Each week I am going to write a short (under 200 word) review for an album from my collection chosen at random by iTunes. You can expect anything from Slayer to Salmonella Dub to (Ravi) Shankar and that is all part of the fun. Enjoy.
Week 7: Estradasphere – Quadropus (2003)
Country: USA / Experimental, Art Rock, Prog Rock
When it comes to bands bending, breaking, and outright ignoring genre boundaries one tends to thinks of Mr Bungle and the volatile legacy they left behind. Many bands have tried to emulate the erratic stylistic changes they perfected to varying degrees of success. You can count Santa Cruz’s Estradasphere as one of the better ones to follow this lunatic muse. Quadropus is their third album and it covers a breath-taking range of music. It leaps giddily from Arabic jazz (‘Mekapses Yitonisa’) to beat-box dub (‘Dubways’) to mystical prog rock (‘Speck’) to pure white trash thrash metal (‘Bodyslam’). Every song bristles with manic energy, each played like they were a completely different song from the others. On Quadropus they never once repeat themselves. Moments of levity are carefully placed around the album, like the cinematic ‘King Crab Battle’ but even that drops into some seriously dirty lounge funk and down-tuned death metal territory. This album is not for the faint at heart but for those who get a kick out of Mr Bungle maddened modus operandi there is plenty here to love.
Rating: B
For fans of: Mr Bungle, John Zorn, Frank Zappa
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