Psychic Lemon – Studio Jams Volume 1 Review & Band Interview

Sometimes a bad situation produces a good one, and in the case of a band member tripping on an amp and needing recovery time whilst also in lockdown, the vaults of Psychic Lemon have been opened and jams have been jammed out.

I am the first to admit that I was slightly late to the Psychic Lemon party and it wasn’t until I heard Live at The Smokehouse that my conversion happened. My world of Psychedelic Rock always borrowed from the Heavy Psych/Desert/Stoner Rock background, but the more I explored the bands from the Psychedelic/Instrumental/Krautrock world, the musical path crossings are limitless, and Psychic Lemon are one of the UK’s finest purveyors of Cosmic Psych Rock.

To quote the Cambridge 3-piece, “….we are releasing Studio Jams Volume 1, a 44-minute collection of our favourite jams, spread across three tracks. Two of the tracks are recordings of spontaneous jams, while the third track evolved from one. All three tracks were recorded live in the studio, using a £150 battery-powered recorder”.

Starting with 23-minute epic Jam 1, the bassline picks you up straight away and builds with the drums whilst both guitar and keyboard effects create the space travel feel, with the listener being taken from the edge of the atmosphere and out into the unknown. All three musicians are locked in perfect timing as the mission never once falls off course. The guitars soar towards you from above and beyond, the drum work, whilst never stopping, keeps throwing you more and more beats and cymbals to keep you on your toes as you can feel yourself hurtling into deep space, and the synth’s keep swirling and twisting at your brain. The intensity of the song has the epic Hawkwind Space Rock trip to it.

Jam 2 slows it down with a bigger, more rhythmic drum beat over a guitar that screeches slowly, whilst subtly sat quite far back in the mix, kind of reminding me of The Cosmic Dead. It feels darker in places like a giant hurricane, with the rhythm section being the eye of the storm that never stops revolving and the guitar acting as the volatile weather that you never quite know when its power will erupt. The explosive eruption doesn’t strike, but the huge walls of sound swirl round and round, leaving the listener in a state of near hypnosis.

The third and final jam, Jam 3, speeds up again with a lot more distortion in the mix this time ala The Heads. Feeling as though each instrument is travelling at speed and trying to elevate and take over, it creates a feeling of positive and negative particles pushing against each other, creating a powerful electric charge. Mix this with all the far out synths and keyboards and you are taken on quite a cosmic adventure. 

Following in from last year’s highly praised Freak Mammal, these 3 jams are a welcome continuation in to the minds of Psychic Lemon. To think this was jammed out and recorded live on a battery powered recorder show that the band are always at the top of their game. I’m sure post-injury and post-pandemic we will see more from the vaults, and be able to witness their explosive powers of psych in a live setting.

Knowing that they had been busy during the lockdown hear in the UK, I sent over a few questions to find out what else the band, Martin Law (Drums), Andy Briston (Guitar & Synth) and Andy Hibbard (Bass), have been up to…..

1. So how is lockdown and social isolation working for you as individuals as well as Psychic Lemon?

Martin: Thankfully, my life hasn’t changed much because I can work from home. Andy H says that he was already a hermit, so lockdown hasn’t changed his day-to-day life too much!
Andy B: I’ve been furloughed, which is great, but there’s no guarantee my job will exist when that scheme ends, so it’s a mixed bag. In the meantime, I’ve taken the opportunity to upgrade my home studio, explore my locale by foot and generally commune with the flora and fauna of my garden.
As a band, we’re still not able to rehearse or record with the lockdown, which is a shame. 

2. Your blog mentioned that Andy H badly dislocated his shoulder a few months back, causing the band to go on hiatus. How’s the recovery going?

Yes that’s right. It’s pretty serious as far as dislocated shoulders go. Andy H was offered surgery just before lockdown, but chose to try physio before making that call. However, it looks like surgery will be needed after all. That’ll be in September, and hopefully back to full rehearsals before the end of the year. We may do some very short sessions before then, but things won’t properly start back until the end of the year.

3. What’s the story with releasing Studio Jams Volume 1? Was it a matter of piecing together various bits of tracks and recordings or have you got a secret vault full of epic late night jams? 

We have a huge vault going back years. Every rehearsal involves at least one new jam, and we record everything, from little surf rock throwaways to 20-minute space journeys. These days all our tracks start from these recordings.

4. Had the three jams been compiled using older material or material you had already planned for a future record? 

It’s a mixture: two of the jams (Jams 2 and 3) were born on the same night, 17th December 2018, though Jam 2 is a one-off recording from that night and Jam 3 has been reworked over the last 12 months. That one is likely to end up on the next album. Jam 1 was a one-off recording from May 2019.

5. As you titled it Volume 1, is it right to assume that you have more volumes to follow soon? 

We’ll see how long the lockdown lasts, and how many tracks we can find that are well recorded. We are slowly cataloguing and reviewing (and mixing) things. We’ve just put out a live track for an NHS charity compilation with the promoter Fishbowl Events (https://fishbowleventsuk.bandcamp.com).

6. You had some killer reviews of Freak Mammal. How are you going to top it?

Thank you. We never have a grand plan when working on a new album, all we ever want is to end up with a collection of tracks that we’re happy with. Freak Mammal is dense and heavy in parts, so the next one may have more quiet moments on it. Though we thought the same thing before we started recording Freak Mammal...

7. I’m guessing that you are still itching to get out on the road to further promote Freak Mammal? Do you have any speculative plans for when you can all stand on a stage and rock out together again?

We’ve missed out on some big gigs, like the Shepherd’s Bush Empire, so we’re definitely looking forward to whatever the next gig is. That gig will now be going ahead in April, so that is the soonest one that’s definitely going ahead. We’re just excited by the prospect of just getting in a rehearsal room together and making some noise again.

8. Your records on Discogs fetch a fair amount for collectors already. Is there any represses in the pipeline?

We don’t think so, sorry! The repress of our second album, Frequency Rhythm Distortion Delay, is available on our Bandcamp page for £12. The first album, Psychic Lemon, was repressed just last November and sold out pretty quickly. Freak Mammal was also released in November, and although it sold out, I’m not sure if it will be repressed any time soon. You should interview Adam Harmsworth, who runs Drone Rock Records, and ask him! Represses are hard for independent labels, because although having every album in stock is good from an income point of view, it also means spending money on pressing records that might never sell, and it’s much harder to put together customer orders. Also your house would be filled with thousands of unsold records. 

9. Finally, do you think we will see any live music throughout the UK in 2020? Do you fear for independent venues, shops and record labels or do you think the dedication of all the underground music scene’s pulling together will make everything stronger in the end? 

We would love to get a gig in this year, but overall it’s looking a little grim at the moment. However, there is solidarity too. For example, the guy who runs our current studio has just had a successful fundraiser to keep his studio going. Other artists in the psych scene, like Black Doldrums, Helicon and Black Tempest, have been broadcasting live gigs at home as well. Now is the time for people to support the little people, in the music industry and elsewhere. Call up a local cafe directly and order something, buy things online from somewhere other than Amazon, buy your music from Bandcamp.

A big thanks from me goes out to Martin Law for sorting the interview. If you haven’t already checked Psychic Lemon out, then follow these links.

Website – Bandcamp – Facebook – Twitter – YouTube – Instagram