WELCOME TO ACID MOTHERS TEMPLE

I’ve never been into what “everybody”—you know, the “cool” people like. You should have seen the looks I’d get in my Nixon administration high school years when someone one works ask what music I like, to size me up, and I’d say “Cab Calloway, Spike Jones, Frank Zappa . . .”

These days, I’d have to lead with Acid Mothers Temple.

I’d probably get the same looks, only more so. They would probably be accompanied by facial tics, twitching limbs, foaming at the mouth. Maybe they’ll just scream and run. And that's just in reaction to their name.

I like to describe their music as what the Establishment (remember them?) was afraid acid rock would be, only more so. There’s a definite psychedelic vibe, also electronic wailing that gets downright stark, raving sci-fi, complex structures that kick the guts out of the traditional rock’n’roll two and a half minute attention span, and on the rare incidents where there are vocals, they usually aren’t in English. Most of the time, there aren’t even words.

We’re talking music to write sci-fi by. A lot of my latest novel was written with it blasting away in the background.

They probably won’t become top 40 hits on anybody’s charts, win any awards, or even get played on the radio—as far as I know—but, oh baby, what they do to my brains and body! Language fails here. Invite the more adventurous to give them a listen. The rest of you can retreat to a safe place.