The psychedelic trance group Juno Reactor is back at it again. Formed by Ben Watkins in 1990, the band joins forces with many other prominent musicians from around the world in order to deliver a very interesting mix of musical styles. Their new album, Inside The Reactor, was released on July 12 and it contains 11 songs that feature remixes from their past albums.
“Navaras” (MIDIval Punditz remix) introduces you to the album. This techno track incorporates many different sound effects as well as incomprehensible lyrics and it makes you feel as if Armageddon is coming. The bongos and shakers break out on “Conga Fury,” (Ace Ventura remix) for a very tribal tune. The fourth listing, “Mona Lisa Overdrive” gets much more upbeat as Thomas P. Heckmann does a great job speeding up this dance song. I would imagine that this track will be played a lot in clubs, perhaps not so much in America, but certainly in their native London.
The Bombay Dub Orchestra puts together a Spanish-sounding track that features an acoustic guitar with “Pistolero,” one of the finer tunes here. Mixed by Uber Tmar, the hardest song, “Hotaka,” sucks you right in and it doesn’t let you go. It almost sounds like the James Bond theme Rammstein and Combichrist blended together, making this one of the most intriguing songs I’ve heard in a long time. Some other tracks worth mentioning include “Children Of The Night,” “The Heavens” and the closing track, “Navras.”
This is a very unique disc, to say the least. It’s extremely trippy and it makes you feel like you’ve been taken to another dimension. Overall, the CD really isn’t too shabby, but perhaps it should only be reserved for dancing partygoers or fans of electronic music.
In A Word: Freaky
