Firefriend – Fantasma
Firefriend – Fantasma was released on November 26th 2020 as a Bandcamp DL however plans are in the works for a vinyl release in 2021.
Firefriend – Fantasma
Firefriend – Fantasma is a dark psychedelic rock album with shoegaze, post-rock tenancies. This latest album have the eerie dark bass steady almost beat machine like live drums and extended reverberating and echoing guitars with dense fuzz tones. The vocals sound great coming in with ominous notes and reverb to draw the psych factor. The songs are shimmering reflections of sound refracted in the icy canyons of dark imagination. The cold reverb tones can be very chill and mellow or blast with killer fuzz tones and laid back drumming.
Firefriend – Fantasma has great songs that all stay in the 3 to 5 minute range. They are a guitar forward band and allow the sustained notes to fill the mix. the vocals are soft and punctual with an emotional apathetic appeal that is spiked with attitude. The lyrics are melancholic with lines line “Trying to find another way to live in this world” and “In the mornings I feel so hollow” and “There is more to life than just death.”
The tone of the album fits this honest downer outlook with reaching echoes that make distance and create a sense of isolation in a vast space. The vocals become fragile and serious with a mellow presentation. The sound pours out slowly as though its traveling through a viscus environment and being slowed down. The lag of timing is enhanced by the time effects and slap back which distort against the tight rhythm of the drum and bass. The bass gets into the reverb action as well in some areas of the album like in ‘666 Fifth Avenue’ where it also has chorus of a 80’s tone.
‘Ongoing Crash’ is a psych rock songs that brings to mind the vocal phrasing of Alex Maas of the Black Angels. The guitars are fuzzed out with tremolo and loads of reverb. Its driven sound is perhaps the most vintage or popular music orientation on the album. Overall, the Psych genre is not concerned with single or radio play but Firefriend has a few songs that could make awesome singles.
The sound quality on this album is very good the mix has warm tones and clear isolation of the various instruments. Each musicians performance it strong and the overall effect is highly inspired.
This album will appeal to fans of Brain Jonestown Massacre, Magic Shoppe, Alien Mustangs, My Bloody Valentine, Spacemen 3 and other spacey psych rock with shoegaze elements. They grab tones from the 80s, 90s, and today to craft their songs. Tone is very important in this style of music and Firefriend uses wonderful fuzz tones and effects that make their music stand out above their contemporaries.
Firefriend – Fantasma is the 11th full-length from the São Paulo, Brazil musicians. Their debut self Titled album was released in 2006 and many of their album were self released in limited editions. The last few years they have been partnering with Cardinal Fuzz Records and Little Cloud Records with great success. They are hyped by the psych rock community year after year and put out amazing vinyl that gets a repress or two.
Excited to see what the vinyl release will look like for this album and I assume it will be out on Little Cloud records or Cardinal Fuzz but time will tell. for now its direct Downloads from the bands bandcamp site. be sure to head over there and support this awesome band.
Firefriend – Fantasma
https://firefriend.bandcamp.com/
About The Psych Rock
Hi everyone ThePsychRock.com is my outlet for the music I love. The psych Rock genre is growing exponentially however the music is very hard to track because it comes from all over the world on labels large, small and even self released from the bands. ThePsychRock.com is here to help you find the best newest psych rock. please follow the page check out my unboxing series on youtube at The Psych Rock and follow me on the social media.
I am into album that are rare and limited so I created a news section for pre-order announcements and other interesting music news.
The end of the year is fast approaching and I have some best of lists in the works. I am behind on reviews sorry to all those who emailed me but I am working through all the stuff and trying to find all the great albums I missed before posting my best of lists and I missed a lot. Its been a knock out year for psych so make sure to scroll through and find all the music you missed and get introduced to new bands!
Thank you to many thousands of people who visit the page and thank you most to the labels and artist making the music that keeps me inspired. Together we can make psych rock the best music in the world and help people find it too!
Thank you so much and yes we do all need psychedelic rock acid folk music in 2021 we need more hippies in our world. Peace n love brother.
Very informative!!! Thanks my friend, can’t wait wait until the next one!!! Much love from dmtworld.net!!!