Review Summary: Still your song resounds.
Phase 7: Aproaching the Jazz
Part 3: It's a Love Cult
Although in retrospect it is pretty agreed upon that the jazz/60s infused trilogy of albums Motorpsycho released are some of their most interesting and lush work, it would be a bit of a stretch to say that their fanbase at the time was a huge fan of this development. Sure, although select songs were received warmly and went on to become fan-favorites, such as The Other Fool, Walking With J. or Go To California, people were pretty mad at Motorpsycho for leaving their alternative/psychedelic/heavy-rock roots behind. And Motorpsycho were aware of that, very aware in fact. And so, after the release of Phanerothyme, they decided to switch things up again, and combine the jazzy experimentation of Let Them Eat Cake with the pop-appeal of Phanerothyme and a good dash of their trademark sound before 2000.
It's a Love Cult really is an odd album in and of itself. Motorpsycho really try to throw almost every idea together that came to them since their inception, and still it kinda works. This album is chock full of quality material, from the thumping rock of Überwagner, the hilarious bombast of Neverland, the folky swing of What If?, the very jazz-reminiscent This Otherness to the layered and floating The Mirror and the Lie. And while not every song hits hard, Carousel may be a tad bit too long and Circles fails to leave a lasting impression, the true surprise comes in the final three tracks of the album.
I could rave on forever about Serpentine. A song about apparently a nasty breakup, it is the closest they ever came to a bonafide pop-song. It features some beautiful guitar-picking, acoustic guitar-playing, great piano-work, blistering solos, a thumping bassline, an instantly addicting hook and one of Snah's best vocal performances to this date. It is really breathtaking, especially on the album version which features an awe-inspiring build-up with distorted bass and strings. One of their best songs no doubt. Custers Last Stand follows, and has a deep and distorted bassline for a foundation and some heavy distorted guitar action going on. It is very reminiscent of the songs from their „Angels and Daemons at Play“-era and features them at their most energetic in years. And the last song, Composite Head, is basically a slideshow of their work on this trilogy of albums, throwing jazzy chords, 60s pop-influences and catchy melodies into one big melting pot, closing off this album and this era of the band perfectly.
In conclusion, this is an excellent album with some of Motorpsycho's best work. The only true fault on this album is, that the tracklisting stumbles a bit from time to time. Not every song flows that well into one another. But even that doesn't change the fact that Motorpsycho were still at the top of their game, even while acting outside of their comfort zone, as it seemed back then. Nowadays of course we know that they would make this kind of music their comfort-zone as well, but that's a story for another time.
