Fred Laird's psychedelic travelogue based on travels in Morocco, China, Eastern Europe and Bacup.

Taras Bulba was formed in the winter of 2019 by Fred Laird and Jon Blacow. Taking a new direction from their last musical outfit Earthling Society, the duo embarked on an inner space mission for new age ideas, rhythmic mantras, ambient landscapes and creative micro dosing.

Recorded between September 2018 to May 2019 on home recording equipment in different houses and any empty space large enough for a drum kit. A laptop dying with over worked CPU and amps so broken that the only alternative was to record straight into the desk. Working to a true DIY ethic like some paranoid Philip K.Dick character with a tin foil antenna; piecing together tracks created out of the ether like satellite messages from some imaginary planet.

Taras Bulba – 1 is a pot-pouri of Eastern/ Asian sounds, Krautrock Rhythms, ambient landscapes, psychedelic blues and Orb inspired dub. Taking influences from Midori Takada, Tony Scott, CAN, Neu!, 6 organs of Admittance, The Orb and the soundtracks of David Lynch and Angelo Badalamenti.


credits
releases September 13, 2019

Fred Laird - Guitars,Bass, Harmonizer, Alesis Synth, Recorder, Kalimba, vocals, Tibetan Bells, Hammer and Bolster.

Jon Blacow - Drums, electric and acoustic percussion. LP conga and Djembe.

Mike Blatchford - Sax on The Neon Midnight.


Reviews

For some idea of what to expect from Taras Bulba, you may do well to seek out the recordings of Popol Vuh. That mix of electronic sounds and found sounds, mixed in with a displaced ambience is best heard on ‘Moroccan Waves’ which works on a repetitive eastern tinged riff, before dissolving in a haze of disembodiment and displacement. This is one of the more straightforward tracks on this album too, and the adventurous listener will certainly find more to stir the investigative mind.
The key to enjoying this album is being able to settle into the more introspective moments such as ‘On Mt Kailash’. Once you can do this, a whole world opens up before you as each track becomes an experiential journey into the inner space of your mind. The thudding drone of ‘I Had U Nuit’ provides some emergency as it develops into an enticing exploration of guitar driven space rock before developing into an explosion of trance like melodies, almost akin to Future Sound Of London. It’s an intriguing mix, and plays into the space between all those influences that Laird and Blacow have ever pulled from.
‘Rising Lazarus Blues’ takes another approach in that it delves deep into a kind of gospel blues psych. Whilst this is in no way something totally original, the way in which the track turns upon its head at the halfway point into an elegiac lift up into the heavens is something rather special. Even more interesting is the monotone acoustic picking of ‘The Neon Midnight’, which completes its reverential drone in a flurry of dissolving sounds. It almost makes the start of ‘The Yo-Yo Man’ sound tacked on just for alleviation’s sake.
That alleviation fear soon wears off as you realise that here we have the epicentre of the album with a track which on the surface may sound like one of those trance hippy style anthems you may have found at the bottom end of a field in Glastonbury, but once you explore deeper, understand a deeper fluidity between musical styles and influences that seeps into the crevasses of the track. By the time the titular Yo-Yo Man comes in within the vocals, you are one of the faceless dancing souls, thrusting your hands to the sky.
This emotion is kept going on ‘Goin’ West’ albeit in much shorter style which leaves you gagging for more. By providing a less is more approach, Laird and Blacow have opened up a whole world of possibilities with their new approach to music. Indeed, just by playing back England Have My Bones after one listen to this album, you can hear a progression beyond any kind of norm. Earthling Society had their day, and with it came one of the more interesting excursions for psych travellers, but with Taras Bulba they go further out and further in than they have ever gone before. A mindfuck of an album, which also allows for a complete reassessment of all the music that Laird and Blacow have created before.

Echoes and Dust

‘One’ was recorded between September 2018 and May 2019 in various places on home recording equipment. This nomadic recording process is also reflected in the rich diversity of influences from musical styles, traditions, countries and cultures to be heard and enjoyed in the Taras Bulba sound.
The record starts with ‘Hashish’ and the sound of an unwinding, densely layered dream state raga that also has echoes of traditional European folk in its claustrophobic eastern tinged psychedelia. It’s a wonderful atmospheric opener to draw the listener into the world of Taras Bulba. ‘Moroccan Waves’ follows and is in essence a folk dance with a meaty riff propelled by the heavy and hearty beat of Jon Blacow’s drums. It once again creates a hybrid of Eastern desert ambience with hints of European folk melodies. Fred Laird’s joyful electric guitar solo dances through a hazy soup of desert sound occasionally accompanied by high pitched and dramatic synthesised strings. The final third of the track is a strummed acoustic section with recorder floating over the jaunty melody. There are hints of Plant and Page’s more adventurous moments and strong desert blues influences at play but also the folk fusion sensibility of the Incredible String Band to bring it all together into a coherent and original piece of music.
With ‘On Mt. Kailash’ we move to more ambient territory and a much more contemplative sound that recalls Popol Vuh and other Kosmische pioneers. It has a spare and meditative beauty after which the direction of travel once again changes with ‘I Hadit, U Nuit’, a joyful space rocker built on shuffling jazzy rhythms, tense drones and a soaring guitar solo. There is an echo of ambient or triphop/dance music in the repeating keyboard motif that emerges through the track which somehow manages to remain distinct in the eye of the storm. ‘Rising Lazarus Blues’ is a lengthy track of two halves. It starts as an acoustic blues with a lonesome wailing vocal and an almost dirge like rhythm before a blissful Kosmische guitar and keyboards section takes the mood to a higher, ecstatic place. ‘The Neon Midnight’ returns to a darker, mysterious, avant garde ‘thriller noir’ sound with its picked acoustic motif, sax notes, squalls of noise and music box/Eastern percussion working in a cinematic harmony. With another distinct change of direction we get ‘The YO-YO Man’ where avant funk rhythms and basslines put down a fine groove and underpin an improvised fusion of synth and guitar sounds flying in all directions, barely held together by a repeating chanted vocal of the title. It’s different to anything else on the record but none the worse for that. To end we get ‘Goin’ West’ which returns to a more atmospheric Kosmische informed sound but takes it to a different place with a subtle dub undercurrent in the mix.
This is a wonderful record that really delivers a melting pot of sounds with great intelligence, invention and style. Each play brings something new and rewarding to the experience and is a rich, exotic and occasionally ecstatic listening pleasure. I recommend it to your ears very highly.


Terrascope