With the benefit of hindsight, it's obvious that Dutch ensemble 35007 were still finding their footing, creatively speaking, throughout their 1994 debut album, Especially for You. It's not that they hadn't already settled on the fundamental stoner, psychedelic, electronic, and space rock elements that would define the first few years of their career; they just hadn't figured out how to combine them into a balanced sonic fusion just yet -- or else this album is a landmark in schizophrenic abstract sound collage techniques. Opener "Zandbak"'s dominant guitar riff stutters into view and rattles along rather clumsily until a fluid synth solo takes over; next cut "Cosmic Messenger" feels altogether cluttered, there's so much going on, yet provides the best Silver Surfer soundtrack music since Joe Satriani's Surfing with the Alien; "Basiculo Ad Cunnum" is basically motorik on crack, suffused with wireless radio interference and a nod to Monster Magnet; the mellow and trippy "Suave" hints at 35007's future ambient reinvention via 2002's Liquid; "Bad Altitude" and "The Elephant Song" both feature rare commanding performances by frequently overruled vocalist Eeuwout Baart; then he duets with a mystery-tongued woman on the cryptic "U:Mu:M'Nu:" before the guitar and sound effect-drenched "Water" drags all of this musical flotsam and jetsam out with the morning tide. Sound chaotic? It is, but one could say that Especially for You's gobsmacking eccentricities kept things almost as interesting as they were confusing, until 35007 could bring some order to their ideas on more consistent efforts yet to come.
© Eduardo Rivadavia /TiVo