Alice's Orb

UK Alice's Orb are a part time, principally studio based band and one of the few able to do a convincing imitation of early Pink Floyd. Their origins lie in a noisy Luton pub rock band, The Twitch, who were active in the area from 1983-87. This band split, but Jeff Ross and two of the other members kept The Twitch going for another two years. Some of this band's material was released posthumously. After The Twitch folded, Jeff joined a punk band called Chocolate Foetus, the pinnacle of whose career was supporting the Mega City Four. Inspired by listening to the home made efforts of Bevis Frond, he next bought a four track portastudio and began recording his own music along with Martin and Alan from The Twitch. The results of these early sessions were released as the Alice's Orb tape, the first release on Jeff's Strangely Brown label. Like all the Alice's Orb tapes, this first one was obscure (although it is still available from Acid Tapes), but an idea of the quality of Alice's Orb at this time can be gained from the three tracks that made it onto the debut album, Mr. Phelps, Mi Lady and Teardrops. They are all very primitive and with muddy sound quality, although Teardrops in particular is a fine song with its bizarre sound effects and spoken mid section. The debut album, Even The Grass Is Full Of Acid, took its strange title from a line in a Star Trek episode and was a compilation of material that appeared previously on tape. Despite the primitive nature of most of the recordings (even though Jeff had upgraded to a six track somewhere along the line), most of the material came over quite powerfully. Alice's Orb is a suitably weird intro, mutating from a spacey synth passage into a chorus of You Are My Sunshine. Coalbarn Blues is the first of the many songs which have a strong Syd Barrett feel to them and is full of strange sound effects and jangling, discordant guitar. Telescope takes the Barrett feel further with feedback and Floyd-like organ set against a subsonic bassline; the song descends into psychedelic mayhem mid song. The percussion was played by a guest musician called Rusty. Horace's Magick Pyjamas is a fast, hard rocking instrumental with some inventive guitar work from Alan and one of the filthiest bass lines ever. The stand out track of the album is another Barrett-influenced number, Psycho Doodle, a very odd, eerie song with more pulsing bass guitar, sparse percussion and vocals pitched very low. The original demo version of this song has appeared on a French compilation, Come Together. Around the same time, Alice's Orb also supplied a song for the Psychedelic Psauna compilation. Don't Know If I Should is the most polished piece of music that the Orb have ever done and betrays a debt to the Beach Boys, another of Jeff's favourite bands, in its sound. Another tape, Pyramid, quickly followed the album after which Alice's Orb spent some time on the back burner. In 1994, Jeff formed a live band called The Microdots with Alan, Martyn and a new bassist called Nick Gylanders who had previously played in the interestingly named Oliver Reed Drinking Experience. He brought a number of songs with him, some of which would make it onto the second Alice's Orb album. Because the Microdots were playing principally Alice's Orb material, Jeff resurrected the Orb moniker and the band began sessions for a second album. Indelible Witch Cream is far heavier than the Acid LP, and generally has a better sound. There were three tracks which had originally appeared on the Pyramid cassette. Steve's Last Trip is a very strange affair and it sounds like there's a calliope somewhere in the mix, but the song is rather disorganised. On And On represents the band's tribute to Iggy and The Stooges and is barely controlled mayhem with guitar insanity and sound effects aplenty. The song was originally called Babblin' On which is why you can hear this in the lyrics. Giroscope is yet another Barrett-influenced piece with lots of guitar doodling and general strangeness. Two of the tracks come from the Microdots period. Chillin' With The Aliens is a frantic garage thrash and a bit of a guitar workout. The fast pace is also to be heard on High Times whose punky sound is complemented by slide guitar and bells. The other tracks on the album are equally good, particularly Obelisk and the Lewis Carroll-inspired Forgotten Ones with its backward taped percussion, fuzz guitar and strange vocal effects. The original intention was to release Indelible Witch Cream as a CD, and two other tracks were taped: Meatballs, a song dating from the Twitch days, and Mangrove Road. In the end, the album was released as an LP in a limited run of 500 and is sure to become a rare item in the future. Three tracks from Indelible Witch Cream were lifted for a German single, again in a limited run of 500. (Chris Williams) members: * [bandmemberJEFF ROSS vocals, guitar, bass, keyboards * [bandmemberALAN WOOLFORD guitar, bass, keyboards * [bandmemberMARTYN FORD drums * NICK GYLANDERS bass Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.