Aural Fixations

LIQUID VISIONS
From the Cube
(Fünfundvierzig)
Psychedelic rock has always functioned as an underground movement; music that deliberately pushes the envelope of convention (however one defines that) is willfully uncommercial, so the masses remain oblivious. Occasionally, though, a worthy band escapes even the attention of the cognescenti—such seems to be the case for Liquid Visions. The Berlin-based quintet even has the advantage of being from a country well known for its psychedelic figures, unless you don't count internationally respected artists like Can, Kraftwerk and Faust as psychedelia. Liquid Visions has little in common with those notables, though. Instead, the fivesome is strictly traditional in its approach (as much as there is tradition in psych circles), relying on hazy, melodic, guitar-based songs with introspective lyrics couched in cosmic terms. From the Cube, the band's third album, is hardly a radical construct; longtime fans of psychedelic rock will immediately feel comfortable in these surroundings. Which isn't to say that this is a prosaic, by-the-numbers record, either. Liquid Visions obviously loves what it does, and does it extremely well. "Moonspell," "Out of This Room" and "What It Is" are wonderfully catchy slices of tasty psych rock pie, with tight harmonies, excellent guitar work and lyrics like "But it's the colour of green that makes the colour of red/And it's the colour of life that makes the colour of death." Singers/guitarists HP Ringholz and Kiryk Drewinski are more concerned with what it means "To Be Real" than with cosmic hippie jive—how many other psych bands do you know who would sing "Let me bring you down to earth again/There's no secret information?" The band wouldn't have the right to call itself psychedelic if it didn't have at least one acid rock epic; the atmospheric, 14-minute "Pink Cloud" and the bruising nine-minute "Ebola Monster" not only fit the bill, but do so with class and style—no meandering bullshit here. Liquid Visions may not be flying an original freak flag, but it's a colorful one that should be a signpost for any psych fan with taste. Michael Toland