Mirza Albums (5)
What The Critics Say
A useful after-the-fact reissue that collects the group's initial four-song EP along with seven otherwise available cuts, Last Clouds makes a good case for Mirza as one of the better American post-rock/space rock bands of the '90s. If the combination of smoky psychedelia, instrumental jamming, cascading blissout, and tense drama -- the latter in particular being the group's secret weapon, as cuts like the opening "Nostalgia" show -- wasn't per se unique, the end results still make for an excellent listen. Eschewing vocals in favor of letting the music itself be the calling card, the quartet more often than not transcends obvious influences to achieve their own reasonable blend of meditative calm and rough, strong power. Certainly anyone thinking that Mirza was just a Steven R. Smith project would get a fine surprise from the sense of full-band connection here -- if the tracks weren't recorded live, they certainly sound like it. Hearing the near-Cure-level bass that starts off "East" and drives it and the band forward to an explosive effort that easily reaches the peak of prime Ash Ra Tempel makes for a fine, fierce experience, as does its equally involving counterpart, "West." The hitherto unreleased cuts, if sometimes lacking the richness that the mostly eight-track recordings used for the EP possess, still make for a great listen. More than once the band ends up sounding even more intense than ever -- "Acts/Volcano of Birds" practically charges out of one's speakers in a mess of distortion and rampaging drums, while "Dust Crushed From a Moth" is at once monstrous and majestic, epic guitar leads sailing out over the rhythms. Other winners: the quiet start to guitar rage of "Caspian Sea" and the more restrained zoneout of "Cypress Trees," brief but still captivating. ~ Ned Raggett, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
Part of Darla's Bliss Out series, Anadromous finds Mirza mostly pursuing longer efforts, totaling four songs over 40 minutes. Though there are instances here of the group's excellence at mind-melting guitar overload, the quartet finds a generally calmer course here, drawing out the more restrained side of their earlier work to find a new context. The opening track, "Dream of the Fossil Sea," shows how this works well; as everything begins to intensify almost 11 minutes in, it still never quite explodes, with a bit of feedback crumble around the sides left as a hint of what might have been. As always the emphasis is on instrumental work with all vocals absent, with a particular focus on live exploration -- one can almost sense the bandmembers testing each other softly with their contributions, finding new ways and new melodies to work with. "Bless This Gathering" finds Mirza at their most overtly rocking for the album, though not quite as totally crazed as some earlier efforts. It's still quite fine, though, getting more and more tightly wound and freaked out until it collapses into a fuzzed-out blast of chaotic static and a series of low drones. "These Are Our Last Days" keeps some of that intensity but carefully underplays it with subtlety, whether from the nagging piano key in the background or the guitar crumble into charging riff that still sounds like it was recorded from one room over. "Aphasia" ends up having the best start of the songs, with almost gong-like percussion and dark, murky loops mixing with very random vocal samples from heaven knows what source. From there the band turns it into a beautiful but still unsettling dream of a track, taking a steady and slow head-nod pace, though in a nice twist from convention the song itself ends at under the five-minute mark rather than well over it. ~ Ned Raggett, All Music Guide
