Smokin: Sirius Matter

Never say never in prog rock. Members of Smokin’ Granny were once in a promising but little-known, prog fusion group called Freehand that had to evolve. You can hear that history clearly in “Toad Pizza” and the 7:19 “Moveable Feast”. Todd Barbee, saxophonist and WX7 midi wind instrument, Jeffrey Damon Lindsey on drums and percussion, and Brian Preston on basses have come a long, strange way. With them now jams David Oskardmay on guitar & effects. Both Steve Hatch, (ex-Volare, current Matter Eater), and John Heitzenrater appear, torturing electric guitars into flagrant anarchies. Heitzenrater does bassoon too. “Neural Pulse . . .” wins my vote as most impressive overall cut. It runs a full 9:25. It had a certain Volare air about it.

What you have here is four-layer-cake CD release, deeply sampling Smokin’ Granny’s 1997 cassette-only release. Six more tracks of studio-polished and various live-in-studio jams were added. A must-have, if ya dig electrified Lost Tribe, Steve Coleman sax syncopation, King Crimsonoid crunch, funkified craziness, and bizarre sonic snippets. This is jazz-prog-fusion, funk rock. I dare you to enter this twisted maze of sonic graffiti on a runaway train of mad musings. Groovy things are slammin’ and slidin’ in this weird world of a Sirius Matter.

Reprinted with the permission of John Collinge and Progression Magazine .