Some of the best music I have heard in a long, long time......Eddie Ruscha does it again. This music is fresh as can be, heavy use of analogue and dub style production techniques but combined with some extremely cosmic sounds, intricate rhythms, spacey melodies and cutting edge tech sounds and production skills this really is a well put together compilation. To add to that the fact it seems to be sequed and sequenced live or at least comes across with that sort of energy makes it a pleasure to listen to from start to finish. This guy really should be far more well known and gigging all over the planet. He's being doing this sort of thing for almost 20 years.....but a bit of me suspects that 2012 may well be his year! Total genius. 10/10

I was going to begin this brief comment by saying that this is one very under-rated album indeed.....but having had a look at user ratings it seems that everyone who's voted has given it 5/5. So under-rated it isn't. It's just never had the recognition it deserved. A shame really as it's extremely good and quite complex with a vast array of guest musicians. Much like their Blakula! alter ego this album is a trip through a variety of hypnotic grooves that despite being extremely mesmerising are far from simplistic repetitive refrains - layers and textures and instruments float in and out of the mix constantly. A sadly obscure piece of genius. But that's always the way isn't it?

Gothic horror disco!!
This album by Blakula! is like nothing else on Bear Funk. Or any other current label for that matter. Every track is top notch. Not that that helps you, dear reader. Musically we have ten well-sculpted pieces of modern, disco-infused, gothic hypno-funk, where each composition is driven by either dark fuzzy guitars, deep dubby basslines or hypnotic organic rhythms and then layered with eerie noises, creepy synth lines, distorted (disturbing) vocal samples or disjointed pianos to create the feel of an imaginary horror soundtrack mixed with the very best original disco grooves imaginable.
This is the album that JP Massiera would have made as Horrific Child crossed with Les Maledictus Sound were he making music today.
10/10

Where to start.
Well, perhaps I might mention that I've owned this release for a couple of years. I'd heard Warriors, Willy & The Hand Jive etc and I'd also heard that this album was their hidden classic. When I got it I skipped through the tracks unimpressed and the LP sat hidden away in my collection until I decided to sift through my collection and find things to sell in an attempt to prune it. And, yes, you guessed it, I stumbled onto this record once more.
First time around I'd thought it sounded like average cheesy disco fare.
How wrong I was.
This album is a dark masterpiece. Yes, it's disco. But not as we know it. It's got the electronic/psychedelic edge of JP Massiera but instead of blasting off into a world of fantastic outer space this album smashes reality right back in your face.
I mean, by the end of Side 1 we've covered such subject matter as suicide, corpocracy, credit cards, government control, police state, nuclear testing etc etc all supported under a dark, sleazy, electronic cyber-disco soundframe.
By the time we get to side B which begins with Armageddon and rather sick domestic violence I realise the juxtaposition of what is normally such a 'happy' and hedonistic form of music with such dark lyrics is somehow a perfect balance of how things really are. Sugar-coated this is not.
And the best is still to come.
Because by far the most original and amazing track, both lyrically and musically, is Put Yourself In Alpha, a clear reference to escapism via LSD. To go into details would just spoil things for you. Saying that, the lyrics are so distorted through effects you can barely differentiate them from the synths. But who cares what they are saying with music this great?
Go check it out.

A little bit of history: when Gavin was DJing in Glasgow (Scotland) in 1995 he and his girlfriend Araceli stayed with my friend Marcus McNicoll and his girlfriend at the time Rhona Mackenzie. In their bathroom he saw a very odd picture of a crazed looking boy looking back at him. It impressed him so much he asked if he could take it and use it for his next single. It became the cover for Acid Funk. Bet you didn't know that! :)

A very weird track indeed. The "styles" options above are practically useless. Distorted guitars and amazing lyrics and well crazy rhythms make this a very cool and highly original release.

These two men are in a world of their own. In this dreary musical climate that's not a bad thing.

As far removed from 'pop' as you can imagine, their sound is like peyote/mushroom music from the ancients (or is it the future?) grabbed as it flew past whilst the two of them sat at the edge of time and later regurgitated onto disc!

They have a very 'cyber', and conversely very 'tribal' sound. Rhythmic. Cerebral. Physical. Not techno, not breaks, not ambient, not dub, but ALL of these things combined somehow! Their sound is as hard to define as it is TIMELESS.

But what facts are actually known??

Almost all releases are limited.

They literally started the craze for locked grooves when they became known for their trademark 'eternal opsucules' in the early 90s.

Other than that their sound must be tried to experience their world - just to see what I mean.