PSYCHEDELIC PROG

Take a trip with ROB HUGHES as he seeks out the latest mind-expanding music.

Multi-instrumentalist Jarrod Gosling is best known as one half of both I Monster and Cobalt Chapel, but Regal Worm is very much a solo enterprise.

The Hideous Goblink (Quatermass), the Sheffield operator’s fourth album, is a feast of analogue goodness, layered with vintage organs, Mellotron, guitars, found sounds and more. The cantering Action By HAVOC and Underground Comix make for thrilling modernist space rock, while his Cobalt Chapel partner Cecilia Fage handles vocals and choral arrangements on post-Goblin hyper-suite Pollinators.

Californian trio La Luz are on their fourth release too. La Luz (Hardly Art) is the best yet from songwriter/guitarist Shana Cleveland, bassist Lena Simon and keyboardist Alice Sandahl. Its captivating blend of cosmic folk pop and languorous psychedelia, lightly dusted in reverb, comes with woozy harmonies and renewed dynamics. Watching Cartoons and the pulsating In The Pines are terrific, though the real keeper is the majestic

Goodbye Ghost.

As indicated by the title of their debut album Let The Festivities Begin! (City Slang), Los Bitchos are party starters with a real kick. The quartet hail from London, Australia, Sweden and Uruguay, their fizzy instrumentals pulling from twangy surfrock, exotica, Eastern psychedelia, calypso and Latino funk. Produced by Franz Ferdinand’s Alex Kapranos in Phil Manzanera’s studio, it’s enthralling stuff, from the ringing The Link Is About To Die

to the punchier, fuzz-tripping Lindsay Goes To Mykonos, based on Lindsay Lohan’s decision to open a luxury Greek island hotel.

New York-based Latinx quartet Combo Chimbita take their cue from the Afro-futurist aesthetic of Sun Ra to fashion their own distinct brand of tropical wonder. Latest effort Ire (ANTI-) finds Carolina Oliveros (vocals, guacharaca), Niño Lento es Fuego (guitar), Prince of Queens (bass, synths) and Dilemastronauta (drums) addressing cultural legacy, identity and spiritualism against a rich backdrop of Latin-American rhythms and psych-funk bliss. Babalawo and De Frente,

in particularly, are revelatory.

Brazilian twosome Atalhos are a little more chilled. A Tentação Do Fracasso

(Costa Futuro), translation: ‘The Temptation of Failure’, is an immersive journey into chiming dreampop. Gabriel Soares and Conrado Passarelli cite War On Drugs and Wilco as chief inspirations, but there are also strong flavours of 80s neo-psych in their swirling sound, filtered through waves of tropicália. At times they sound like Caetano Veoloso channelling The Dukes Of Stratosphear.

And for those who prefer something heavier, Sweden’s

Sleepwulf aim to conquer with proto-doom distortion on

Sunbeams Curl (Heavy Psych Sounds).

Riffs and stoner grooves dominate as the quartet examine ancient mysticism and occultist philosophy, with songs such as

Sex Magic Manifestation and the frankly unstoppable Toad Licker Mushroom Picker.