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- One of the publicity shots from Verende, J. Gentle’s Sub Pop debut.
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- Jennifer Gentle – “Sacramento Session” – A Silent Place Records
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- Get down, get with it, get OFFFF …
*** The above is a Chinese ad for condoms that uses a Jennifer Gentle song as its soundtrack. Cool?
Jennifer Gentle – “Electric Princess” MP3/download [NOT representative of what's happening on Sacramento Session]
When I see a limitied-edition record by a psych-rock band, I GET IT, dealing with the consequences later. In the case of my purchasing Jennifer Gentle‘s Sacramento Session, however, there are no consequences to speak of; just magic.
I first heard these Italian Syd Barrett worshipers — they recently appeared on a tribute to SB with Besnard Lakes and many others — whilst working in college radio. For some reason I remember them having a female vocalist with a snotty delivery. As it turns out, history has taught me it’s actually a man singing on that album (can someone help me out here? It appears JG has had female members; did one of them singe on Velende? What the hell’s going on?) …
Not that singing has anything to do with Sacramento Session. This is all Religious Knives psych, with proto-’delic bass lines that serve as a rudder, time-chewing tom-toms, bird-call loops and, you guessed it, reams and reams of Marco Fasolo‘s wailing guitar cryin’ like Roy Orbison over-top.
That’s Side A; Side B is even more experimental, no drums or bass, just a collage of effects and loops and rumbling death heading to your door like a frothy bull with a ring through its nose the size of a hula hoop.
That’s pretty much it. You can read into it more, if you like, but the elements I just mentioned in the preceding paragraph form a crux that’s never codified or communicated in any other fashion, for better or worse. Other signposts:
- Acid Mothers Temple/Makoto Kawabata
- Ghost (Japan)
- White Magic
- The Psychic Paramount
- a legion of post-rockers that don’t quite have the juice
- several more bands from the ’60s I don’t have the time to catalog fully here, Cromagnon being one
- Bardo Pond (should’ve started with this comparison; Jennifer Gentle’s counter-measure in the world is B. Pond)
I don’t miss the vocals at all, though I find that side of Gentle to be appealing as well. The joy of Sacramento is listening to Fasolo, Alessio Gastaldello, Isacco Maretto, Liviano Mos and Francesco Candura do whatever the-fuck they want for an hour or so. No pretenses, no rules, no limits, no laws …
This kind of free-spirited group-think jamming often leads to little in the way of salvageable material. You won’t find that to be the case here, however. This is a must-have.
I should also mention Sacramento Session is a limited pressing of 500 copies on super-heavyweight black vinyl, shiny and alluring as a pelican moon lighting a deserted lakeside dock. Snatch this up or start grieving once these are sold-out (which they are NOT; you can buy copies of this from Sub Pop).
