“The year was 1975. CAN, the biggest name in Krautrock, released the poor Landed, and would sell out with their next album. Amon Duul II, another founding Krautrock band, was pretty much completely dead (at least as far as their ability to make music that mattered). NEU! was in the process of breaking up, and released a patchy album (albeit with some great material on it, but also some equally not-so- great). Faust was in the midst of a five-year disappearance. Ash Ra Temple was gone, and their follow- up, Ashra, would not produce a studio album until 1977. 1975 was not, in short, the greatest year Krautrock had seen. It seemed to be entering a decline (one it has not ever really exited) like the one symphonic prog hit in the late 1970s as the big names like Yes and Genesis turned pop. But amidst this turmoil there arose an amazing band…Dzyan, and they were out to show that Krautrock was still alive and kicking, and, wow, did they ever succeed.
The songs on this album incorporate Krautrock “freakouts,†ethnic influences, avant-garde percussion, great mellotron work (as another reviewer put it, “mellotrons from hellâ€), and just a tad of everything else you can think to name. “Back to Where We Come From”, the opening song, contains a liberal dose of spacey sound effects and also uses the same instrument King Crimson used for the beginning of Larks’ Tongues in Aspic Part 1 to start, and then slowly incorporates all the elements I mentioned earlier (and a few more as well). The drumming/percussion on this song is some of the greatest I’ve heard, continuing in the Krautrock tradition of stealing the show (though they do tone it down just enough – which isn’t much – to allow for a similarly wonderful guitar solo near the end). A Day In My Life shows amazing use of the sitar, and The Road Not Taken builds up for three and a half wonderful minutes to one of the greatest Krautrock freakouts I know, which ends the song in marvelous fashion. Again, it’s impossible not to mention the drumming, which is as incredible as ever. Khali blends the sitar of A Day in My Life with the “mellotrons from hell†a fellow reviewer mention. For Earthly Thinking is probably the standout song on this album, building perfectly to include all of the elements I mentioned earlier before hitting a Krautrock freakout even better than that on A Day in My Life. This song is almost post-rock in nature, given its lengthy-buildup-to-amazing-climax format, a genre that, like world music, would not be defined until much later (I’m not suggesting that this song sounds like post-rock, just that it foresees the basic post-rock structure). Electric Silence (the title track) closes the album just as wonderfully as it began, with more amazing percussion, ethnic influences, and the like.” – Prog Archives
Dzyan
Electric Silence
MediaFire Download Link
Tracklist:
01. Back To Where We Come From
02. A Day In My Life
03. The Road Not Taken
04. Khali
05. For Earthly Thinking
06. Electric Silence
