Customer Reviews

Drop (+ Bonus Tracks)

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4 star:		(1)
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This Scottish band sounds a lot like a latter-day Electric Prunes, notably on the tracks "Strange Day's Dream" and "The Other Side," two strong cuts, especially the latter. My pick for the hottest track is "Through My Window," a sweet psychedelic pop number. "Something About You" is another strong tune. By comparison to The Electric Prunes and other '60s psychedelic bands, The Shamen is less raw but they benefit from modern production and a nicely layered sound.

Fans of the early Shamen were bitterly disappointed by their transition into a techno-rave band. Such is life. The transition is uncomfortably chronicled on the rare CD "What's Going Down?," which contains a couple cuts from "Drop", a cover of The 13th Floor Elevators' "Fire Engine" and a clutch of techno-psychedelic numbers of varying quality and differing levels of techno and psychedelia.

For fans of modern psychedelia, "Drop" is undoubtedly one of the best albums out there. It has a great sound and pop feel. A few weak tracks is all that keeps it from a five-star rating.

As it stands this is a highly listenable collection of cod-psychedelia songs but there's a slightly uneasy feeling listening to this. If you felt that The Shamen were their best at being astral technoid hippies then by all means this album is not for you. This tends to be a little dour and well you can't help but feel that it stinks a little of being a bunch of Luddites playing the standard rock fare. Indeed it's reminiscent of a lot of 60s psychedelia and it brought in many bands such as The Stone Roses and The Happy Mondays but......it's difficult to love really. It feels like they're being a rather anaemic tribute band to Pink Floyd and the 13th Floor Elevators with a side dish of The Cure just to make them feel a little more contemporary and more favourable to the indie world.

Still I can't fault Through With You which is good in any way, shape or form, I Don't Like is also another one that stands out. But the one that really stands out is the bonus track Christopher Mayhew Says A Lot, it really begins to show the way The Shamen were turning and is a hell of a lot more interesting. The sample behind the song actually has a rather neat story attached. In the 1950s, a politician called Christopher Mayhew, under supervision of doctors took mescaline live on TV and then described the effects he was having as it happened. So he would be asked " Are you here now? " " Yes I'm here. No, wait, I'm off somewhere else now!" Truly remarkable. I doubt we'll see the like of that on TV ever. Surely some TV station in Britain has it lying around in the archives section.

But to get to the point of this album, this is an interesting curiosity for all Shamen fans. You may enjoy this album but it's far from their best if you ask me