Sean Trane In the wonderful 70's, when a group wanted to release a double album filled to the brim with music, it didn't have to be jam-packed of tight songs, but it could have some loose jams in different moments. AB's second album is a fairly different beast than its debut, much looser, much more ethnic and much less jazzy.The group was reduced to a sextet but numerous other changes and many guests were invited. Under a gatefold artwork showing amateur but inspired pencil drawings and some more "homemade" features giving the album an unprofessional or amateur look, without this becoming a bad thing. The first disc's opening side seems dedicated to Indian music as both track (amounting to 21 mins+) a much in the Europeans thought they could do it homage as the sitar reigns supreme over harmonium drones. On the flipside there are appears to be some slightly cosmic trends in Jorden, which is slightly odd just preceding the Kelzmer-Gypsy jazz of Charmante Yerevan. The closing lengthy Akreaka II is a slow evolving and enthralling piece, but it ends up too repetitititive.

The second disk starts on Tibetan horns (rightly so as the track is Radio Tibet), but the music evolves much and ends up improvising greatly. Finishing that side is the usual Embryo-sounding Tva Vardlar. The flipside has the gypsy-jazz Jugoslavian Dans, the Indian sitar & tabla music over a flute & piano background, but it's overstaying its welcome by a full two or three minutes. The closing Tva Hundra is a cosmic jam (possibly after an Aurora Borealis, given the electronics tweedlings)

Much less enthralling but at least as adventurous as its forerunner, AB II is not an easy piece to digest, because it tends to fuse different ethnic musical styles together, but ultimately come out only as halfway successful. So while certainly worth a listen, their second album is not really essential and therefore might be only interesting only if you thought their debut superb.

Sean Trane First album of a loose formation (they will never record two albums with the same line-up) that was probably closer to a hippie community that could write some tight songs, but also extended themselves in lengthy jams. Their first album is an excellent example of this as their type of jazz-rock was much laced with ethnic influences that they almost get lost in the confusion and the fusion of their main two musical preoccupations. Their first album received release in 73 with an amusing comic character, probably called Archimedes over a starlit nightsky. The albums starts on three short songs that can have thinking Samla or Zappa, tight little tunes that are actually far away from each other as possible: the opening Det Stog is Samla-type, Kaumba starts on ethnic percussions before veering folk, while Sweet Loves is a delightful track with plenty of sax works driving you to the heart attack as it is so tense. The rest of the opening side is taken by the superb almost 14-minsWago Goreze, a repetitive but slow-evolving and spell-binding track that starts out on a bass line accompanied with diverse chimes , than entering a slow superb sax that comes from behind and gradually takes the spotlight. This track is somewhat reminiscent of Third Ear Band (first period) or Tery Riley (Rainbow in CA) in its glacial climactic best. It is minimalist and trancelike characteristic has two sax hovering in the heavens while the great ethnic percussion instruments keep flowing on the earthian grounds. Outstanding.

The flipside is made of short pieces (max 5 mins but min 0:27") that are spread ovzer a wide musical spectrum: the short Yelir is double flute thing, while Sempokjens is a delightful dual guitar piece that either Phillips or Hackett could've written. Taxar Springa is a mid-eastern sounding based mostly on the use of an oud and one can't help but refer to the European piece just before it. Most of the tracks on side 2 come linked to each other, no intervals separating them. Mister X is a return to Samla/Zappa- type of song starting full out and ending with a good piano break. The unwriteable Sammansmaltning is a return to the lengthy epic on the first side, although its not quite as repetitive, but just as spellbinding with its dual sax attack. Then comes a delightful 3+mins cover of Trane's ALS, while Jarnet is a wahwah guitar soloing away over a jazz-rock beat. Badande Gurun is a head-spinning fast tune, contrasting heavily with the following Morgonstjarnan, a slow guitar starter slowly evolving in a sax-led crescendo, while the self-explanatory Repris is reprising a previous track.

This first album opens a certain kind of Badkar musical integrity as future albums will be fairly different from each other, but remain completely uncommercial and typically in the AB spirit. But unfortunately for them, they will ever be better than in their debut album, which is the only essential one from them.