Short Reviews [3rd Ear Experience - 2025 - "The Twilight Sutra"]

This is the eighth album by desert space rock band 3rd Ear Experience, but I must confess it is the first time I have come across them, thanks to my good friend Dr. Space who is one of the many musicians involved on this release. What we have here is a concept album which has actually been envisaged as a ballet, with the band currently attempting to raise funds for that to actually take place (and I truly hope they succeed as I can “see” that being an incredible experience). The story is that of a Viking boy and a Celtic priestess who live in parallel universes, often inhabiting the same space as they both sit by the same tree by the same pond, but of course cannot see each other. Slowly they subtly begin to merge, sharing thoughts within their dreams, but their parallel universes are also merging, and what does that mean? What I find remarkable is the number of diverse influences being somehow combined in a way which should never really work but it does, incredibly well. The directness of rock music is combined with the rhythms of African music, combined with Indian Ragas, Celtic Folk, New Age and so much more. In some ways it is as if The Levellers and Ozric Tentacles have gone on a very strange trip with early Genesis, Hawkwind, Ravi Shankar, Osibisa and Tangerine Dream and this is the result. It is an incredibly infectious piece of work, and even though it is more than 85 minutes in length the time just flies by as one falls deep inside the world being created between the ears. Vocalist/guitarist/composer Robbi Robb has created a soundscape which is hugely inviting, all-encompassing and very special indeed. Apparently, the album was recorded in the Mojave Desert over a period of 15 light-years, and given there are 17 musicians involved I can imagine it was quite a journey from beginning to end. This is truly progressive as here we have an album with a total refusal to conform to what anyone feels music should be like as they have smashed through artificial barriers and constraints to create something very special indeed.