Purgatory reviews...

(like we care a pig's rear end)

I found one review so far, an another one was sent to me by Andy Hawkesworth (thanks man!). Any more stuff... let me know: pepyn@geocities.com!

Hailing from West-Virginia, Karma To Burn made quite a name for themselves over the last few years. They had a desperate sound, a scream for help. A unique sound too. Off course, some Kyuss here and there, some southern rock, but they were a psychedelic band, no doubt about it.

Yes, they were, because the long awaited new album "Wild Wonderfull Purgatory" is a little bit different than their nameless debut. The dark, melancholic, spiritual feel of that album has moved for a more rocked out variation. They also threw out vocalist J. Jarosz and drummer Nicholas, who’s replaced by Rob. No more dark, strange, intense songs like "Mt. Penetrator" or "Playboy Pallbearers", just plain hardrock ( "Twenty-eight"), stonerrock ("Twenty-six") and even some southern rock influences, like the guitar riff in "Twenty-five".

The last four songs are known from their first album, but here in a slightly different version, and instrumental. Highlights on "Wild Wonderfull Purgatory" are opener "Twenty" and the epic "Thirty-one", while songs like "Thirty" and "Twenty-nine" keep rocking big time.

I can’t really give you a comparison, but who needs one? This is Karma To Burn. Slightly different than before, and now all instrumental. Guitarist Will doesn’t really fill up the gaps created by losing the vocals, so it sounds a bit the same overall. This is not bad, though. Here’s a band that says 'fuck you' to everyone who expected something different and they just do their own thing.

And they do it well. Killer riffs in "Twenty" and "Twenty-nine", not as dark as on their last album, but they rock heavier. Where Karma To Burn once was a psychedelic rockband, I think you can skip the word psychedelic now. Not really music to smoke on, but more an album to dance to, with a big bucket of beer in your hand. "Wild Wonderfull Purgatory" is an album full of hard rocking songs, that should be played at maxium overdrive, so eventually nothing has changed at all because it’s all about the rock!

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    published somewhere in summer 1999
    info missing... hehehe... oops
So the stubborn and headstrong Karma To Burn finally get their own way and release the instrumental album they always envisaged. They don't like vocals and frankly, they don't need them. Their music speaks loudly and whispers seductively enough that any lyrical caterwauling would bog down them down, effectively stifling the creative meanderings found here.

Their rock-heavy instrumentals are not sullied or trivialised to distraction, as there is only the complex interaction of just the bass, guitar and drum to carry the whole album through every twist and turn. Admittedly, it's hard to keep abreast of the tracks here as they have named every piece by a number instead of a song title - this isn't the first time they've played this game but this just ultimately forces the listener to simply sit back and suck it all in.

There's an abundance of precision-perfect stop/start moments - big fat pregnant pauses that echo in the empty silence before the pulse of the music's heart begins pumping again. Their Southern influence and homegrown roots in West Virginia appear as rippling fleeting sensations, casual callers like ZZ Top and Lynyrd Skynyrd dropping in at various points in the proceedings. It's an album of many flavours, designed to absorb and ponder. The pulsating soundscape effectively conjuring ever changing snapshot images of seedy skid row locales, neon-lit juke joints and lonely cruises down deserted strips of highway - the variety and abundance only limited by the listener's own imagination.

[8] MARION GARDEN

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This page was edited by Pepijn Klaassen
last update: 7th october 1999 		Another
thingie again!