“A timid comeback? What the heck! This is Binar and its world and Mushroom Vimana is loaded of their madness”
1 Delayed Orders 17:20 2 Prangfoo Vindaloo 14:07 3 Psychotic Samosa 14:22 4 Electribe Sag 7:39 5 Floatylite 7:37 6 Afterfloater 3:54 7 Vimanarama 11:25 Andy Pickford Music
(DDL 76:27) (V.F.) (Endgland School, ambient beats)
As soon as we hear these dark breezes shadowed by voices and rustles of goats, these noises came from beyond the grave and these electronic distortions which have as equivalence only the blue smoke stemming out from psychotic clouds; the imprint Binar is back. Delayed Orders extricates itself from this ambiosonic decoration with pulsations which spit cracklings and which move a cloud of puny sequences of which the jumps in the shadow weave a delicate melodic approach. The chirpings of these sequences are melting to some ringings which illuminate a dense cloud of Mellotron fog. The atmospheres are loaded of chloroform and the rhythm is charmingly mesmerizing. Andy Pickford loosens his chords of electronic guitar while that slowly Delayed Orders is untying a structure of a little bit bumpy down-tempo where the vapors of the England School, moderated in an ambient progressive approach a la Pink Floyd, for the keyboard which does very Rick Wright, continue to enclose these always ambient beatings of Delayed Orders. The Pickford/Nagle duet lies down little by little his electronic painting which will be of used as anchoring to the next 60 minutes of MUSHROOM VIMANA; a comeback album after a hiatus of nearly 10 years of those boys who has marked the imagination of more than a fan of the England School.
Improvised, and doubtless practiced in the den of their excess, MUSHROOM VIMANA was recorded during the performance of Binar at the Awakenings Festival in July 2015 in front of a crowd of empty chairs in delirious, dixit the Bandcamp site of Andy Pickford. And the least we can say is that the enigmatic duet always manages to harmonize the creative madness of its two creators in a sound mosaic which starts again more or less where Spindragons has left the adventure. In the sense that the rhythms are mainly tempered by dense clouds of atmospheres and in the sense that the movements of sequences bicker between rhythmic or melodic avenues. In fact, Andy Pickford and Paul Nagle have quieted down. But the music, their madness his always there. They are always very imaginative, but they traded their suits of electronic rockers in order to lead us towards more ethereal banks. On a very soft rhythm, a rhythm skipping on a meshing of jumping pulsations and of sober percussions, Prangfoo Vindaloo offers us a superb serenade strummed in an electronic envelope which spits its poisons of the discord around the 7th minute with sibylline harmonies. Harmonies which swirl loops on a structure became less clement of the sweetness of the electronic piano by restructuring its approach with sequences which jump up randomly in a pouch which will always remain prisoner of its electronic atmospheres. Waves of wandering harmonies fill up one finale which drives us towards Psychotic Samosa. That will have taken 30 minutes of ambiences and of charms of the ambient beats before that Binar decides to feed ears, always on the alert, of this armada of rhythms which will always remain so difficult to seize than to describe. The sequences are lively and are sculpted in the impatience with filaments which swirl in these delicious Binar moods. The laconic pulsations invite their stoical beatings in this swirling dance, amplifying a static rhythm which adorns itself of the tinglings of the cymbals. A cloud of Mellotron wraps this unreal dance that some jingles fatten with an object of hearing seduction. The pulsations become heavier, livelier. And the beat takes off! It's heavy and infectious. Blue clouds are swirling all around, as well as these faded voices and these percussions of which the echoes resound constantly, while that Andy Pickford is tricking our ears with solos of a guitar which are shaped in the secrets of his synth.
This is some great e-rock filled with the pastiches of Krautrock. Psychotic Samosa runs away towards the delicious Electribe Sag and its structure which limps such as a wounded horse and which scampers awkwardly in the ornamentation of disaster of which surrounds the universe of Binar and where the wall here ooze of lamentations. The trot accelerates and we guess a series of sequenced keys falling to pieces. They get loose in order to crumble a structure which nests in a mysticism amplified by a finale loaded of clashing tones. These deformed sonic clouds are watering the introduction of Floatylite and its onset of rhythm which harmonizes its jumping crystal-clear sequences with a thick cloud of quirky electronic tones. An incredible troop of sequences runs away, like a herd of wild horses, and skip in the electronic plains where a keyboard a la Rick Wright establishes a climate of serenity, the other hillside of Floatylite. Short but lively and heavy, Afterfloater pulses ardently into an electronic decoration fed of strata mummified by orchestrations and by an impressive wall of very symbolic Binar style electronic fog which have undoubtedly set the fire to this troop of empty chairs and which stuffed an EM always imagined in the complex visionary corridors of Paul Nagle and Andy Pickford. Vimanarama is a bonus track which was also recorded during an improvisation session of the duet Pickford/Nagle. The imprint is the same that the one in this Awakenings concert with a rhythm which jumps in the resounding waves of the symmetric pulsations to which are added some slamming percussions. The shadows of very ghostly synth solos around while Andy Pickford's false guitar floods our ears of very ethereal solos. The rhythm becomes livelier and more incisive but always stays without secondary road. A vision which could doubtless annoy the non-initiated to the Binar magic who does a shy comeback I have to say but a retour which aims my expectations because Binar never made things like others and it's the nature of its charms. And this MUSHROOM VIMANA is full of those! I just wish that we won't have to wait another 10 years before having some other goodies from these wild and creative men.
Sylvain Lupari (December 19th, 2015) *****
Available at Andy Pickford Bandcamp
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