Moon Unit - Hell Horse and Heady Stratus

Don't be fooled by the extended krautrock intro of pulsing cosmic synths and noodling guitar that opens up Hell Horse and Heady Stratus, the second album from Moon Unit. The Solar Skull' soon sky rockets into the first of many guitar freakouts from this Glasgow based psych-noise trio, featuring Ruaraidh Sanachan (Nackt Insecten), Andreas Jonsson (Lanterns) and drummer Peter Kelly. If drums and keyboards are restrained here, they're clearly not on 'Mother's Ruin'. Against a heavy elongated drone and wild crashing drums the guitars here come over all piercing and shredded. The entire piece is a forceful noise jam.

Moon Unit's psychedelic noise improvisations teeter at the edges of a rock sound but like the best psych-noises outfits this bassless trio never fall into structure preferring formless excursions. There's little let-up on 'Too Many Blues' a spontaneous screech-fest of shredding guitars and rampant drumming, while 'Ten Horse Hairs' offers something of a comedown with its spacious drones. Things really come together again with the cosmic synths and floor-scraping guitars of 'Earth Collision', the entire thing combusting spectacularly into a black hole of sound.

Moon Unit are definitely onto something, as Hell Horse and Heady Stratus features some of the finest psych-noise improvisations I've heard in a long time. Hell Horse and Heady Stratus is released on heavy virgin vinyl in an edition of 500 copies with stunning full-colour totemic artwork from Jake Blanchard. For more information go to www.blackest-rainbow.moonfruit.com