Salmonella Dub--Killervision--Ambient Psychedelic Reggae Synth Dub from New Zealand

This is a band whose name intrigued me, which is not really a good reason to go and purchase music. But they seemed to be held in some esteem in New Zealand so I took a shot. Developed a deep appreciation for this from the very beginning. Haven't listened to this much lately--but it is a well done record, sort of like a very eccentric version of the UK reggae band UB40, but with much more instrumental diversity and more interesting percussion.

I really like the loping reggae of the second song on the album For The Love Of It. The first song Dragon is pretty good, with a lot of tempo changes, but the second song is the first one that stands out for me. Dubby, a little psychedelic, with jazz interludes, Drifting is a good chill out of a song. What I found about this record is that for a type of music that can at times be repetitive, they do a good job of switching things up during songs, or at least introducing different instruments, so the songs stay interesting--like a good detective novel, you aren't always sure where things are going, and you look forward to seeing what they are going to do next. Ambience is also an important aspect of this record--I think that they must be sampling a lot of diverse sounds and putting them in the mix but I can only really hear how the whole mix comes together.

Crazy 80's is another dubby exercise, as you might expect of a band with the word dub in their name, and is a mostly trippy track with a driving synth bassline. Peyote Dub is another druggy vision quest of a track with effective use of flute. Deep into the song chanting voices come drifting in like a breeze wafting through the song. The record really is one of those where the sound makes my ears tingle. And like Wilco does with their music, I could see them taking a basic reggae song, demoing it, and then ripping it all apart, slicing and dicing, until you have a very different song. But underneath all the sonic experimentation and improvising, there is a really good song. No Worries 2000 sounds like London Calling meets Two Sevens Clash, apocalypse and steel drums. Savage is very nice, with kind of a funkier New Order vibe. Justice is a tense corker with snapshot percussion and funereal horns weaving in and out. The song Johnny sounds to me like a 2.0 update of Bob Marley's Johnny Was, but probably is so only in my own imagination.

Overall there is a spiritual feel to the whole album where you wonder whether the vocalists are chanting prayers or singing. A good album to relax to, to reflect a little--you don't have to be tripping or into crystals to enjoy this. It ends with Kaikoura Rim, an ambient tune which is basically the recording of waves crashing into the beach, which for this album seems to be an apt way to end the record. Definitely an interesting and creatively constructed record.