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Photos, Live Review: Acid Mothers Temple, Stearica @ Miss Peapod's, Penryn

14th November 2008 | by Gavin Riley

What happens when you mix Japanese Psychedelia with Italian Post-Rock? The answer is fireworks, as many will attest to on bonfire night last week.

Two bands, from distinctly differing backgrounds complimented each other perfectly, somewhat appropriately in exploding fashion.

The first of those bands was Italian outfit Stearica, who were intent on displaying their grasp of the English language. After rattling off numerous swear words, they similarly bounced their brand of diverse, imaginative and propulsive post-rock to those assembled.

It's taken the Turin-based three piece almost ten years to finally release their debut album. Entitled Oltre, (roughly translated as ‘beyond') its fair to say that on the basis of this live performance, it's exactly where the album will take you.

Their drummer Davide Compagnoni was in imperious form, scaling the windows and whatever else he could find in order to get the right sound.

It was a hard act to follow, and initially Japan's Acid Mothers Temple struggled to match the intensity of Stearica. Since Cotton Casino left the group in 2004, the band has relied ever more heftily on frontman Kawabata Makoto's shoulders.

Its hard to describe exactly the sound that emanates from the creaking amps of AMT. It'd be easy to paint it as an offshoot of psychedelia, but what really exudes from those amps, is a wall of sound, peaks of distorted loops and hooks, at a ridiculously high volume that tend to repeat over and over.

Some of Makoto's solos would stretch for twenty five minutes, but no-one dared glance down to check their watches.

Those assembled for this sonic display - looked on in both wonderment and astonishment, as for those 90 minutes, it was as though Acid Mothers Temple were the only band in the universe that really mattered.