MATCHING MOLE — Matching Mole's Little Red Record (review)

MATCHING MOLE — Matching Mole's Little Red Record album cover

Album · 1972 · Fusion

3.5/5 · 2011-02-18
snobb

Second (and final studio) Matching Mole's album is quite different from its predecessor.Psychedelic naive and beautiful pop/rock songs has gone, and the band stepped to complex experimental jazz fusion area. Being predominantly instrumental, this release contains not much of Wyatt's vocals, but demonstrates one of the best his drumming ever.

Organist David Sinclair, collaborated on band's debut,left the band, and Dave McRae started to use synthesizer. Electronic music guru Brian Eno,being on the peak of his experimental activities at that period, participated in album's recordings as guest musician,he didn't played much physically there, but his electronic sound using ideas did influence album's sound for sure.

Compositions on this album are mostly complex interplay between all musicians,with great drumming,bass structures and plenty of experimental keyboards sounds. Very soon use of synthesizers and electronic effects will become the real nightmare,destroying many musical genres for decades, but there on this album (as on some more Eno's albums of early 70-s) one can hear how interesting and tasteful electronic sounds could be.

Few vocal-oriented songs are presented here,with obvious influence of early Soft Machine's aesthetics, but even them are transformed according to more modern and experimental band's direction. Some compositions sound very close to Soft Machine's Third (just slightly more relaxed) - it's really difficult to avoid comparing Matching Mole with Soft Machine!Better organised than their debut,with structure and direction,this release sounds more mature (even if some naive but so attractive late 60-s spirit has gone). In all - strong experimental jazz fusion album with successful use of early electronic and plenty of artistic ideas on it. In many senses,this album is more attractive than Soft Machine's releases from post-classic period.

Speaking about this album,it's difficult to avoid one more theme - radical leftist Wyatt's ideology. Album's name and cover both refer to Chairman Mao's Little Red Book and Wyatt is openly influenced by Cultural Revolution idea. I can hardly imagine someone attracted by Chinese Cultural Revolution or Stalin's Gulags nowadays, but under all these naive but organic Wyatt's political craziness I see more infantile pose than serious point of view. I spent my childhood and young years in the world Wyatt possibly dreamed about in early 70-s (the world with empty shop shelves,grey clothes and grey faces,the world, where people saw no future and were afraid of any man in uniform, and with small children, dreaming about few mandarins or banana as best New Year's gift (not Christmas gift - Christmas was banned)),and I am sure that leftist heaven from Wyatt would look as real heaven for millions of those, living in Socialist reality. And Wyatt himself with his artistic personality would finish in Siberian concentration camp for sure. So - really attracted by music, I don't care much about ideology of this release: Wyatt just doesn't understand what he is speaking about here, don't hate him for that!

This album became last band's studio release,Wyatt started his real solo career after, and Phil Miller went on to two other Canterbury scene bands, Hatfield & the North and National Health.