Friday, July 13, 2018

Evil Triplet (Heavy psych by Austin punk pioneer ex-Terminal Mind) share first track from new album


"Evil Triplet have the psychedelic factor turned up to 11. You might just have an out of body trip through whatever space-time wormhole they were spawned from." -- Cvlt Nation

"Evil Triplet's laissez-faire, anything can happen attitude works really well. There's no pretense or chest thumping, just an enjoyable fuzzed out ride." -- The Sludgelord

"The band's power space rock punches all the right buttons: distortion, winding melodies, propulsive rhythms, astronautical lyrics, whooshing electronics - even the occasional Middle Eastern lift." -- Austin Chronicle


Austin trio Evil Triplet share the first track from their forthcoming sophomore album Have A Nice Trip on Super Secret Records today via PopMatters. Hear and share "Space Kitten" HERE. (Direct Soundcloud.)

Evil Triplet is a heavy psych trio from Austin, TX. The space rock behemoth is comprised of Steve Marsh (guitar and vocals), Kirk Laktas (drums), and Joe Volpi (bass).

Marsh traces back to Terminal Mind, a seminal band in the Austin punk scene of the late 70s that spawned The Big Boys and The Dicks (Super Secret offshoot Sonic Surgery Records will be reissuing Terminal Mind's original recorded output, plus unreleased studio and live tracks, later in 2017). He then led Miracle Room, a psychedelic industrial hoedown that shared stages with Snakefinger, Butthole Surfers, Scratch Acid, Negativland, and Sonny Sharrock, among others, and morphed into Wisdom Tooth, which released a CD on Knitting Factory's imprint.

Kirk is the keyboard wizard in post-rock bands My Education and Cinders, and was an early member of Stars Of The Lid. He has worked sessions with Acid Mothers Temple, Shearwater, Pauline Oliveros and ST37.

Mr Volpi toured and recorded with Primordial Undermind, as well as lending his chops to countless other Austin bands, including The Flood and Reverend Glasseye. He also performs a dark acoustic song cycle solo as Kaiser Soze, and plays standup bass in Cinders.

While not a double LP this time, Trip was also recorded at Sonic Ranch Studios in West Texas, produced by Rob Halverson and Steve Marsh, engineered by Charles Godfrey, mixed at Halversonics Recording in Austin, and mastered by Bob Weston at Chicago Mastering Service.

The songs on this album continue in the lysergic direction of the previous record, dealing with a world view that is decidedly psychedelic, while simultaneously growing in terms of song craft and also somehow gaining a more aggressive, explosive edge. The topics explored in the songs veer occasionally toward the interpersonal, albeit from a quizzical perspective ("Space Kitten", "Aren't You Experienced?") or a tortured one ("Open Heart", "Apparition"). "A Day Like Any Other" is surely about a day that was anything but ordinary, and "Pyramid Eye" takes on the disturbing image at the core of the Great Seal of the United States.

Once again, the group has attempted to use the studio to its full potential, adding mellotron, keyboards and swirling synths and electronics. While the overall trend is punchier, there are still the blissful space-outs. They even manage to use the time tested approach of turning the 24 track tape over and recording guitars backwards against the existing rhythm tracks, a la Hendrix.

Even the cover art is a trip, with the front cover deriving from a photo Marsh took of a paint drip in the corner of Rob Halverson's studio. The image was reminiscent of a falling human, which led to the album title.


Have A Nice Trip will be distributed by Revolver USA, available in 180g vinyl and CD at record stores or by mail order from Super Secret Records, and in digital formats on July 20th, 2018.



Artist: Evil Triplet
Album: Have A Nice Trip
Label: Super Secret Records
Release date: July 20th, 2018

01) Space Kitten
02) A Day Like Any Other
03) Aren't You Experienced?
04) Open Heart
05) Pyramid Eye
06) Apparition

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