Nicklas Sørensen, Martin Rude and Jakob Skøtt are back.
No, that sounds wrong.
With this new studio recording being the fifth release of Edena Gardens in the span of only four years it doesn't actually feel like the Danish trio has ever actually been away. At least I cannot claim that I've grown tired of their previous output thus far. But of course I will gladly take this new offering anyway!
EDENA GARDENS - Dispossessed (LP) (2025)
The improvisational instrumental Psychedelic super group made out of members of Papir, London Odense Ensemble and of course El Paraiso Records founding band Causa Sui presents itself in an often dry, stripped down way on "Dispossessed".
The album starts with the slow cowboy Doom chords of "Hiraeth", very akin to Earth and maintains a relaxed bluesy atmosphere, which sometimes lifts off into wider dreamier spheres, while still keeping one foot firmly in the dirt of the bare ground.
Between desert Americana and Post Kraut the organic flow of guitar, bass (or baritone guitar) and drums switches of your body clock with each of the eight tracks seperating you farther from your common perception of time.
As the ultimate logical conclusion of this experience the slow motion twangs, howls and Ambient textures of the ten-minute piece "Aftenstjerne" are a great way to close this album.
While many cover artworks of the label are created by Jakob Skøtt, "Dispossessed" is actually graced by a painting of another band member, bassist Martin Rude.
Visually and acoustically: beautiful work, everyone!
Damn, half of the year is already over again! So here's a very quickly in the moment decided selection of my favorite fifteen albums of 2025 so far. No long write-ups, no distinction between live and studio releases. Just great music!
This is so impossible... more than one release I considered a TOP 5 candidate before is already missing here. But maybe those will return in six months, who knows?
It's summer and I'm slow, falling behind with my to-review list again. But then it's also summer and page impressions are slow, too.
But anyway, I have to warm up again at some point, so instead of a proper insightful music review here's my "look what I've got!" from two weeks ago at Esbjerg Fuzztival in Denmark:
CAUSA SUI - In Flux (random colour ecomix vinyl 10" 2LP) (2025)
Ha, busted! You got me! I didn't even buy this in the merch room. In fact for some reason Causa Sui weren't able to bring stuff to sell there. So no, I already had their latest studio album before.
"In Flux" doesn't lay out a radically new path for the instrumental quartet, but pretty much continues right where last year's "From The Source" or the latest live release "Loppen 2024" left off. There's no twenty+ minutes multi-part Psych Prog epic on here (well, "Astral Shores" at least cracks the sixteen-minute mark), but all in all it's the same perfectly balanced mix of fuzz and wah-wah heavy Stoner Rock, Latin Fusion ease and cool Americana, which - performed by these players - at this point has become such a signature sound, that you could almost talk about Causa Sui by the numbers.
Of course that sounds unnecessarily disparaging. But you know that these numbers are super creative and high, right? So yeah, no doubt that "In Flux" is awesome. Presenting the album in agatefold cover as a double 10" record is the icing on the cake. The vinyl comes in random colours and I got green and teal tones which fit the artwork quite well. Beautiful!
I already lamented starting my merch spree a couple of minutes too late, so I missed the last vinyl copy, which Skyjoggers brought with them on their sixty-day tour. But hey, music's the same on the CD! So here comes a sweet thirty-six minutes injection of heavy, crunchy, fast and fuzzilicious Space Rock for fans of Karkara (who had sadly cancelled their Esbjerg show), Slift, "Nonagon" era King Gizzard and their likes.
While the studio recording in all its raw explosiveness cannot even convey the full extend of the Finnish trio's on-stage energy, "12021: Post-Electric Apocalypse" undeniably is a veritable Kraut banger. Hop onto the rumbling Psych'n'Roll express train now!
GREEN MILK FROM THE PLANET ORANGE / FUCKWOLF - Let's Split (裂けても) (LP) (2025)
Let's continue with the last vinyl copy which I could score: It's a colourful Psych Rock split featuring two bands from Tokyo and San Francisco.
Green Milk From The Planet Orange (the band which actually played in Esbjerg) occupies the first half of this LP with a nineteen minutes long live recording of just one track called "Concrete City Breakdown". Just like during the festival listening to this trio feels like a continuation of Skyjoggers, but even wilder, stylistically wider, more skilled and more emotional. And this is not a jab at the former at all; I saw their drummer watching his counterpart here laughing with a wide open mouth. No, Green Milk are just an unbelievably crazy force Psych Punk Prog'n'Roll with that special spark that feels distincitively Japanese and must have something to do with something in the volcanic water over there. And this recording is a nice raw document of what a show of them feels like.
Fuckwolf spread their creativity over more tracks, presenting six song between two and a half and slightly below seven minutes length. And each one of those shows a different side, from atmospheric analog synth moods to punkish noisy Kraut explosions, from desert hike soundtrack to journeys towards the event horizon and beautiful dreams of love and peace under the burning Frisco sun. Neat.
GREEN MILK FROM THE PLANET ORANGE - Tragedy Overground (CD) (2025)
The highlight of Green Milk From The Planet Orange's show was a new, over twenty-two minutes long Prog piece, and this is the single / EP, which contains it. After a slow pinkfloydishstart "Tragedy Overground" escalates through multiple wild crescendos of burning Prog Punk, Noise Rock (and even small bits with a jazzy vibes, which you might miss as you're hurrying along with this) before finally returing to the opening theme and - of course reprising all the madness that happened before once again in a wild synopsis. It's brilliant, for sure one of my my favorite tracks of 2025 so far!
WYATT E. - Mount Sinai / Aswan (3 colours striped vinyl LP) (2015/2025)
The Belgians for sure brought a lot of merch, including new pressings of some older albums which were missing in my collection. And who can say no to coloured vinyl releases by Heavy Psych Sounds? I know, normally I prefer my coloured vinyl to have some connection to the artwork, but come on, this pink/yellow/blue thing was just too tempting!
Musically the two instrumental longtracks "Mount Sinai" and "Aswan" already point to the direction the Psychedelic Doom trio would go later, yet they don't add as many electronic, vocal and percussive elements beyond the realm of hypnotic Drone and Doom Metal yet.
On the B side however a certain Near Eastern groove, bass pedal synths and bongos already come into play. And even though Wyatt E. later evolved beyond the sound we're hearing here, it doesn't diminish this earlier work in any way. The aesthetics were already set, this is just the first chapter in a (so far) front to back captivating discography.
Great album and reissue!
WYATT E. - Exile To Beyn Neharot (transparent black and orange splatter LP) (2017/2025)
Well, aren't they economic? Two years after "Mount Sinai / Aswan" Wyatt E. followed it up with another album of two epic tracks, which just reused the same cover, just horizontally flipped. As if the drawing on the inlet wouldn't have been a dope alternative. I guess there was some conceptual meaning behind this decision, making these two sister releases. The new splatter vinyl reissie definitely is nice to look at as well.
The deep Drone, the mystical sounds and Oriental elements, the Krautrock vibes and cosmic Berlin electronics, the undeniable Dead Can Dead influence, they have all entered the temple and are here to stay now. The drum performance gets more advanced, as well as the production of it all. Noone is singing yet, but this is just the step you'd retroactively expect between the debut and "Āl Bēlūti Dārû" in 2022. A flawlessy beautiful hypnotic Doom ceremony.
DAEVAR - Sub Rosa (CD) (2025)
Last but not least - following the Fuzztival running order - here's the latest album from the German trio Daevar. Call it Shoegrunge or call it Dream Doom! Whatever. Dont call it female-fronted, because despite being technically correct that term is somehow dumb and icky. Listen to it and enjoy great songs with catchy melodies and rumbling Stoner riffs!
Last weekend I made a little trip to Denmark for my second edition of Esbjerg Fuzztival. There was some back and forth about the event's location, since the original place wasn't available and the alternative in a tent outside the center of town proved unpopular. So ultimately it moved back to the original venue, but onto the first floor instead of the ground level. Was this a downgrade? I cannot really say, because when I was there back in 2023 the festival took place at yet another different venue altogether. But I wasn't under the impression that anyone was disappointed.
It would definitely have been convenient to return to the Huset Esbjerg just for the close proximity to my car which was standing in the free public parking lot next to it. On the other hand the Tobakken venue as well as my hotel were both only a ten minute walk away. And even though the Huset vibes had been cool, it felt less crammed this time - and I also preferred this year's smaller, more intimate stage.
There was a spacious merch room, many sitting accommodations for inbetween the shows, a food truck that offered a good shawarma and the weather was much better than the rain during my drive had promised.
All in all I found only few general things to complain about, like serving zero zero sugar soft drinks at the bar. Or claiming it was a smoke-free room, when one specific guy smelling like a hundred years of lung cancer rendered that sign a total joke.
And even though the old-school Psychedelic projections light show surely is cool and a trademark of the event, it gets tiring after a while. And once again I'm not only saying it, because it were challenging conditions for my little toy camera or I just want to be that edgelord with the unpopular opinion. In my mind it would just be more effective if it were reserved for those shows, where it actually fits the mood. Because some music simply works better with punchier lights actually interacting with the sound instead of just being an endlessly floating space trip.
For the first band of the afternoon however - the space trip it was!
VESTJYSK ØRKEN
Like every year the Fuzztival opened with its house band. And I learned that Vestjysk Ørken either are a trio now or always have been and the bassist was just missing the last time I saw them.
Once again their fuzzy Stoner Psych sound set the tone for a lot of what was to be expected on these two days. Their sound surely was heavier this time. The long movie dialogue samples, which mainly occupied the spaces without vocals or lead guitar gave them a nice recognizable touch.
And the song "Dune" logically lead to the next band on stage...
DUNES
Dunes weren't bad, but I must admit that I needed a YouTube reminder to refresh my memory of them. They probably were the purest Desert Rock band on the billing, pretty cool live for sure, but if they had any special sauce that should be mentioned, I'm sorry that I don't remember it. It's just not the style that clings to me or makes me want to listen to it at home - and I was quiet tired at this time of the day. See what a big bag of excuses I have?
APTERA
Wakey, wakey! My homework for the festival had been brief and weeks ago, so I was genuinely surprised what a raging alarm call awaited me with this all-female quartet from Berlin.
Most videos you can find of Aptera will show you that only a couple of years ago the band was centered much more around Blues and Stoner elements, which would instantly qualify them for this festival. But now their sound seemed much more like a mixture of Crust Punk furor, Speed Metal lead guitars and thunderous Brutal Thrash even escalating in blast beats. And with how much joy the drummer delivered those! Her whole performance was incredibly fun to watch.
Yeah, this show was the one which made me feel like the festival had just truly started. Definitely the most atypical band here, but just as much a highlight of the day.
DAILY THOMPSON
A bit of Punk flavour also spilled over to the next show, but that was only one of many ingredients of Daily Thompson's sound. The German trio with alternating male and female lead vocals combined Hard Rock, Grunge, Psychedelic Stoner Rock, yet also some surprises like Surf and Country vibes with a cigar box guitar to an entertaining whole. Rock'n'Roll!
CAUSA SUI
Besides various artists on Saturday Causa Sui playing one of their rare live shows was once again one of the biggest pulls for me to buy the Fuzztival ticket in the first place. And the Danish Instrumental Psych Rock masters didn't let me down.
With a setlist that included tracks from at least five albums since "Euporie Tide" (2013), while of course also focussing on the recent release "In Flux" they made sure to present a wide spectrum between Desert and Mediterrean, California and Latin America, Fuzz, Fusion and Kraut. Everything this group does just feels so intuitive and tasteful. A dream to float in, both in its featherly lightness and its crunchier and wilder crescendos.
What a band. Flawless!
DEAD MEADOW
No, I didn't mix up my pictures! That's still Causa Sui's Jakob Skøtt behind the drumkit. I actually still don't know what exactly happened, but somehow the drummer of Dead Meadow had an emergency. And as Skøtt told me after breakfast (we happened to stay in the same hotel) the next morning, he actually only knew directly after Causa Sui s show that he would fill in for this gig.
The original plan was to play maybe one song together and then let singer/guitarist Jason Simon do a solo set afterwards. But during soundcheck they made a couple of ten-second test runs through various other tracks ("yeah, we could do that") and suddenly it became almost a complete full band performance. Since I'm not familiar with the band's original material I can only assume that they probably sounded a little more like Causa Sui than usual this night, but both on and off stage everyone was impressed by how smoothly this solution worked.
Given how great the interplay of this unrehearsed spontanous constellation already worked, I must imagine that a regular show of the group would surely have been another level of amazing. Given the circumstances however this show couldn't have been saved better.
Simon still ended the show with a couple of solo songs, but I didn't stay for all of it, because it had been a long day and I was eager to fall into my bed.
