Embryo - 1970 - Opal

A1. Opal
A2. You Don't Know What's Happening
A3. Revolution
A4. Glockenspiel
B1. Got No Time
B2. Call
B3. End of Soul
B4. People from Out the Space

Embryo is a band from Munich, Germany, exploring an eclectic range of styles, from jazz-rock to prog, to psychedelic jams with elements of blues to some middle eastern influences. All of which can be readily discerned just by the first two tracks. The two founding members are Christian Burchard (keyboard? possibly bass [by logic of reduction....the specific instruments don't seem to be formerly credited]) and Edgar Hofmann (sax). The other two members who are credited are John Kelly (guitar) and Ralph Fischer (vocals).

Along with their diversity, the four-piece blends perfectly together to create a diverse range of compositions that manage to be both concise and spontaneous, with the excellent and strange blaring of Edgar Hofmann's saxophone. This groundbreaking album was released on the ever-amazing Ohr, home to countless big names in German psychedelia right up there with the label Brain.

I'll avoid going into the specifics of each composition as I think the tracks will speak for themselves. Ralph Fischer's charming lament for the death of soul in 'End of Soul' is rather poignant considering his brief affiliations with Xhol Caravan. The LP is rather short but makes the best use of its time with seemingly no filler whatsoever, keeping the listeners attention from start to finish. Nothing more to say other than just fantastic jams, composition, and sax playing. 9/10

Et Cetera - 1971 - Et Cetera

Et Cetera's self-titled LP is the first album under this respective alias, and the second album by Wolfgang Dauner, whose project formerly went by Wolfgang Dauner Group. They are a talented group using many exotic instruments that blend together in a way that seems somehow chaotically organized.

A1 - Thursday Morning Sunrise
A2 - Lady Blue
A3 - Mellodrama 2a
B1 - Raga
B2 - Milkstreets

There's a variety of instruments used in this album, which are unfortunately uncredited. From the start you can hear the strange guitar-like instrument played by Dauner, whose existence I've been able to ascertain from the live footage. Thursday Morning Sunrise is challengingly atonal, going in and out of a coherent meter. The drum playing I think is  very remarkable, creating strange shapes with a sense of rhythm I can only compare to experimental jazz drumming. Lady Blue is a well written psychedelic spoken word accompanied by a haunting chorus.

After that theres a relatively brief interlude of the more conventional jam 'Mellodrama 2a' before jumping into the second epic 'Raga.' Less chaotic and more spacious than Thursday Morning Sunrise, it features even more wide an array of exotic instruments and percussion with a sitar that ties everything together. The album closes with the altogether meter-less Milkstreets, showcasing more of the drummer's dynamic rhythmic abilities.

Although the music doesn't go far beyond the realm of what appears to be mostly pure spontaneity, Et Cetera's self-titled release is wonderfully strange.They are talented musicians whose dynamic abilities with straddling the line between order and chaos are sufficiently interesting for the duration of this LP. 8/10