The Fast Camels

Crashing in on a wave of psychedelia, The Fast Camels proudly wave their freak flag high. This album is unashamedly steeped in sixties acid music, mainly of the American variety but with a healthy dose of British freakbeat thrown in for good measure. This type of revival has of course been attempted several times before with varying degrees of success (or lack of). For every Robyn Hitchcock there are several Doctor and the Medics. So it's with a sigh of relief that one can report that The Camels pass the acid test with only a few could do better comments.

Guitar driven, the templates are primarily Love, The Byrds, Barrett's Floyd and the UK Kaleidoscope. There is precious little whimsy here, the band attack the songs with gusto, creating waves of sound which are well produced, thick and full bodied. All written by guitarists, Drew Sturgeon and Mark O'Connor (with drummer Stephen Mors and Bassist Marc Vallely getting one cowrite each), the songs for the most part are able to stand in their own right, well apart from being merely pastiche. Starting with ?50 Things on your Mind?, disembodied voices lead into an Arthur Lee guitar riff that captures his trippy punk flamenco blend. The lyrics are spot on, a lysergic search through the singer's thoughts, staring at the sun, looking at the sky to find the answers. A very strong start. Released as a single, the next track, ?Like a magic Optician? is perhaps the albums most immediately appealing song. The spirit of Syd Barrett is invoked as the usual suspects (gnomes, magical shops, and fish) are caught up in a romp through toytown psychedelia with a rousing guitar solo and a tremendous middle eight. There is nothing to compare with these two songs on the rest of the album but there are several contenders. ?Comforting things? uses what seems like backward tracking to create a sense of dislocation in the music. ?Can you see me? is an urgent Byrdsian rush that would sit well on Fifth Dimension with a crazed, fuzzed guitar part. ?Privately Insane? returns to that part of the band that belongs to Arthur Lee with his deceptive use of seemingly innocent sunny melody and harmonies camouflaging a darker tale. The following ?Gone? almost acts as a coda with more Lee type stylings on guitar while the lyrics could be construed as an epitaph for both Lee and Barrett. Indeed the whole album can be seen as a hymn to those departed psychedelic seers. The Fast camels have picked up the baton and it will be interesting to see if they can carry it further. Duke Dali - Crookedrain