ALBUM REVIEW: Rides Again – Sonic Flower

Tapping into the sweet spot between rock ‘n’ roll blues and hazy psychedelia comes SONIC FLOWER, the side project of legendary doom outfit CHURCH OF MISERY. Taking an absolutely different approach, Rides Again celebrates groove and funk in a totally different way, leaning towards the party anthems of the late sixties as a way to explore heavy sounds, as opposed to straight-up doom. 

SONIC FLOWER were formed as a side project of CHURCH OF MISERY in 2001. Tatsu Mikami (bass, CHURCH OF MISERY) and Takenori Hoshi (guitars, ex-CHURCH OF MISERY) teamed up to play more bluesy and instrumental heavy rock influenced by 70’s acts such as CACTUS, GRAND FUNK RAILROADS, GROUNDHOGS or SAVOY BROWN. The result is Rides Again – an album which sounds like the members have finally been let loose on a project they’ve wanted to get stuck into for a while – each part is played with such joy and energy that every single song on this album is an absolute delight to listen to. Fun, energetic, cheeky and heavy, this album is made to be blasted at full volume and danced along to, a world away from the band’s doom-y past.

Jungle Cruise is easily the best original track on the record – it’s the one with the greatest range and variety, especially from drummer extraordinaire Keisuke Fukawa, who holds down the groove and proves his chops with ease. Also worth mentioning are the two covers on the album – a thunderous re-working of THE METERS‘ Stay Away (with more excellent drum work from Fukawa) and the relentless GRAHAM CENTRAL STATION‘s Earthquake. This band really proves their chops when working with someone else’s material. It’s a harsh truth, but it’s the case that arrangement is more their strong suit as opposed to straight-up song-writing. It kind of seems like SONIC FLOWER enjoys experimenting more with sounds and textures themselves rather than songs. 

Rides Again gains points by merely being fun and worthy of headbanging to, but the melodies are pretty simple for a band who follows conventional song structures but without any vocals. This means that you’ll get the usual verse-chorus outline, but instead of the dynamics and emotion of an added vocal line, you’ll get the same chugging riff four times in a row, before moving onto the next section. Don’t get this wrong, the riffs are excellent, satisfyingly heavy and played to perfection by the musicians, but throughout the whole record it does really feel like something is missing. Rides Again is an immense, fun, riff-based record. It’s not exactly going to change the game, but it sure will sound good played at full volume speeding down the motorway.

Rating: 6/10

Rides Again is set for release January 29th via Heavy Psych Sounds.