It's understandable why so many FSOL fans (self included) would be initially put off by this album, especially considering the time span between this & the previous one. But take a little time to look into what happened to the guys & the reality check they underwent. This is a beautiful album once you get past the unfamiliarity.
FSOL's "Lifeforms" is one of my favorite electronic records. If there was any electronic band that could turn out a great psychedelic album, I would've thought it would be them. Here they prove me wrong. All the psychedelic elements are only on the surface - mellotrons, wah wah guitars, sitars, & reverb. They're mostly dressing on top of some pretty weak songs. The best song is "The Mellow Hippo Disco Show" which appears several times across the two albums. To hear an electronic band doing pyschedelia right, check out "The Last Man to Fly" by The Tear Garden.
How they managed the leap from 'Dead Cities' to this raised on Pro Tools cut & paste hippy, drippy mess is beyond me. Take a pass...
...if you like prog/psych more than you do electronic dance music, you just might like this album! The Amorphous Androgynous material shines, especially when put into context, like they did with their "A Monstrous Psychedelic Bubble Vol. 1" compilation album.
Mello Hippo Disco Sucko! Amorphous Androgynous "Tales of Ephidrena" is one of Electronica's best albums. This is one of the worst. Not sure what happened but FSOL started making HORRIBLE music. Dead Cities was their last quality output. The Isness, The Otherness, Strawberry who knows what. Wretched. If you like FSOL get the Archives and Accelerator and the Papua New Guinea EPS/Remixes and steer away from this hippy crap.
The AMG review by "John Bush" for this album was clearly plagiarized from the "allmusic" source that the reviewer below linked to. Shame on John Bush (and therefore emusic) for ripping off the work of others! And I thought this site was all about legitimacy...
What happened to the group that made 'Dead Cities'? This stuff is mostly awful, I wish I had not downloaded it. I don't buy the prog rock references for one second, this isn't prog, it's crap. Frankly eMusic, whoever edited the AMG review to remove all the negative (truthful) comments is a manipulative dickwad. [url=http://wm04.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:djfwxqq0ldte] Here is the real review[/url]
yuck. this album was kind of funny, and it's a bold new direction, but it's pretty awful in comparison to 'dead cities', 'isdn', 'lifeforms', 'accelerator'... not good.
After all of the progressive work and sound of every other FSOL album, this album is a bad lsd trip back to 60's garbage. Can you say "WTF?" What is up with all of the band that were on the forefront of musical creativity, going back to rehash sounds that were done 40 years ago? I could comment more, but it would aggravate my ulcer!
I'll start by saying I love FSOL. I own everything they've done. I ran out to get this record and am wickedly disappointed. It doesn't seem to have the same effort of Dead Cities or my favourite, Lifeforms. Those were albums that seemed like they took months to make. Isness could have been peiced together with bits dropped on the studio floor from their other records. For new FSOL fans, get this record, if nothing else you'll find your way to their much better, spookier, trippier early stuff. For long time fans, move on.
