Review: Mantra Machine “Heliosphere”

With the release of “Nitrogen” back in 2014 that had followed their “Stage One” EP 12 months earlier, Mantra Machine had found something special, mixing the hypnotic sounds of space like psychedelia and the “jam” like feel of desert rock. I have to admit that I didn’t think I would have to wait 4 more years for another record, but when they dropped a new single “Hydrogen” in March, you knew something special was coming, and here it is…..

“Heliosphere” consists of 4 long songs that total 43:00 minutes of Amsterdam’s finest instrumental cosmic rock. 

The journey starts with “Hydrogen” and as the track slowly starts to build and grow, you can already see that the band have spent time really perfecting the sound they want. The guitars have that sound that only people like Josh Homme managed to perfect in Kyuss alongside bands from the early Swedish stoner rock scene. It’s powerful, driving, fuzzy but also manages to give the impression that it’s floating out to another dimension. I know very little about pedals, cabs, tubes etc. but once you’ve heard this, you’ll get what I mean. As the songs keeps moving, it gives the impression of travelling through the clouds and beyond, like what Colour Haze do, but Mantra Machine keep turning the song back to a hypnotic beat. Coming to its conclusion, the work from each instrument becomes more complex and heavier as the song intensifies, before silence.

“Atmos” brings you right back down and lets you drift outwards into deep space. Slow fuzzy baselines alongside rhythmic drumming move you out into the cosmos in what feels like a jam performed in the deepest of nights. As the guitar starts to add more and more layers over the song, the track begins to intensify and the drifting turns in to a mission that, with the help of some killer guitar work, has to be completed.

As keyboards and a solitary guitar riff opens up “delta-v”, the 3 piece create the perfect mix of a desert rock jam with a space rock trip. Lie back and you can see the sunrise just starting to break on the horizon whilst you can still see the stars and galaxies high above you in the night sky. The track has a hypnotic sense to it with a repetitive “mantra” feel behind the rhythm section as the guitar takes you to those galaxies far away in the distance. 

Title track “Heliosphere” closes the album with 15 minutes of showcasing what Mantra Machine can really do. There is a psych riff and back beat that the song always returns to, but one minute the song is all out stoner rock with cymbals crashing, the next there is a raw sounding guitar playing over soaring space like keyboards followed by psychedelia that just melts away. The whole thing is an absolute pleasure to sit back and enjoy the ride.

The digital version is out now via their Bandcamp page, which also includes the link to pre-order the limited edition gatefold vinyl version of “Heliosphere” on ultra-clear transparent or green clear with black marbled effect.

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