Stone Table is one of those albums that’s still, all these years later, a mystery to me. The cd version which I own, apparently has a totally different mix from the vinyl, the track listing and names are confusing. Stone Tablet is a special kind of obscure mess.
Vanishing Voice are, Wooden Wand’s (aka James Toth) backing band but here, they head somewhere way more messy and chaotic. The 33-minute opener Stone Tablet / Peace Symbols heads straight back into the thickest Amon Duul acid trip. A rippling tribal groove slowly layered with percussion, voice and a super baked guitar. After the first 10 minutes of intensity, the piece slowly fragments and exposed more details in the fog before re-energising anew.
Confusingly Last Evil, the second and final track is in fact a cover of Scratching Peace Symbols In Your Tombstone by no less that Charles Manson. Clearly someone that’s more famous for truly hideous things, and is rightly cited as a huge example of the completely unacceptable permutations within the whole late 60’s hippy and psychedelic movement.
In a world where we rightly dethrone the wrong doers, deeply psychedelic music like Stone Tablet attempts the formidable task of separating the music from the musician. As such Stone Tablet remains a dark but superb reimagining of raw primitivism from another time. Whatever is actually going on this weird disc, it’s superb.
Go deep into Stone Tablet here
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