Transatlantic experimental synesthetic sonic explorers The Flowers of Hell are back with their first new music since Symphony No. 1 in 2016. Their latest LP ‘Keshakhtaran’ is “a 42-minute mushroom meditation piece rooted in harp and sitar, augmented with tremolos, flutters, woodwinds, opera soprano and more.

Bandleader Greg Jarvis (who we had an interesting chat with a while back, which you can read here) explains that during Toronto’s 13 months of lockdowns, they discovered “most meditation music is crap made by someone with an Enya synth, so we decided to make our own to escape off into.

Ahead of the release of ‘Keshakhtaran’, “a tripped out … instrumental psilocybin meditation piece in two parts“, the band has released Foray Through Keshakhtaran, the first piece from their first studio album in six years.  You can have a listen the the single version below…

Jarvis explains how “Keshakhtaran began as a 40-minute ‘space guitar’ piece I’d done out of bits and bobs I’d been playing in my home studio for a girlfriend to meditate to in the months before Covid. During the pandemic, I found I couldn’t write anything new (nothing in, nothing out), but I pulled out the guitar track and started sending it to caged up band members and friends to add layers to, and soon I was mixing and editing away, creating a sonic world to escape off into.

With massages being some of the only human contact allowed in Toronto at the time and with one of my bandmates being a masseuse, I’d go in and test the mixes while over-micro dosing on mushrooms for a truly immersive experience that transported me from the bleak times. I’d then play the work-in-progress for bandmates in my ‘semi outdoor contact’ garage that I’d converted into a psychedelic shack with a lightshow and a fog machine, tweaking things until it reached its final form that you’ll hear”.

For Record Store Day this Saturday, 22nd April, Space Age Recordings will also release a deluxe first vinyl pressing of The Flowers Of Hell’s ‘Odes’ album, originally released in 2012; a collection of orchestral pop arrangements of some of Jarvis’ favourite songs.

The full ‘Keshakhtaran’ LP will be released digitally on May 12th with the vinyl (including an inserted bonus CD featuring a reworking of the piece by Pete Kember aka Sonic Boom) to follow in late 2023.

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