The Fiery Furnaces, Vietnam - Bowery Ballroom $20
Acid Mother's Temple, The Antarcticans å Knitting Factory Main Space $15

If I had to pick only one show tonight, it'd be The Fiery Furnaces and Vietnam at the Bowery - two band's I've watched grow from barebones duos five or six years ago into two of the best things going.  But enough about that.  It's totally sold-out and the guest lists are all packed with record label folks, industry folks, and Lou Reed. 

So how about a detour to a show that promises to be devoid of all of members of the biz and full of heads and lovers of esoteric psychedelic freak-out music.  That show in question is headlined by a "collective" that's much weirder, louder, and more interesting than anything from Canada.  I'm of course referring to the Acid Mothers Temple Soul Collective's Acid Mothers Temple & The Melting Paraiso U.F.O. - formerly known primarily as Acid Mothers Temple & The Cosmic Inferno - but also Acid Mothers Temple SWR, Mothers of Invasion, Acid Mothers Gong, Acid Mothers Afrirampo, Acid Mothers Temple & The Pink Ladies Blues - but best known as simply Acid Mothers Temple. 

Formed over a decade ago as Acid Mothers Temple & The Melting Paraiso U.F.O. and dusting off the name again last year, this bunch has recorded dozens of releases that range vinyl to CD to CDR, from small runs on their own label to tour-only to internationally distributed proper releases on Sub Pop, Alien 8, and other more established labels. In terms of their live performance, you can expect a Japanese quartet (sometimes expanded) that's as bizarre upon first glance as the psych-rock coming from their loud ritual - which leads them to all ends of the musical spectrum for the twin purposes of exploration and blowing your mind. They claim that they're merely "transmitting and channeling messages from other realms." Are you brave enough to decode them? Don't let their appearance fool ya - there ain't no fashionable middle of the road bear and wolf and owl and deer and fairy in the forest folk-dribble that people try to pass off as freaky these days.  The Acid Mother's don't look to the earth but to the stars - emitting a more contemporary, Japanese, and messed-up Locust Abortion of Gong or Hawkwind or a mid-period Sun Ra stripped of jazz instrumentation - all kinds of colors and textures randomly, yet artfully, spilled on top of one another - bleeding outside of the borders, interweaving, separating, blasting off, and returning - non linear - both electric and electronic - a circle made of circles of circles. In a world gone square we need some authentic freaks making unapologetically free and freaky music... Fly that flag.

Also:
Abraham Kenney å The Stone 10PM $10
Alone Inside my Head å The Stone 8PM $10
Bill Frisell Quintet - Village Vanguard $30/$35
John Langford¹s Ship and Pilot å Mercury Lounge
KAPOW!, Silent City, TK Webb, Drew and the Medicinal Pen - Fat Baby $8
Lucero, Langhorne Slim, The Reputation - Northsix - $12
ne(x)tworks å ISSUE Project Room $10

Go to NYNT's Live Archive here.

© New York Night Train , 2006