Greg Weeks

Awake Like Sleep

BY Jon BartlettPublished Feb 1, 2002

Sleepy sounds are certainly not foreign to Rochester-based Greg Weeks, but never have they so boldly embraced a psych-rock lineage, as if the master tapes have been soaked in a vat of decades-old acid. Weeks surrounds himself with brilliant contributors, such as Jesse Sparhawk, to bring his numbing vision to life. Strings, omni-chords, mellotrons, theremins - you name it, they're all here. Weeks nods to his former, simpler work early on, with his soft baritone enchanting on "These Days" and "Made," a track replete with mini-Moog coughs that hints at the noise to come. It's not until late in the record, especially on the closing "Sun Way Off," that Weeks brings on the band. The sound collages echo recent works by space-fuzzers Flying Saucer Attack and, of course, the countless '70s prog-psych output, be it Kraut or otherwise. Weeks has done it again, and commendably thrown in enough curves to merit a title change from singer-songwriter to composer.
(Ba Da Bing!)

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