Requiem

The mysterious Swedish psychedelic collective aren't the easiest band to pin down musically, leaping as they do from style to style underneath the psychedelic umbrella. 2014's focused their sprawling approach, which can stray from Afro-pop to Asian folk and all points in between, into something fairly lean and driving. They call 2016's their folk album, and indeed it is more acoustic, but it's also an expansive, mind-expanding trip around the world of music. Utilizing a wide range of instruments, from flutes to pianos to all sorts of drums, chanted lead vocals, and occasional peals of electric guitar, the album is a messy, extroverted explosion of sound. On most tracks, the group set up some kind of groove built around a tightly wound conglomeration of sounds, then spend either a few or quite a few minutes letting it roll along wildly as the musicians add solos and generally let it all hang out. The longer tracks, like "Goatband" or "Goodbye," reach some sort of repetitive nirvana as they go on and on; the shorter tracks often have a blunted hook that the instruments circle around in a frenzy of picking, plucking, bashing, and blowing. The dreamlike "Alarms" and the Middle Eastern psych blowout "Try My Robe" are the best of the latter. Some of the tracks, like "Ubuntu," just drift like untethered balloons as distant voices sing and faraway sounds echo. It's a jovial, welcoming, and globally enriched sound they get on , psychedelic in the best sense of the word, where the music takes you away to someplace unimagined. The colorful textures and lush arrangements are a change of pace. Some fans may miss the heavier guitar attack of , but the band carry off this new approach like the true sonic explorers they are. ~ Tim Sendra