Just a matter of months after their widely
acclaimed album Journey To X, there’s no stopping the rejuvenated
Brainiac 5 as they return with the aptly-titled We’re Ready!
It seems that the band had so much great
material worked up for the Journey sessions that they allowed the
natural momentum to carry them over, bringing additional material to proceedings
to round out the process.
As well as introducing new songs, the band took
the opportunity to revisit their past: ‛Trotsky’, which appeared on their
classic ‛78 EP Mushy Doubt, is retooled here as ‛She’s Free’, sung by
returning guest vocalist Jessie Pie; ‛Night Games’, a song dictated through a
ouija board conversation with Jimi Hendrix(!) many years ago, is presented in
studio version for the first time; and ‛Space Is The Place’, the track that
kickstarted the band’s 21st Century rebirth, is given the full bells
and whistles treatment it always deserved.
Emerging in the mid-70s out of the UK’s isolated yet
thriving South-Western scene, the Brainiac 5 relocated to London, where their Mushy Doubt EP had already caused a
stir. Sharing stages with the likes of The Soft Boys and The Barracudas and
finding fans in John Peel and Alex Chilton, they split before their debut album
World Inside was released through
celebrated psych label Reckless (Bevis Frond, Black Sun Ensemble, Mu).
With frontman Charlie Taylor returning from years in
the US, the Brainiacs reconvened, resulting in 2013’s Sun Ra-inspired Space Is The Place EP which garnered
effusive reviews from the likes of The Wire and Shindig!
Releasing the When Silence Was Sound
anthology, the all-new Exploding Universe
and Journey To X in quick
succession the Brainiac 5 have earned praise from Mojo, Record
Collector, R2, Vive Le Rock, Prog and Louderthanwar,
as well as from psych and outsider websites around the world.
Buy it here.
The group’s music has a freshness
and verve that makes their recent reformation seem entirely justified. Prog
A full on
post-psychedelic prog rock punk trip! Absorbing and atmospheric... Nuzz
Prowling Wolf
Spunky, compelling and liberated. **** Shindig!
Punk energy harnessed to a serious
Ladbroke Grove attitude, the result a wonderful cornucopia of sound. Terrascope
This is acid punk at its best. **** RnR
Considering their 40 years plus history it is quite an achievement for
them to have come out with something so fresh sounding and consistently
intriguing in 2017. Louderthanwar
