masterpiece. This Timeless Turning (1994) focused on the intersection between early Pink Floyd and dance music but hip-hop beats. Hendrix-ian riffs industrial tornados and ancestral rites percolated through the loose flaccid lattice. Both the hippies' philosophy and sound reincarnated in a bizarre San Francisco project. Anton Newcombe's Brian Jonestown Massacre. Despite the clumsy recording quality and the amateurish stance. Methodrone (1995) and Their Satanic Majesties' Second Request (1996) were monumental encyclopedias of psychedelic music from the Jefferson Airplane to Hawkwind from the Rolling Stones to the Velvet Underground. Subsequent albums alternated between superbly derivative such as Take It From The Man (1996) and Give It Back (1997) majestically musical such as Thank God For Mental Illness (1996) arranged with a wealth of instruments and dreamy/melancholy such as Strung Out In Heaven (1998). Newcombe mostly followed in the footsteps of deranged street folksingers like David Peel but his naif folly could also explode in noise collages. Quasi formed in Oregon by Donner Party's guitarist and Heatmiser's bassist Sam Coomes specialized in applying old-fashioned and frequently out-of-tune keyboards to catchy pop tunes for example on Early Recordings (1995). Oregon's most hyped band of the 1990s the Dandy Warhols managed to fuse Brit-pop and the Velvet Underground on Dandys Rules OK (1995) but then sold out to generic power-pop with Come Down (1997) and Thirteen Tales From Urban Bohemia (2000). The dominant styles of the 1980s and 1990s were still being revised but the well was clearly drying up. American shoegazing 1992-96 The influence of My Bloody Valentine and of the whole "shoegazing" movement became pervasive in America from 1992 on. Notable among the early albums of the genre were Fudge's The Ferocious Rhythm Of Previse Laziness (1992) in Virginia and Drop Nineteens's Delaware (1992) in Boston. Pennsylvania's Lilys evolved from the quiet transcendental bliss of In The Presence Of Nothing (1992) to the dilated majestic amorphous melodies of Eccsame The Photon Band (1995). Boston's Swirlies added mellotron. Moog and found noises to the guitar tremolos of Blondertongue Audiobaton (1993). Chicago's Catherine bridged shoegazing and grunge on Sorry (1994). New York's Saturnine 60 sculpted languid ballads that soared with epically distorted apotheoses on Wreck At Pillar Point (1995). New Jersey's Lenola expanded the genre both forward in terms of structure and backwards in term of melody on The Last Ten Feet Of The Suicide Mile (1996). So did Georgia's Seely on Julie Only (1996). New York's Bowery Electric after the embryonic Bowery Electric (1995) a collection of lengthy guitar drones enhanced their trance with dub reverbs sampler loops drum-machines on Beat (1996). Kansas' Shallow enhanced shoegazing with quasi-orchestral arrangements of flute dulcimer piano organ and cello besides loops and samples on High Flyin' Kid Stuff (1997). New Jersey's Flowchart wed My Bloody Valentine's droning symphonies and Enya's magical fairy tales on Cumulus Mood Twang (1998). Beyond space-rock 1992-95 By fusing the extreme styles of psychedelia that favored the extended free-form jam (acid-rock space-rock raga-rock) over the oddly-arranged tune a number of groups sculpted epic sonic endeavors. Lenghty and mostly improvised space jams took up ambitious albums such as: Fuzzhead's Mind Soup (1993) from Ohio; Lorelei's Everyone Must Touch The Stove (1996) from Virginia: Temple Of Bon Matin (1)'s Bullet Into Mesmer's Brain (1997) from Pennsylvania; etc. Crawlspace the creature of Indiana-via-L. A singer Eddie Flowers produced works such as Sphereality (1992) and The Exquisite Fucking Beauty (1995) both anarchic and erudite that went even further into the formulation of psychedelic free-jazz. Mooseheart Faith formed by the Angry Samoans' bassist Todd Homer (now on autoharp) and (black) guitarist Larry Robinson squeezed the entire psychedelic vocabulary (from space-rock rave-ups to dilated ballads from catchy ditties to abstract electronic passages) into Magic Square of the Sun (1991). A group of Los Angeles musicians straddled the line between industrial music and acid-rock and produced intriguing works such as Pressurehed's Sudden Vertigo (1994) featuring vocalist Tommy Grenas and keyboardist Len Del Rio the Anubian Lights' The Eternal Sky (1995) featuring Del Rio and Farflung's 25,000 Feet Per Second (1995) featuring Tommy Grenas. Michigan had one of the most fertile scenes. Fuxa whose Very Well Organized (1996) harked back to both German avant-rock of the 1970s and Spacemen 3's shoegazing psychedelia. So did Medusa Cyclone the new project by Viv Akauldren's keyboardist Keir McDonald on their debut album. Medusa Cyclone (1996). Asha Vida's Nature's Clumsy Hand (1998) stretched as far as to free-jazz and musique concrete. Gravitarwere the noisiest of the bunch and one of the noisiest groups of all times. Chinga Su Corazon (1993) and Gravitar (1995) totally improvised were maelstroms of cacophony. Truculent rock'n'roll progressions built thick walls of noise. Each piece (especially on the second album) was a symphony of spectral dissonances harking back to Throbbing Gristle's macabre "industrial" rituals. Gravitar had endowed Lou Reed's Metal Machine Music with a rhythm. Now The Road Of Knives (1997) featuring a new guitarist brought a bit of structure in their abominable chaos revealing Chrome and Jimi Hendrix as the band's role models. Chicago's Sabalon Glitz led by keyboardist Chris Holmes and vocalist Carla Bruce offered a more electronic version of Hawkwind's space-rock on Ufonic (1994). Oregon's King Black Acid And The Womb Star Orchestra crafted some of the most eclectic encyclopedic and exhilarating space jams on Womb Star Sessions (1995). Pelt in Virginia further experimented on the format with Brown Cyclopedia (1995) a studio-savvy cross between Royal Trux's Twin Infinitive. Sonic Youth's Daydream Nation the Velvet Underground's White Light White Heat and Pink Floyd's Ummagumma. The free-form instrumentals of Burning Filament Rockets (1996) and Max Meadows (1997) that merged mind-bending psychedelic distortions and mind-opening world instrumentation the three epic tracks of Techeod (1998) that obviously homaged minimalism and free-jazz and the colossal title track from Empty Bell Ringing In The Sky (1999) led to the tour de force of Ayahuasca (2001) whose "ragas" defined a post-psychedelic and post-ambient music bridging John Fahey. Grateful Dead. Ravi Shankar and LaMonte Young. Connecticut's Primordial Undermind evolved from the garage-rock of Yet More Wonders Of The Invisible World (1995) and the space ballads of You And Me And The Continuum (1998) to the Hawkwind-style jams of Universe I've Got (1999) and the free-form space-rock of Beings Of Game P-U (2001) two albums which rank among the most "cosmic" and transcendental of the time. New York's Escapade performed all-instrumental music straddling the line between kraut-rock hyper-psychedelia and progressive-rock. The three lengthy acid jams of Searching For The Elusive Rainbow (1996) and the two epic-length excursions of Inner Translucence (1997) led to Citrus Cloud Cover (1998) containing the 30-minute The Sunlight a tour of the force within the tour de force and the best formulation of their conflagration of free-jazz and avantgarde electronic music. Towering over every other space-rock band of the era. Philadelphia-based Bardo Pond (12) turned the acid-rock jam into a major art. Bufo Alvarius (1995) coined a new form of music built around supersonic drones. The average piece was a rainstorm of guitar distortions strident turbulences and catastrophic drumming halfway between MC5's heavy blues and Spacemen 3's shoegazing. It was the soundtrack of a cosmic trauma that still haunts the firmament. While no less brutal. Amanita (1996) revealed a spiritual element that harked back to both Popol Vuh's Hosianna Mantra and Pink Floyd's A Saucerful of Secrets; but nothing could be less religious than the apocalyptic chaos of Lapsed (1997). These albums were as musical as Einstein's relativity. The members of Bardo Pond (guitarists John and Michael Gibbons drummer Joe Culver bassist Clint Takeda) also shone on two magnificent collaborations with guitarist Roy Montgomery both credited to Hash Jar Tempo. Well Oiled (1997) and Under Glass (1999). The former a seven-movement instrumental jam is a cosmic hymn of monumental proportions the psychedelic equivalent of a symphonic mass. Guitars compete for and concur to a universal "om" first running against each other battling for the highest form of enlightenment and then joining together in unison. The music emerges from spacetime warps propelled by seismic rhythms only to delve into deeper and deeper abysses hypnotized by an unspeakable force. The second album was even more experimental less dependent on guitars and explicitly inspired by classical music. It alternated between glacial imposing structures and chaotic noise collages reconciling Wagner and Amon Duul. Verdi and Hawkwind. Bach and Red Crayola. Texas 1990-95 By far the most active scene was in Texas. Texas psychedelia had been the craziest since the 1960s and it claimed again that supremacy in the 1990s led of course by the achievements of the Butthole Surfers. Except that during the 1990s this school diverged from punk-rock and moved towards a more experimental form of music hardly "rock" at all. Spearheading the renaissance were severely irrational Butthole-ian bands. If possible. Ed Hall even increased the psychedelic-madness quotient of the Butthole Surfers beginning with the repellent bacchanals and hallucinations of Albert (1988). At the least they grotesquely increased volume and speed on their classic Love Poke Here (1990) a gargantuan shameless blunder that evoked Captain Beefheart's blues voodoo exorcisms drunk cowboys' hoedowns. Jimi Hendrix breakneck hardcore and redneck boogie. Gloryhole (1991) was the punk equivalent of Beckett's absurd theater. The slightly more serious (at times even melodramatic) Motherscratcher (1993) and the slightly better structured (at times even linear) La-La-Land (1995) were also their densest stews of heretical sonic events. The Cherubs a spin-off of Ed Hall added sampling dissonance and hard-rock riffs to Ed Hall's already explosive mix particularly on second album Heroin Man (1994). ST 37 instead followed in the footsteps of lysergic cosmic couriers a` la Hawkwind on albums such as Glare (1995). Other notable works of Texas' virulent strain of psychedelia included: Bag's Midnight Juice (1991). Lithium Xmas's Helldorado (1994). Brutal Juice's Mutilation (1995). The hynpotic transcendental form of acid-rock was also popular in Texas. 7% Solution (1) gave more melodic and dynamic depth to the drone-driven ambient psychedelia of the shoegazers on All About Satellites And Spaceships (1996). Furry Things crafted the feedback-driven trance of The Big Saturday Illusion (1995) at the intersection of prog-rock ambient music and acid jams. Its "songs" were grotesque deconstructions of rock'n'roll that twitched under clouds of swirling drones. Two schools stood up among the various psychedelic acts of Texas one based in Houston and one based in Dallas. The Houston school was the more conventional of the two. Mike Gunn displayed a morbid fascination with Black Sabbath and Jimi Hendrix on Hemp For Victory (1991) and capitalized on it for the slow-motion ragas of their most original work. Almaron (1993). Mike Gunn's bassist Scott Grimm became Dunlavy devoted to instrumental space-rock; while Mike Gunn's guitarist Tom Carter started Charalambides who experimented with deranged ballads bizarre samples guitar freak-outs and tape manipulation on the 100-minute cassette Our Bed Is Green (1992) and especially the double record Market Square (1995). The monolithic psychological explorations of Joy Shapes (2004) recorded by a trio of guitarists even ventured into avantgarde music and free-jazz. Pared down to the duo of Christina and Tom Carter. Charalambides eventually achieved the naked melodic quintessence of A Vintage Burden (2006) that almost sounded like the negation of their original "acid" program. Linus Pauling Quartet who originated from the same proto-group as Mike Gunn filled Immortal Classics Chinese Music (1995) with languid whacky ballads a` la Flaming Lips but the extended jams Improvise Now (1996) and The Great Singularity off their best album. Killing You With Rock (1998) aligned them with the boldest sonic surgeons of their era. A completely different route was followed in Dallas. The Vas Deferens Organization or VDO founded by New Orleans-natives Matt Castille and Eric Lumbleau highlighted the link between psychedelic culture and the century-old cultures of dadaism and futurism. They specialized in a form of narrative nonsense for electronics and percussions that relied on a vast sonic puzzle. The three mad suites of Transcontinental Conspiracy (1996) featuring Medicine's guitarist Brad Laner fluctuated between the most childish compositions of Frank Zappa and the most daring pieces of the classical avantgarde. Saturation (1996) combined the Mahavishnu Orchestra's wild jazz-rock with Terry Riley's keyboards-driven minimalism musique concrete with raga. Abandoning the reckless frenzy of those early works the five compositions on Zyzzybaloubah (1997) flew with more aplomb displaying a brainy pretentious attitude where merry pranksters used to play. The VDO tribe spawned countless projects. Matt Castille recorded a lengthy suite of psychedelic excesses on Muz (1998). Eric Lumbleau formed Sound (USA) and recorded the audio montage of Drunk On Confusion (1999) worthy of Frank Zappa's most amusing and iconoclastic moments. Mazinga Phaser assembled the unfocused collages of Cruising In The Neon Glories (1996) by juxtaposing chamber music elegiac bebop gothic dub space soul ethereal bossanova and discordant drums'n'bass. Scott Sutton vented his Jimi Hendrix fixation on Late Nite Songs (1996) as J. Bone Cro and his Syd Barrett fixation on Owners Manual (1997) as Jaloppy. Further emancipating themselves from the stereotype. Ohm a keyboards-bass-clarinet trio composed ethnic and electronic music on O2 (1997). Texas had its share of conventional psychedelic poppers (Flowerhead. Starfish. Monroe Mustang ) but their feeble melodies paled compared with the bolder acts. The notable exception was Sixteen Deluxe with Backfeedmagnetbabe (1995). San Francisco's noise psychedelia 1991-96 Mason Jones is a San Francisco-based guru of noisy post-psychedelic post-ambient post-cosmic and post-industrial music. His manifestos were the first two collections of experiments released under the moniker Trance. Automatism (1991) and particularly Audiography (1993) whose compositions range from symphonic movement to ethnic watercolor. The formidable wall of noise of Delicate Membrane (1996) began the saga of Jones' Subarachnoid Space featuring Melynda Jackson on guitar. The pieces were fully improvised the sound was majestic and the mood ranged from suspenseful trance to sheer horror. Ether Or (1997) showed that the distance between their therapeutic mayhems and free-jazz was negligible. The idea was further refined on Almost Invisible (1997) a massive hodgepodge of astral chaos frantic ragas oceanic psalms and abstract soundpainting that represented an ideal soundtrack for the marriage of heaven and hell. Jones had virtually resurrected early Pink Floyd and provided their biography with an alternative ending: a terrible mutation of A Saucerful Of Secrets rather than Dark Side Of The Moon. Endless Renovation (1998) their first studio recording and a more sophisticated variant on that idea (that quoted casually from Frank Zappa. Terry Riley or Colosseum) and The Sleeping Sickness (1999) a collaboration with the Walking Timebombs (the Pain Teens' Scott Ayers) simply increased the stylistic confusion around Jones' and Jackson's wild guitar distortions. Mandible Chatter unleashed Helios Creed-ian guitar fury on the black mass Serenade For Anton (1992) before turning to sound manipulation on Hair Hair Lock & Lore (1994). Guitarists Steven Smith and Glenn Donaldson focused on free-form instrumental psychedelia with Mirza's mini-album Ursa Minor (1996). In addition. Steven Smith released several solo works of eerie instrumental pieces created via a process of gradual composition from Gehenna Belvedere (1996) to Tableland (2000) to Lineaments (2002). Those dense and meticulous blends of ancient modern acoustic electric western and ethnic instruments reenacted Smith's private ghosts the primordial spleen that was the undercurrent of his avantgarde projects (the abstract and cacophonous Thuja the pan-ethnic Hala Strana). Six Organs of Admittance the project of acoustic guitarist Ben Chasny coined a psychedelic form of Sandy Bull's and John Fahey's western ragas with east-west meditations such as Sum of All Heaven off Six Organs of Admittance (1998) and VIII off For Octavio Paz (2003). The golden age of British psychedelia The golden age of British psychedelia was not the 1960s: it was the 1990s. Never had England witnessed such a deluge of psychedelic bands. The scene of raves created an inexhaustible demand for drug-induced drug-related and drug-facilitating music. The poppy version of psychedelia (the one that wrapped facile melodies in eccentric arrangements) went hand in hand with the booming phenomenon of Brit-pop: the Telescopes's Taste (1989) a more robust version of shoegazing; the Inspiral Carpets who focused on the nostalgic Farfisa-driven sound on The Beast Inside (1991); Verve's A Storm In Heaven (1993) which predated their world-wide hit Bitter Sweet Symphony (1997); Sundial's Reflecter (1992) a bridge between California's Paisley Underground and British shoegazers; the Auteurs's New Wave (1993) a nostalgic tribute to the hippie era; Whipping Boy's Heartworm (1995) in Ireland a work drenched in neoclassical melancholy; Kula Shaker's derivative but exuberant K (1996). Plus Jellyfish Kiss the Dylans. Jack. Freed Unit etc etc. What was truly remarkable about these bands is how derivative and predictable they could sound. A more sophisticated form of psychedelic pop song was devised by Curve whose Doppelganger (1992) aimed for a lush catchy and dance-oriented form of dream-pop; the Cranberries an Irish band whose No Need To Argue (1994) was an album of desolate lullabies propelled by the operatic guttural and melismatic vocals of Dolores O'Riordan; Rollerskate Skinny also from Ireland who were among the few bands to match the soulful madness of Mercury Rev on Shoulder Voices (1993); and Scotland's Beta Band whose first two EPs. Champion Versions (1997) and The Patty Patty Sound (1998) were devoted to intense sound sculpting and disco-oriented shoegazing. In Belgium dEUS crafted the eclectic and baroque Worst Case Scenario (1994). The hippie spirit and their favorite style raga-rock was resurrected by Gorky's Zygotic Mynci particularly with the eccentric Tatay (1994) which Euros "Childs" Rowlands's keyboards and John Lawrence's guitar turned into alternatively a poppier Incredible String Band a less caustic Bonzo Band or a more bizarre Brian Wilson. The latter's orchestrations would provide the inspiration for the more conventional Barafundle (1997) and Gorky 5 (1998). Far less successful commercially although far more creative in Britain was the noisy and free-form version of psychedelia that wed Hawkwind's space-rock and early Pink Floyd's interstellar ragas. Porcupine Tree the project of guitarist Steven Wilson went through three stages. Initially. On The Sunday Of Life (1992) sounded like a compendium of Pink Floyd-ian sounds from Syd
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