You can sort of tell a little bit about Finnish band Kiki Pau’s evolution by looking at their old promo band photos.  The photos of yore show a young-looking bunch of (smiling!) kids.  In contrast the band’s current photo is much more somber. Noone is smiling, and most are sort of studiously looking off-camera.  It’s the perfect graphical representation of a band who began in spirited pop/rock and then changed course into a psych-rock group that focuses on “inner space/time-traveling.” The lesson here kids is that psych-rock will make you unhappy.

I’m just kidding around – for all intents and purposes the band should be smiling in their current picture rather than the other way around.  Their current sound is certainly something to smile about – a lush mix of neo sixties psych, krautrock, and jam rock.  Their first single “Tomte Mars,” very slowly builds up a bluesy guitar groove over a hypnotic bass line for the space of around six minutes (punctuated by the occasional intense harmonica blast) before adding in the band’s harmonized space-centric lyricism bring everything home.  The band does a nice job of drawing out an 8+ minute song without getting bogged down in tedious repetition.

Check out the tune below and if you dig it you can pick up Kiki Pau’s third full length Pines via Beyond Beyond is Beyond Records on 2/5.

— Jon Behm

Jon Behm