thirsty-moon.jpg
Thirsty Moon’s second album is definitely titled as risque, mostly due to its title and rather ugly semi-erotic cartoon artwork, but the music proves the title wrong. Lead by the Drogies brothers (I’m serious, check it out for yourself ;-) this psych-jazz-rock septet has a very Krautrock feeling and can be assimilated to Kraan crossing Release Music Orchestra to remain in their German homeland. Indeed, there is a definite spacey-psychey attitude in their music, fitting well the legendary Metronome section of the Brain label. The opening side is a killer with only two lengthy tracks allowing for tons of interplay, solos, plenty of tempo changes and embellishments of all sorts. The 14-min+ Trash Man is really enthralling and suffers no lengths or over-long soloing tirades. The opening I See You was in the same register as well.On the flipside, after the very fusionesque Tune In, we are clearly waiting for the monster 12-min+ title track, which starts out very slowly, almost cosmic, slowly moving across the galaxy, powered by a Fender Rhodes engine to the dissonant, almost free-jazz realm (avoiding its black hole, though ;-) then by activating the saxophone booster gliding and grooving to its great j-r destination. The closing Das Fest is just as beautiful, starting slowly, evolving to a quiet peaceful groove before exiting on a fade-out.One of the better Krautjazz-rock (if you’ll allow me ;-) album around, this easily beats most of Kraan’s works past their debut album and their double live album. I suggest the progheads to start with this album (most of their early ones have just received a remastering, some with bonus tracks) and their debut before eventually heading towards their next album Blitz, which is fairly different. Sean Trane (Hugues Chantraine) PROG REVIEWER