Dreamtime - Tidal Mind

The Beatles sang, “Sitting on a cornflake waiting for the van to come.”

The Moody Blues proclaimed, “Blasting, billowing, bursting forth/With the power of ten billion butterfly sneezes.”

Bubble Puppy proclaimed, “In the mist of sassafras/Many things will come to pass.”

Procol Harum simply said, “Well my son, life is like a beanstalk, isn’t it?”

Dreamtime speaks from a very similar cosmic argot that includes “gardens of Neptune suspended timelessly in warm sapphire,” “webbed fingers as delicate as flowers,” and a “silver moon [that]shrinks in the darkness, taking all with it but a few bubbles of love.”

By the way, speaking strictly in physics-space travel lingo, rock music has travelled light years beyond “Love, Love Me Do.”

And there’s a (hopefully credited) whale who takes lead vocal duties at the end of the first song, “Morning Star.” Now, I have no idea what the big guy is actually singing, but I truly believe he is capable of pondering his own aquatic universe, and if the Spark Notes communication was possible, enjoying the symbolism of Melville’s Moby Dick; however, I sort of hope Mr. Leviathan is really singing a pop ditty to his favorite cetacean cow with the title (and this is a loose translation) of “I Want to Hold Your Fin.”

To quote another great psych band The Pretty Things, Get the Picture?

This is music that sparks (without notes!) the fusion of psych rock with space exploration. It may be lyrically all a bit tongue in cheek, but for those of us who loved The Beatles, The Moody Blues, Procol Harum, and, of course, Bubble Puppy, this is a pretty cool record. It’s an intense and melodic tapestry of an inner journey in search of some sort of universal truth. And it buzzes around the brain. Thank you, very much!

It begins as waves lap the shore, and then drums kick “Morning Star” into orbit. Primitive keyboards swirl and a guitar fuzzes its way through time, space (both inner and outer), and lovely vinyl record vibrations. There’s even a dab of surf guitar. Fans of the before-mentioned Moody Blues will find a lot to love here. There is a density to the sound like “House of Four Doors,” from In Search of the Lost Chord. But the tune takes on a life of its own as the guitars play great rock music that juxtaposes (and cuts across) the ephemeral space stuff. And then that whale croons his tune.

“Emerald Sea” has the spoken bit from some hoary sage about those “gardens of Neptune,” “webbed fingers,” a few bubbles of love,” and whatever. It’s a great museum piece of a song that has a razor blade guitar edge. But (and perhaps I’m wrong), the chord progression pretty much quotes the song “In the Court of the Crimson King” from Robert Fripp & Company’s first album.

But, you know, a good song’s a good song.

“Of Nautilus Descent” is a deep-sea tone poem. Its density is a thing of beauty, with an almost sitar sound. This music never becomes vacuous hippy gimcrack. Despite a few airy-fairy lyrics, this is tough music. In fact, the tune has a slow riff that pulses like Black Sabbath’s “Iron Man.”

The title tune, “Tidal Mind,” is another song that bounces on the fabric of the universe. Heavy guitars pulse. The vocals are distant, like a Hubble photo. And it all rocks like a spaceship in warp drive. Then there’s an acoustic bit that morphs into a dramatic coda. This is great album rock ‘n’ roll stuff.  Yeah, the heavens descend with deep sonic wisdom.

Notice the aquatic them? “Submerged Sanctuary” is slow, impressionistic, and intense, in a very watery way. This is what we one time called an album cut, and it buzzes around the brain. “Liquid Light” is even better as it uses dramatic chords to proclaim the euphoric beauty of the universe. This one drips and pounds the certainty of the guitar riffing uncertainty into the stars.

So sure, this record is filled with the psych echo of cornflakes, butterfly sneezes, and sassafras mist. And, of course. Life is like a beanstalk, isn’t it? That’s a given! But, there’s always room for more. The universe is a pretty big place. And this is psych-space music for both young and old. And, in keeping with the spacey sound, it would theoretically even appeal to Captain Kirk & Company of the Starship Enterprise who, because they were usually cruising at warp factor 6, did not age (see Einstein’s Theory of Relativity for a further explanation!) as did their human counterparts back on Earth, and consequently, are both young and old at the very same time! And with the very rare dilithium crystals in mind, let’s just say this record is, to quote dear Mr. Spock with the word he used 74 times¹ in the original series, fascinating.

¹ Thank you Me TV for such knowledge!