Wooden Shjips Vol. 1 is a compilation of early single releases by the San Franciscan four piece. Releasing through the labels Holy Mountain and Sub Pop, the band have been gradually gaining more recognition after their debut LP last year and spurred on by a moderate amount of media praise. The band bleed heavy rock, krautrock, fried psychedelia and drone into a sprawling messy unity on this patchwork compilation.

First track ‘Shrinking Moon’ is definitely the best, an 8 minutes 39 seconds long odyssey through a wind tunnel. Organ and guitar take residence in opposite speakers, the organ is a buzzing repetition, playing the same riff over and over and over. The guitar is chunky as fuck, feedback, fuzz, the lot, seemingly playing one chord over and over and over. They ram into either ear, with mindless power. The drums are fairly backgrounded, but add nice emphasis to the organ line. After a minute of this, a sliding steaming pile of slag cuts across, (another guitar), leaving piercing squeals, a sudden but welcome variation, even as the foundation to the song carries on without a backwards glance. Vocals appear with sun-stroked and stoned abandon, drawn out and unintelligible. After a while we get another variation on top of the repetition with a shattering squall of feedback slabbed on top of everything. Later there is a squiggly riff, reminiscent of Hendrix, and after a while the music seems to have dissolved itself into one long drone, all instruments are one.

‘Clouds Over Earthquake’ is shorter, but follows in a similar vein to ‘Shrinking Moon’, but with the organ playing extremely fast little riffs, and the drums adding a tension to everything, ‘Death’s Not Your Friend’ can also be lumped in with these two, too. The band go more experimental with ‘Space Clothes’, which is a juxtaposition of computer hum and swamp sample, water flowing, crickets and birds making sounds whilst a slowly progressing electronic drone is explored. ‘Dance California’ is a slower scaled back take on their signature sound, things are more chilled. There are astral plane riffs, (still crunchy, natch), high up the neck of the guitar and ruminative in mood, a high pitched soft organ drone and vocals that are reverby and help promote a mystical feeling. It’s all a bit like a slightly slowed down Hawkwind. ‘SOL ‘07’ was released just before their debut album, and could possibly be a live recording, with applause at the start and a quieter rougher mix altogether. The addition of horns and the prominence of the organ in the track are both good things, but the overall production values weakens the song's impact.

At their best this band can transcend space and time, with only the fried droning of the now mattering. Some reservations: it has to be said that the drums need to be heard more prominently, too often they are lost in the murk when they should be leading the way with their dour motorik stride. This is a compilation of early singles, and it suffers from this fact, in the sense that the band were obviously still exploring what they could do and what they wanted to do, thus leaving this release feeling slightly uneven. But the potential is there, oh yes. 72%

Links Wooden Shjips [myspace ] [official site ]