Hypnos 69, Legacy (2010)

This is one of those albums that earned every second of its 2LP length. Brilliant front to back over the course of its seven tracks, I got to the point with Hypnos 69‘s Legacy where it wasn’t so much that I wore the record out as much as it wore me out. The Belgian heavy prog rockers conjured such textures and crafted such gorgeous spaces for their songs to happen in, I still kind of feel unworthy in listening.Elektrohaschreleased this album and I think it’s one of the best things the label ever put out — and if you know anything about this site, you know that’s saying something coming from me.

No real word on if they’re still a band. It was four years between their prior outing — 2006’s also excellent The Eclectic Measure — and Legacy, so even if they were going, it’s entirely possible they wouldn’t be making much noise. There seemed to be mumblings both ways a while back and then things got quiet. I prefer to live in a reality in which there’s a chance for a follow-up to Legacy, and if that reality doesn’t reflect the real reality, so be it. People force beliefs on themselves all the time. It’s how religion happens. Let me and my altar to “The Great Work” have our little moment.

And I said it at the time as well, but man, if Legacy is it for Hypnos 69 for real, what a note to end on. Just a dream of a record. I know capping the week with the expectation that you’re actually going to sit and listen to all 72 minutes of an album is probably a ridiculous thought, but even if you just get a taste now and check out the rest later, I hope you’ll listen, and of course, that you’ll enjoy.

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Kind of a non-week, this one. Having the holiday right in the middle there more or less shot the whole thing. I’ll die happy knowing I didn’t miss Wino Wednesday though just because it also happened to be Xmas. I was down in New Jersey at that point; The Patient Mrs. and I drove down Tuesday night after having dinner with her grandmother in Connecticut and stayed there until last night, family stuff front to back over those days — hence the general lack of posts — then back up to Massachusetts last night. We rolled in just before 12:30AM. Tomorrow we’re back to Connecticut for more family whathaveyou. I shouldn’t complain. I’m happy these people want to spend time with me (mostly they want to spend time with my wife, but I can’t argue with their point — she’s the draw for sure), the road time just adds up is all.

Even though next week is New Year’s, things should be a little bit closer to normal at least in terms of posts. I’m not traveling, so there’s that. New Year’s Day I might take it easy, but otherwise there’s still stuff I want to do to wrap up the year that I didn’t get to do this week — song of the year, comeback of the year, Top 20 EPs, singles, etc. — and I’ve got an Obelisk Questionnaire waiting to go up from Acid King‘s Lori S. and that rules, so I’m looking forward to it as well. I like that feature. I hope to keep it going indefinitely. The pace will probably slow somewhat over time, but at this point I’ve got a decent backlog to get up, so we’ll do at least one a week for now.

Next week I’m either going to review the new Truckfighters or the new Alcest, or maybe both if I’m feeling fancy, and I’ve got a tape from We are Oceans to check out and some vinyl in the stack waiting for a writeup as well, so in addition to that year-end silliness, the format wars will continue unabated.

I hope you have a great and safe weekend. Entirely likely you don’t give a crap, but this week I finished watching the entire original series of Star Trek and there were recaps on the forum that were good fun, if you have the chance to check them out. Please also hit up the Radio stream.

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