ARABS IN ASPIC
Progeria/ Far Out In Aradabia/ Strange Frame Of Mind KARISMA
Early doors splurge from Norway’s prog preservers.
Veterans of the Norwegian prog scene, Arabs In Aspic have opened the vaults and given their first three records a fresh polish. Compared to its successors, 2003’s debut EP Progeria has a few tentative and uncertain moments, as if the band were still searching for that sweet spot between nostalgia and ingenuity. The languorous, three-part ramble of Shelob’s Cave veers from ponderous, low-key verses to choruses underpinned by thunderous, Sabbathfuelled riffing, and Arabs In Aspic briefly sound as if they’re torn between going full prog or just being a slightly trippy stoner doom band. The organdrenched melodrama of closer Megalodon is much more effective and, when it needs to be, as knowingly brutish as mid-70s Van der Graaf.
From then on, the Norwegians have seldom put a foot wrong: 2004’s Far Out In Aradabia showcased the fine-tuning of their analogue-loving bombast, while repeatedly veering into eccentric psychedelic territory that its creators’ audibly relished. Like a turbocharged Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci, the Arabs struck lysergic gold on the uplifting Hair Of
The Sun, while closing Butterpriest Jam reworked the band’s early meanderings as a focused yet freewheeling space rock ritual.
Strange Frame Of Mind from 2010 is the shiniest gem here, however. With enhanced sonic values, but still with the omnipresent hiss and buzz of analogue gear and occasional bursts of neanderthal riffing, songs like Flying Norseman and Mørket were sharper, catchier and yet considerably more inventive than anything that had gone before. From the title track’s bucolic dreaminess to the surging blues-psych of Have You Ever Seen The Rain Pt 2, it was the sound of a band truly hitting their stride.
Although since outstripped by recent triumphs like last year’s Madness And Magic, Strange Frame Of Mind proved that Arabs In Aspic were equipped for the long haul and every bit as inspired as the prog gods who paved the way.