What a moment this was for these bands. Consider that in 2013 when this split full-length (review here) was released, Netherlands-based heavy psych rockers The Machine and Sungrazer were both signed to Elektrohasch Schallplatten, and were the spearheads of what seemed to be the next generation of European heavy rock, both working off influences from weighted fuzz and trippy jams while offering a personality of their own in that. Neither sounded precisely like the other, despite shared elements and basic construction — both were guitar-led three-pieces with an affinity for tonal warmth and mellow-psych exploration — but they were both young, exciting bands who took the work of those who came before them like their label head in Colour Haze and pushed it to places it hadn’t yet been.

By 2013, Sungrazer‘s 2010 self-titled (review here) and 2011’s Mirador (review here) — the only two albums they’d ever make — had established them as a significant presence in the European heavy underground. Supported on club tours and throughout the then-emergent Euro heavyfest scene, the band’s melodic approach, penchant for drift, and sheer tonal depth made them a standout. The Machine were the longer-standing band, having debuted in 2007 with Shadow of the Machine and issued Solar Corona (discussed here) through Nasoni Records in 2009, been picked up by Elektrohasch for 2011’s Drie (review here) and 2012’s Calmer Than You Are (review here). The worlds of each of these trios seemed to draw them together — they toured in 2013 around this release as well — and though then-Sungrazer bassist Sander Haagmans (also The Whims of the Great Magnet) would eventually join The Machine for a brief period, this split was nonetheless the payoff for the toward-each-other momentum they had to that point built.

The Machine — led by guitarist David Eering, with Hans Van Heemst on bass and drummer Davy Boogaard — would take side A and earn it almost immediately. If “Awe” wasn’t named after the effect produced by its central riff, then it should’ve been. Pure worship. They knew it, you certainly still feel it while listening, and they ride that groove from the moment the “the eagle has landed” sample ends well past the 10-minute mark in a glorious celebration of rhythm, vibe and repetition. If this release had nothing else in its favor, you would nine years later listen to the entire thing and call it stunning for that lone riff, and they give it its due space as part of a three-song showcase of who The Machine were at that point and who they were en route to becoming, with the subsequent hooky “Not Only” cutting to (less than) a quarter of the runtime a two and a half minutes of punkish burst.

Careening in a way that was prescient of where they’d head on 2015’s Offblast! (review here) and 2018’s Faceshift (review here) — the latter issued through the band’s own imprint uncoincidentally called Awe Records — “Not Only” perfectly cleaned the slate before the also-north-of-10-minutes “Slipface” took over with its early fuzz twist and going-and-not-coming-back jam later, a final two minutes of residual drone and drift, organ or effects hum and swirl wrapping up because what is their possibly left to say? They took about 23 minutes to showcase who they are, where they’d already been on their first four records, and where they were headed on the ones to come. One doesn’t like to throw around words like ‘perfect,’ but certainly their efficiency and the sureness with which they executed these three songs is to be lauded, all the more in hindsight.

If The Machine presented a challenge in not delving into hyperbole, certainly that’s another shared aspect with Sungrazer. This would be the swansong for the three-piece of guitarist/vocalist Rutger Smeets, drummer Hans Mulders and the aforementioned Haagmans on bass, as they broke up at the end of 2013, thereby denying their audience a third full-length and leaving a hole that even now feels unfilled. Their ability to take massive fuzz and roll it out with a touch that could feel both heavy and delicate was something that no one else had yet brought to heavy psych, different from just melody, jazzy in a way but more open than pretentious. They began their stretch with “Dopo,” meeting the nod of The Machine‘s “Awe” head-on with a landmark riff of their own while saving a crescendo melody for the song’s second half.

Sungrazer‘s three inclusions, “Dopo,” “Yo La Tengo” and “Flow Through a Good Story,” all sat comfortably around seven or eight minutes, and demonstrated precisely how welcoming their craft was at its best while “Yo La Tengo” offered hints of their maybe pushing the balance more into the psychedelic and “Flow Through a Good Story” took what would’ve been a hodgepodge in less capable hands and turned it into what the title promised: a sonic narrative of their growth and being able to run fluidity across bumpy shifts and rougher feeling terrain. They were a band who could’ve gone anywhere after this and simply didn’t.

Nine years after the fact — not an eternity but certainly long enough for a revisit — and amid so much vibrant creativity from both these bands, that remains sad. Smeets and Mulders joined the more folkish Cigale and would release a self-titled (review here) in 2015 before the former passed away that October. That tragic ending to one of heavy psychedelia’s brightest lights.

That’s it. That may be half a sentence but that’s the sentence. That’s exactly how it felt when Smeets died. Like a story left unfinished. So there. Cigale never did a second record, no Sungrazer reunion, which would’ve been otherwise inevitable. Done.

In that context, this split, yes, has a surrounding bittersweet aura. I’d encourage you to listen to it in the spirit not just of what could’ve been but also what might still be. The Machine have a new album in the works, and I’m not going to say too much about it, but those who found themselves engaged by this era should perk ears to what they’re up to these days. And Haagmans and Mulders both remain active to some degree, but this split represents exactly what I said at the outset: a moment in time for both of these acts. Along the myriad paths heavy psychedelia has taken in the ensuing years, including among these players, this was when theirs came together at just the right time, right place, right sound. However long or short, in music or out, not every life is gifted such a moment.

As always, I hope you enjoy. Thank you for reading.

—

Up and down week, but busy. Head-spinning, still recovering from Psycho Las Vegas last weekend and a tumultuous return trip that had me home at 3:30 in the morning on Monday/Tuesday. Not the best way to start out, and I basically lost all of Tuesday working as a result. That sucked; I don’t have another way of saying it. Frustrating end to a trip that I still feel like I’m processing on a few different levels: emotional, physical, ethical, and so on.

The Pecan starts school week after next. The Patient Mrs. started her new semester yesterday, which he’s old enough now to know means she won’t be around. He and I are pretty tight. We have a solid relationship, and markedly more so now that he’s potty trained. But as with pretty much everything else about my relationship with my wife, I am the second. She is the star of the show, and legitimately so. He fucking loves her. And I get it. It’s not like I’m out here arguing against. I have spent the last 25 years rightly worshiping the ground she walks on, so yeah. I understand. She’s incredible. But that does make it harder when all of a sudden she’s not upstairs on her laptop anymore, she’s out teaching class. Next week will be difficult.

He was bummed yesterday when she left, but we got down to work cleaning the house, played the arcade for a while, ran errands, talked a lot about music and construction vehicles and space and generally had a good time. He’ll fight you, though. He’ll push, and push, and push. If there’s a line, he’s crossing it. He’s not yet five. Every day he says, “I hate being told what to do.” Fucking hell, kid, who doesn’t? Welcome to existence. Sorry about that.

He has openly admitted (which is saying something as regards him and emotions generally; they are mostly denied verbally and expressed via physicality) to being nervous about starting school again. I feel for him. And if he can’t find a balance between knowing when to break rules and climb fences and when to sit down, shut up, do your work and then screw off and do whatever you want, he’s going to have a much, much harder time. Maybe “first this, then that” is the frame. I don’t know. I’ll try it. Thanks for talking it out with me. Starfleet method. Brainstorm AF.

It’s 5:50 and he just opened his door to come downstairs, so I’m out. Have a great and safe weekend. Thanks for reading. Hydrate, enjoy your waning summer if it’s summer where you are, watch your head, all that. Good stuff next week.

Here we go.

FRM.

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[Click play above to stream The Whims of the Great Magnet’s Good Vibes & High Tides in Full. Album is out Dec. 1 with preorders direct from the band.]

Founded seven years ago by Sander Haagmans in Maastricht, the Netherlands, The Whims of the Great Magnet returns with a second full-length album in the self-released Good Vibes & High Tides. The follow-up to early 2017’s The Purple & Yellow Album (discussed here), it would seem to be in conversation with Haagmans‘ work as bassist/vocalist for the much-missed Sungrazer, whose 2013 disbanding was followed in 2015 by the death of guitarist/vocalist Rutger Smeets, thereby obviating an eventual reunion. As willfully as The Purple & Yellow Album pushed in alternate directions away from what Sungrazer was, the 10-track/44-minute Good Vibes & High Tides embraces it without necessarily trying to recapture that sound and moment entirely. Haagmans instead hones across the new album’s span a kind of summery grunge fuzz, occasionally given to psychedelic shimmer — some added pedal steel on “Simple” courtesy of Ingo Jetten at Trashed Attic Audio doesn’t hurt — and holding onto the intimacy of solo songwriting while adopting a more full-band feel with drummer Iwan Wijnen, even unto capturing a fluid, at-least-part-improv guitar-led jam on 11-minute closer “Roerloze Beweger.”

That in itself is an impressive feat, even for Haagmans, who’s had plenty of time in the studio over the course of the last decade and seems at this point to do most of his recording at home, but as the title of the record puts it first, the focus here indeed is on the vibe, and the vibe is good. Good Vibes & High Tides is marked by a welcome sense of tonal warmth that lo-fi neopsych has replaced with naked shimmer, and the depth that’s been forsaken by so much jammy psych is evident right from the opening roll of “Lose My Head,” which counts in on the hi-hat and then is on its way like it was never off. Haagmans‘ vocals are laid back in the verse and layered in the chorus, the bass tone is an early highlight — as it would almost have to be — and immediately the spirit is melodic, welcoming and engaging, continuing onto “Here to Party” as if to underscore its intent. Through up and down verse lines that shift quickly into the chorus, the 3:40 “Here to Party” is marked by its abiding lack of pretense.

I wouldn’t call it a party song in the “party rock” sense — the hook lines, after all, are, “We are only here to party/We are only here” — but its straightforward presentation is a fitting summary of the perspective from which Good Vibes & High Tides seems to be working in general in balancing personal expression and a complete-group sound. Even shorter at 3:19, “Guess it’s True” follows in subtly more patient fashion, alternative rock and fuzz melding without argument beneath layers of sweet-toned post-Cobain vocals and a third-in-a-row memorable chorus. Three makes a salvo, and there’s still the title-track to round out the opening movement, which would seem to be delineated from the rest of the LP by the 40-second interlude “Hay.”

That’s just a riff and the word repeated a couple times — a lost art of sneaky listener-disorientation that any number of in-some-ways-more-loyal ’90s preservationists have neglected — over in flash and maybe a vinyl-flip to bring on “Oew,” with a vocal drawl and particularly Sungrazer-style chorus sort of bounding through a thick and immersive fuzz after more of a strummed verse. Though it has the briefest runtime of Good Vibes & High Tides‘ non-interlude tracks at 2:23, it nonetheless keeps the underlying structure as barebones as possible, cutting off at the end and refusing a jam that might otherwise have taken hold in spite of itself in Haagmans‘ one-time four-piece incarnation of the band. I don’t think it would be missing if it wasn’t there, but the presence of pedal steel doesn’t take anything away from “Simple,” certainly, and it plays up the pastoralia-memory of the verse ahead of the crunchier chorus, just a touch of Brant–Bjork-at-the-beach coming through but ultimately establishing its own personality ahead of “Cocaine & Yoga,” the verse of which seems to have derived part of its structure directly from Nirvana‘s “School.”

There’s some slide in the chorus (I don’t think it’s more pedal steel?), but the song itself is a high point — “What the hell is going on today?/Cocaine and yoga all the way” is a hook that deserves to be delivered from a stage — and the noisy transitional mess and quiet guitar line that picks up to end the song is a surprising and, frankly, delightfully honest, moment put to tape. By then he’s well into the depths of side B, but the closing duo of “Wei Wu Wijnen” (6:01) and “Roerloze Beweger” (11:41) are a movement unto themselves just the same, the former establishing itself quietly with fading-in drum swing and a guitar/bass bed for soft, bluesy melodic vocals.

This too would seem to come from a similar place as some of the more atmospheric stretches of Sungrazer‘s second long-player, 2011’s Mirador (review here), hypnotic guitar noodling leading the way out and directly into the righteous opening strum of “Roerloze Beweger.” A well-placed tambourine shake signals the launch of the groove and the finale is underway, uptempo and exciting if still overridingly mellow of vibe. The push settles down for the verses but plays well back and forth, and the song pays off the layered vocal melodies heard prior, the forwardness of the rhythm of Good Vibes & High Tides‘ most rocking moments, and its hinted-at sense of nod, arriving at the latter circa three minutes in and taking spot-on ownership of it. An instrumental jam ensues from then on, moving through a plotted progression into more improvised-sounding fare in the basslines standing out around five minutes in and the guitar that takes the reins after the final builds and crashes of Wijnen‘s drums, a meandering line that recedes to silence gently to end the album.

While there’s no doubt Good Vibes & High Tides both lives up to its title and the legacy of Haagmans‘ former three-piece, it does leave one wondering what his plans ultimately are for the project. To wit, this material is really, really engaging, and where The Purple & Yellow Album seemed almost to be an act of expression-as-exorcism — a release in the truest sense — Good Vibes & High Tides has more of an outreach kind of feel, connecting to the listener with outwardly catchy songs meant to do precisely that. Will Haagmans put together another full lineup? Will he continue down this sonic path, or is it a directional one-off en route to the next thing? Would he combine this with some of the more bedroom-acoustic material he’s done before? As much as Hunter S. Thompson advised following the Great Magnet’s directives, Haagmans seems to-date to be charting his own course with The Whims of the Great Magnet, and as to where that will take him (rumor has it a trio incarnation is to debut live next month), we’ll just have to wait and see. This record is nothing less than a gift as a part of that process.

The Whims of the Great Magnet on Thee Facebooks

The Whims of the Great Magnet on Bandcamp

[Click play above to hear ‘BVO’tje (1 More 4)’ from The Whims of the Great Magnet’s The Purple and Yellow Album, out April 1.]

Even before the book was closed in 2013 on fuzz rockers Sungrazer, bassist/backing vocalist Sander Haagmans had begun to explore new ground in The Whims of the Great Magnet. The rock was lower-fi, still pulling influence from a ’90s sphere, but rawer in tone and intent alike. Haagmans, alternating between a full-band and completely-solo approach, oversaw the release of several EPs — 2012’s EP being the first, followed the next year by a collection of home recordings, then April Fool in 2015 — and now makes a full-length debut with The Purple and Yellow Album, once more working on his own and in arguably the most intimate incarnation of The Whims of the Great Magnet to-date.

Comprised of 12 self-recorded songs and running a vinyl-ready 37 minutes, The Purple and Yellow Album brings forth an at-times psychedelic vision of grunge folk. Instrumental and vocal layering and arrangement varies as songs like “Falling to Pieces” and the later “Better Stay at Home” might only feature an acoustic guitar while others build further out, whether it’s the howling guitar of “BVO’tje (1 More 4),” the incorporated keys of “As I Felt Alright Before,” the garage psych of “Ow What Have I Done” (which gets an experimentalist reprise at the album’s conclusion), the Mellotron-infused “Debussy” or the six-minute “Slowburner,” which shifts from its solo melancholy into an acoustic/bass/drum progression at the end over a six-minute run that makes it the longest inclusion overall.

Wherever he takes a given track, Haagmans unites the material on The Purple and Yellow Album through his own performance and an overarching sense of honesty in the songwriting. Some songs have a self-aware humor, like “Better Stay at Home” or the preceding “Teen Anger,” but even these are executed with harmonic depth and a resonant emotionalism, and while one can hear shades of Haagmans‘ former outfit in pieces like “As I Felt Alright Before” and “I Could Just Leave it Like That,” that becomes only one context in which his songwriting lives up to the considerable ambition behind the concept of these tracks and the finds balance with the humility with the circumstances of their recording and release, providing a nonetheless rich and engaging front-to-back listening experience.

Below, Haagmans talks about the songs’ making and some of his future plans, threatening a doom record and more.

Please enjoy the following Six Dumb Questions:

Six Dumb Questions with The Whims of the Great Magnet

Tell me about writing for The Purple and Yellow Album. At what point did you know the material would take a more acoustic direction?

Right from the start. It’s a collection of home recordings. And at home I had mainly acoustic guitars, so… But I just moved to a new house where we’re making a rehearsal room in the back, so my next recording might be a doom record.

Home recording is a very intimate process and you’ve decided to really convey something raw in these tracks in terms of sound. How did that come about? What is it you’re looking to say in these songs?

I just wanted to record some songs, sounds and sketches on my four-track cassette recorder (actually it’s my wife’s; thank you, wife). There’s lots of imperfections and vocals out of tune and all. But I wanted it to be loose and whimsical. So I kept many first ideas and mistakes and just played around. Also I used all of my ideas. So the cheesy songs, the sing-a-longs, the quasi serious songs and the slow boring songs are all in there. It’s a pretty good reflection of what music comes out of me at home. And I didn’t leave things out because it might not be cool enough in some setting or whatever.

Why purple and yellow? Is it just the artwork or is there some further significance to using those colors?

I remember I had a period in my childhood that I would only colour and paint with these two colours. And since I’m feeling more and more nostalgic as I’m getting older I went back to this period for the cover. Wish I could do the same with my music. But I will probably never reach the level I had when I was 12.

Will future The Whims of the Great Magnet recordings take a similar direction, or do you see yourself moving back toward a full-band sound again?

I really don’t know where the path will take me. I will keep doing stuff as The Whims of the Great Magnet for sure and it can go in any direction. Maybe a doom record isn’t such a bad idea. Also I really need to get a band together again but that would probably be with a different name.

Of course we have to mention your past playing in Sungrazer and that band’s ongoing legacy (you recently appeared on Spaceslug’s Time Travel Dilemma, for example). The Purple and Yellow Album has a laid back feel but some grunge to it as well. How do you view it in relation to your past work?

Ah the grunge thing! Anything I did in the past is not what I’m doing now. When we were with Sungrazer, we played as a band. We were in that moment together. Now with this album I’m doing something on my own. That’s a difference. But I’m sure it has some similarities as well which is obvious. But because I’m doing this album alone, it’s more personal and closer to me than anything I have done with a band. Because it’s just me, uncompromised and unfiltered. You could be right when you say that this doesn’t necessarily have to be better for the result. But that’s just the way it is (Bruce Hornsby!). And I’m not only into solo and mellow acoustic stuff. Nooooo, no, no, no, no. The other things still attract me just as much but weren’t around when I hit record.

Any other plans or closing words you want to mention?

I would like to thank you and the people so very much who supported my music in the past and especially in the present. Cowabunga dudes!

The Whims of the Great Magnet on Thee Facebooks

The Whims of the Great Magnet on Bandcamp

For a while there, it was looking like Sungrazer were the future of fuzz. No shit. After I heard their Mirador album in 2011 (review here), I was all set and in fact did on several occasions count them as one of the brightest hopes in the European heavy psych scene, all the more so as they were brought forth with the endorsement of Elektrohasch Schallplatten, the imprint founded by Stefan Koglak of Colour Haze. The trio of guitarist/vocalist Rutger Smeets, bassist/vocalist Sander Haagmans and drummer Hans Mulders released a split earlier in 2013 with like-minded Dutch trio The Machine (review here) to mark their “Strikes and Gutters” tour together, and then Sungrazer were supposed to play Duna Jam, and Smeets quit. That’s how it went. Here’s his post from Thee Facebooks on June 4:

Dear all,
After having played many years with Sungrazer with great joy I have come to the conclusion that there’s no more future in this band for me. That’s why I quit Sungrazer and so, unfortunately, I can’t come to DunaJam. I’m sorry about this and I want to thank you for the great moments we shared.
Peace,
Rutger

In the months that have followed, there hasn’t been much more said about it than that. Nothing, actually. It’s hard enough to replace any member of a trio without creating an entirely new group dynamic, so I guess Haagmans and Mulders decided without Smeets that was it. It was one of 2013’s biggest bummer breakups, and more so since after their future-classic 2010 self-titled debut (review here), Mirador had expanded their sound into even jammier, more naturalistic vibing, so that cuts like “Mirador” and “Sea” and “Behind” seemed to emerge from a glorious overarching wash of tonal warmth. The self-titled had that as well, and “Zero Zero,” “Common Believer,” “If,” “Somo” and “Mountain Dusk” were even more distinct on their own, so that as much as the record worked as a whole, individual songs flourished as well.

I was fortunate enough to see them twice, first at Roadburn 2011 and then again at London Desertfest 2012, and they’d only gotten better as a unit. It’s always strange to write about a band who’ve decided to hang it up, first because you never know if they’ll get back together, and second because no band breakup has ever proven to be the end of the world, but Sungrazer had a special sound that was increasingly their own, their songs had a character that was their own, and of all the heavy psych to come out of the European heavy underground over the last half-decade or so, theirs showed a quick mastery of creating a peaceful feel with heavy tones. Particularly after the split with The Machine, which brought forth three new tracks in “Dopo,” “Yo La Tengo” and the wonderfully atmospheric “Flow through a Good Story,” my hopes had been high for their third album. Everything seemed to be on track.

That was the real kicker of it — the surprise factor. Some breakups stick, some don’t. I’d hope Sungrazer‘s falls into the latter category, but it’s not something I’ll attempt to predict either way. Late in 2012, Haagmans released an EP under the moniker The Whims of the Great Magnet, and a full lineup of the band with him on guitar and vocals made its live debut on Dec. 19, 2013, in Maastricht. Smeets seems to be playing with the new outfit Cigale (though they haven’t posted an official lineup or band pics as of now), who just released their first audio teaser, and I’m not sure if Mulders has a new project going or has joined another band or what, but it’s hard to imagine a psychedelic drummer of his caliber won’t resurface somewhere down the line if he hasn’t.

And since the best case scenario for any disbanding is output from players’ new projects, at least there’s that to take comfort in, though Sungrazer left a considerable void when their wall of fuzz fell.

Sungrazer, “If” official video

Sungrazer on Thee Facebooks

The Whims of the Great Magnet on Thee Facebooks

Cigale on Thee Facebooks

Formed just in early 2009, Dutch trio Sungrazer have become fast veterans. Their self-released, self-titled debut got picked up for wider issue via Elektrohasch Schallplatten, the record label run by Stefan Koglek of Colour Haze, and the band hit the road backed by European mega-bookers Sound of Liberation, resulting in festival gigs like Stoned From the Underground, Roadburn and Duna Jam. Their second album, Mirador (review here), came out on Elektrohasch in the first half of 2011 and has been among the year’s best.

Their formula is pretty simple, melding jam-intensive European heavy psychedelia with desert riffing and landmark grooves. Of course that balance is much easier said that achieved, but on both Sungrazer and Mirador, guitarist/vocalist Rutger Smeets, bassist/backing-vocalist Sander Haagmans and drummer Hans Mulders sculpt laid back vibes and heavy tones from warm low end and flowing rhythms. As a band, Sungrazer are able to shift smoothly between stonerly riffs and open-ended stretches that, like the Mirador highlight “Behind,” feel so natural it’s as though you’ve known them all your life.

Sungrazer hit the road in Europe earlier this year with RotoR and Colour Haze as part of Elektrohasch‘s “Up in Smoke” traveling mini-fest, and are currently on tour with similarly-minded German purveyors Grandloom. In the meantime, they’ve also begun the writing process that will take them through the follow-up to Mirador and doubtless to another level of well-deserved recognition. They are the heralds of a new generation of European heavy psych, and their organic approach can only get stronger with more time on the road.

Prior to leaving for the shows with Grandloom, Smeets took the time to field an email interview with some questions about the inner workings and processes of the band, and some of the differences and similarities in his mind between their work on Sungrazer and Mirador, as well as their time touring in support of both albums. It’s brief, but Smeets gives some insight as to Sungrazer‘s decision making process, and, fittingly somehow, the kebabs are key.

Complete Q&A is after the jump. Please enjoy.

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