Album Details

• Artist: Beehoover
• Album: Concrete Catalyst
• Label: Exile on Mainstream
• Year of Release: 2011
• ME Rating:
• Reviewed by: patchen on 2011-03-01

With some of the most tasty grooves this side of early Meat Puppets, the guitar/bass duo Beehoover explore blues, stoner rock, and more experimental quirkiness in search of those grooves. "Concrete Catalyst" is their latest assault on the predictable and un-funky. Beehoover are not odd for its own sake, however; this is one German duo that creates its own world not to be cool, but to help spread cool to this world.

"Ocean River" and "Five Minutes of Resistance" offer the kind of fuzzy, unpredictable  time-change for which the band is noted. Less noted are they for soulful vocals; bassist Ingmar Petersen and drummer Claus-Peter Hamisch are more noted for a call-and-response style more comparable to duets between Les Claypool and Suzie Creamcheese. A wonderful surprise then, is "Rocking Chair." This six minute mini-psych epic features somber, passionate singing  (by Petersen) which shines above and beyond deliberate repetitive monster groove. Likewise, the mostly silent acoustic "Wild Geese Yell" features inspired, if harrowing, half-chanted poetry.

Also on the epic side are "The Dragonfighter" and "Counted is Bygone," where the grooves stretch out and echo. The closer, a hypnotic, build-up-to full tilt "Trainer," ends the set with the same infectious fury with which it began.

Beehoover ought to be on a stamp for the way the deliver majestic and funky grooves, always with a hint of daring and fearlessness. "Concrete Catalyst" continues that assault on the conventional with power and style.

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