May 8 - A K9 Suite

On the final day of jam bands, I am writing about the band that got me interested in the genre: Motorpsycho. I think one can argue long and hard whether they technically are a jamband or not, but if you go down the checklist, these are their qualities that make me consider them one:

• Dedicated fans that travel from show to show
• Unpredictable setlists that change from night to night
• Long shows
• Songs that evolve into long, unpredictable jams

I think that's enough. Whether they officially are a jam band or not doesn't matter - they qualify for my purposes for this week's theme. Today's song is a great example of their jamminess. I really wanted to use All Is Loneliness from Roadwork Vol. 4, but I couldn't find that on YouTube - that is a great example of a 5 minute song becoming a 18 minute monster. Today's song started as a jam - they played along to Luis Bunuel's silent movie Un Chien Andalou, or An Andalusian Dog

at Cinemateket in Oslo, Norway in 1996. When this piece was recorded for their 1997 album Angels and Daemons at Play, it was name Un Chien d'Espace - or A Space Dog. And then, as a 30 minute long trippy version of it surfaced on Roadwork Vol. 1 (with the fantastic subtitle Heavy Metall Iz A Poze, Hardt Rock Iz A Laifschteil), but now it was named A K9 Suite.

I saw them several time during this part of their career, and the first 8 notes always made my hair stand up and the goosebumps commence full force. When the main riff starts and the Moog Taurus bass pedals thunder through the speakers and shake your solar plexus, all you need to do is give in. That is the power of music. That is the power of Motorpsycho.