Band: Oresund Space Collective

CD Title: “The Black Tomato”

Band Website: www.oresundspacecollective.com

Label: Transubstans Records

Release Date: 2007

Space-rock fans, heads-up here’s a must-ad to your music library. The band is called Oresund Space Collective and the music they create is everything space-rock is supposed to be. This collective of eight individuals, some Danish, some Swedish and some American take the genre and work it. The Black Tomato is their third official release, although the band has as much as 35 hours of music available to be listened to or downloaded on their website.

Instruments used here aren’t just synthesizers although there are plenty of those. The Oresund Space Collective also employs traditional drums, guitars, bass and even a Hammond organ. A number of the members also work with a wide range of effects. Their musical style is one of improvisation. Getting together in the studio, turning on the equipment and playing, letting the music take you where it wants to. What that means is that there are only three tracks on this disc. The first “RumBle” is 38:35, the second is “The Black Tomato” is 32:05 and to close out the disc is the short 6:28 closer “Viking Cleaner.” Now each of these compositions is divided into shorter segments some seven or some eleven minutes, but it’s all joined together and you never really know when one slides into the next.

The music created by Oresund Space Collective is heady stuff. Forget about floating, dreamy style space music, the music of The Black Tomato has a trance-like, psychedelic-influenced heavy groove. The drumming is quite interesting to start, because rather just sitting quietly in the background, it’s constantly changing working with the bass to set a driving rhythm that propels the music along in quite a forceful fashion. The guitars, and there are three of them take turns playing lead lines that alternate from searing to soaring to intricate picking. That combined with the various synths, and there are three of them go about their business creating the atmospheric landscapes on which this music seems to float. For the most part this is pretty intense stuff, although there are moments of softer pastoral music that tend to bridge the more hyper moods allowing a little tension and then release. But man can these guys play in a groove. Part 3 of the title track “The Black Tomato” sets up a rocking riff between guitars and Hammond organ that just gets you movin’.

I have to say this is music that takes a few listens to really get into. The first time I put it on, I found it too intense, too much going on, too many notes, but then each time I came back to it, I found myself listening a little deeper and hearing what was being played beneath the surface. If this was to be your first introduction to the space-rock genre (and it would be a solid introduction) you might find it more than a little challenging. But if you are already a fan of the music created by bands such as Ozric Tentacles, Hawkwind or the rockier material from Tangerine Dream then you’re gonna love Oresund Space Collective. I’d highly recommend this to fans of the genre. The music of The Black Tomato is classic space rock and is totally out-there!