Psychic Temple

★★★★ Houses Of The Holy JOYFUL NOISE. DL/LP Long Beach psych-jazz outlier’s magnum opus – not a Led Zep tribute. A studio auteur with a bulging old-school Rolodex and a vision that straddles jazz, psych, Californian pop and more, Psychic Temple major domo Chris Schlarb’s ambition has long outstripped his success. On his sixth PT album, though, his conceptual audacity reaches a new high. Each of Houses Of The Holy’s four vinyl sides feature a radically different band configuration: the raggedy, beatnik-country session with indie types Cherry Glazerr that kicks things off is sweet, but relatively slight. Side two ramps up affairs, enlisting post-jazzers the Chicago Underground Trio and strings to track Schlarb’s singer-songwriter meditations. Side three is a monster, as Paisley Underground vets The Dream Syndicate are folded into Schlarb’s band – check the Crazy Horse firestorm of On The Slide. But even that’s topped by side four, a cosmic jazz extravaganza fronted by LA rapper Xololanxinxo that roughly resembles a daisyage Rotary Connection. Quite a trip all round.