Munehiro Narita, the original “psychedelic speed freak”, is for many people the undisputed king of acid-fuzz guitar.
In active since the late 70s, Narita is a Japanese psychedelic underground legend. After playing in cult bands like Kyoaku no Intention, he founded the brutal heavy-psych power trio High Rise in the 80s. His furious guitar playing, which involves lethal doses of fuzz-wah at ear-splitting volume, can also be heard on his current band Green Flames (featuring Mitsuru Tabata from Acid Mothers Temple).
In 2014 Narita released a Japanese only CD titled “Psyche De Loid”, doing heavy guitar fuzzed-out covers of classic psych songs from the 60s/70s. But “Psyche De Loid” was also the first ever psychedelic album recorded using the Vocaloid technology. Very popular in Japan, Vocaloid is a software / singing synthesizer: you enter the lyrics of a song into the program, add music, and then you can have one of the Vocaloids – or “Vocal Androids”, mostly female – sing for you in a bizarre “android” type vocals.
“Vocaloid” is often associated with J-Pop but on “Psyche De Loid” Narita smash this “genre” into a wall with the contrast of killer, Ron Asheton-alike piercing fuzz-wah guitar and child-like “android” vocals, featuring surreal covers of tracks by Stooges, Hendrix, Blue Cheer, Shocking Blue, Pink Floyd, MC5, Jefferson Airplane…
Previously available as a Japanese only CD, here’s the first ever vinyl edition with new artwork.
“One of the finest acid-punk shredders to ever walk the planet, Munehiro Narita gives these time-honored psych rock classics a serious kick in the ass, in the most bizarre and Japanese of musical settings” – Steve Krakow (Galactic Zoo)
“Munehiro Narita (High Rise et al) bleeds all over a series of massively re-wired cover versions of classic psych while computer generated little girl vocals relocate the whole damn thing in another future altogether.” – David Keenan (Wire, Volcanic Tongue)
Tracklist:
Side A: Fire – Venus – Summertime Blues – You Keep Me Hangin’ On – Move Over
Side B: Born To Be Wild – White Rabbit – Kick Out The Jams – Astronomy Domine – Little Doll