Anthroprophh

Gonna lock in for this week before I make any end of year judgements because there’s still a lot of heard fought music coming out. Case in point; this absolute burner from psych veterans Anthroprophh. The band, an offshoot of Bristol legends The Heads with the band’s Paul Allen at the wheel, has long been hovering in an afterburner bliss of noise-addled psych. Their latest, a split between Cardinal Fuzz and Feeding Tube, doesn’t disappoint in that regard. The record launches itself into the higher reaches of the atmosphere pretty much immediately with the 16 1/2 minute opener “German Oak” with leads the listener on a journey through an amplifier acid bath of guitar scorch that’s admittedly also laced in thick plumes of venomous smoke. Guessing that title is an homage to the ’70s German Progressives of the same name, and its a pretty nice homage in that regard.

The song doesn’t play into riffs so much as it unhinges from the universal need for tether — free jam sonic curdle at its best. The second side plays out over four additional pieces that take the temperature down quite a few degrees, preferring to work through meditative creep, cosmic float, field recording ambience, and even some acoustic tangle. It’s a varied player that shows all sides of the band’s influences without losing the thread. It seems that while broken into four tracks, the second sweep is more of a suite of songs that melt together into a soft-touch counterpoint to the first side’s charred ruins ravaging. The record is out now and any Heads fans already know they need to get this one on the shelf. UK psych folding in a full array of past obsessions for a new era.

Support the artist. Buy it HERE.