Though admittedly the paradigm has shifted somewhat in the era of social media word-of-mouth, manipulable algorithms and so on, Polish heavy, like that of Greece, Ukraine and to a lesser extent Italy, has never seemed to carry the same respect in the greater continental sphere as bands from, say, Germany, Sweden, or the UK. I won’t claim to understand centuries of European tribal politics — and oh the war drums beat again — but such outright discrimination is only to the detriment of all. And again, that’s lessened over recent years, but in some cases there is still a sense of isolation, parallel perhaps to American views of bands from Mexico or Canada, both nations with vital undergrounds.
One could go on at length about the rigors of geopolitical relations as regards fuzzed out rock and roll, doom, and other sundry weighted sounds, but the thing is, with a mind toward Polish heavy, I put on Krapkowice-based four-piece Andromeda Space Ritual‘s All Shades of Perception when I started writing this, and I’m afraid my brain has melted. I can feel it quietly leaking out of my left ear as I slightly tilt my head in that direction to account for how I’m sitting on the couch with my legs folded under me and in the quiet of the early morning, I can’t say I regret either the inevitable cleanup — that extra roll of paper towels is gonna get put to work, I guess — or the liquefication of my train of thought.
Indeed, I’d much rather take out the ol’ stationary and send Andromeda Space Ritual‘s Kamil Lasonczyk a personal thank you note for ‘dat bass’ throughout the album. The crowded Euro underground — Northern, Southern, Eastern, Western — is not at all short on heavy psychedelic rock, but All Shades of Perception stands out in no small part because of the prominence of low end and the creativity of the play there in kind with the keyboards and synth of Dominik Spasówka, the guitar of Marcin Bis — which isn’t necessarily de-emphasized, but able to lead or recede in the well-balanced mix — and Mariusz Łyżwa‘s drums. Indeed, where more jam-minded fare is often held together by the drums, sometimes in what feels like endlessly looping progressions, in 15-minute opener and longest track (immediate points) “Signs of the Unseen” and along with the early, vaguely Eastern-tinged echoing howls of centerpiece 
“Relay,” Lasonczyk is doing the word of uniting the melody and rhythm, bringing the songs coherence they’d otherwise be very much lacking.
Released in June 2020 through Galactic SmokeHouse, the five-song/44-minute instrumentalist offering is cosmic in its sense of reach and ability to cast an atmosphere. The band bills it as their first full-length following 2017’s four-tracker Satellite, and if one considers All Shades of Perception as a debut release, its patience is all the more impressive. Toward the end of “Relay,” even as the guitar reaches outward toward My Sleeping Karma-style contemplation, bolstered in doing so by the weaving lines of keys, the vibe is particularly resonant in a way that, while shorter, feels like it’s building on the slower and languid soloing in the second half of “Signs of the Unseen,” the two tracks separated by the sub-four-minute “Lazarus,” a piece that would seem to be entirely synth-based (there may be some guitar effects in there, etc.) and intended as a bridge between the longer songs that’s more substantial than an interlude or at very least more hypnotic. That, too, could be the idea.
The structure of All Shades of Perception works along those lines, longer song, shorter, longer, shorter, longer, with the digipak edition of the album available from the label its only physical release to date, allowing for an entirely linear experience to which the flow is excellently suited. That is to say, while one could split sides A and B between “Lazarus” and “Relay” and I’m sure give vinyl psych heads a platter worthy of their various social-sharable photoshoots (nothing against them), the direct-from-one-end-to-the-other approach has its own rewards when it comes to listening. “Bullet Cluster” (6:41) follows “Relay” and holds a tense undercurrent in its first couple minutes, subtly telegraphing the surge to come at the 2:30 mark introduced by — naturally — the bassline as the full meditative lumber takes hold, shades of a fleshed-out Om taking the foreground backed by the steady tap of snare and the crashing cymbals. Guitar and bass are both exploring, and the vibe is almost improvised feeling, but there’s too much of an awareness of where they’re headed for it not to be plotted, the comedown before the five-minute mark leading to a second crescendo before the last keyboard drama — Wendy Carlos walks by and waves, carrying a beat up LP of the A Clockwork Orange soundtrack — before the near silence at the outset of 10-minute closer “Telepath” sets the foundation for its own movement.
For being five minutes shorter, “Telepath” is no less immersive than was “Signs of the Unseen” — or “Lazarus,” or “Relay” or “Bullet Cluster,” for that matter — as it works on a singular, patiently executed linear pattern, marked out by some more angular turns than have come before and a right-out-the-airlock spacey midsection of punchy noodling, but the end result is righteously fluid and settles itself in its final minutes on a throne of tonal substance, the guitar, bass and keys meeting in a way worthy of the far-off thudding drums backing them. It comes apart with a last crash and residual noise in a way that feels purposefully unplanned, but however much off-the-cuff it may or may not be, it hints at a spontaneity under the surface in what Andromeda Space Ritual do and is a welcome last-minute manifestation of the ‘ritual’ in their name.
To answer the question you didn’t ask, no, I don’t think I’ll miss my brain. Looking down at the puddle of goo that once held the noncorporeal essence of myself — the ‘me’ I think of as me — I’ll probably just scoop it up and shove it back in my ear, hope for the best. Fingers crossed, and such. And much respect for Polish heavy.
As always, I hope you enjoy. Thanks for reading.
—
By the early afternoon yesterday I was so tired I wanted to cry. The entire week was exhausting, and I slept late yesterday — until about 6:30AM, though doing so involved shutting off my alarm twice — but I’d gotten up before 4AM on Wednesday and a better night’s sleep obviously had not been enough. It’s 6:30 now too. My alarm went off at 5 o’clock so I could get up and write this before The Pecan was really kicking. I see him on the monitor, he’s awake. He hides in his blanket when he gets up now, as a game. When you go upstairs you say, “What is this lump? I remember putting a sweet kid to bed,” and then he uncovers himself and it’s a big reveal. Dude is big on repetitive play. We do this daily.
He was back to school this week, which was fine. We had a good week last week with him home but I think by the end he was ready for something else, so school is that. This week was kind of bumpier. I’ll ask him a question and he just ignores me, and last night at bedtime I don’t even remember why — I think I was putting away a toy — he started in both punching and biting me and I just took him upstairs and instead of closing out the usual bedtime routine just shut the door and left him there. He cried for a couple minutes and I came back downstairs and as usual The Patient Mrs. was like ‘you’re a terrible person’ without saying it out loud in her “I have WASP roots in Connecticut kind of way — which is lovely — and I went back upstairs and talked to him for a while. He asked why he didn’t have grandpas, so I sang him “Dear Prudence” and then talked about The Patient Mrs.’ dead father and my dead father for a while. Covid and a fall, respectively, if you’re curious.
The latter was interesting because The Pecan made the connection entirely on his own between his fall down stairs and cracked skull and my father’s — a connection I hadn’t previously made. He said “he got a big bonk” and I said “yes, much bigger than yours and he didn’t recover.” The kid is too smart for his own good. ALSO too smart for my good. I will cry when he moves across the country and abandons us here in this house.
Errands today. Shopping. Maybe Costco? I don’t know. I’m so out of it I might just be inclined to take him to a park and let him run it out, despite the fact that it’s been obnoxiously cold here all week. Just cold enough to make me want to hunker down. Cold enough that waiting for his bus in the morning has been an extra pain in the ass. We’ll see I guess. I tried to get him to watch A Hard Day’s Night yesterday but he wasn’t feeling it because it’s something different, plus he knows there’s a bus in Magical Mystery Tour — which is otherwise horrifying to a small child, mind you — and even the train in black and white doesn’t seem to be enough to persuade him away from that. Maybe I’ll put on the Yellow Submarine cartoon and just scar him for life. He can write an Obelisk Questionnaire someday about how his first musical memory was seeing Yellow Submarine at four years old and having nightmares forever about it.
There’s a Gimme show today. 5PM. All requests again. The playlist should be up by now, so thanks if you tune in. It’s a good show, as much as I can take responsibility for it.
Thanks for reading. Have a great and safe weekend. Watch your head, drink a gallon of water. I’m back on Monday and will be around in the interim working on whatnot.
FRM.