“Let’s get Lucid” Album Review

“Meet the Devil – as we lean into hell, with a smoke in our hands, and the Devil lights up with a blaze of demands…”; if this sounds familiar from your own life experience, then BABAL’s new album “Let’s Get Lucid” will definitely appeal.

Lyricist/singer Karen Langley told me;” We brought out “Who will I be when I leave?” last year as a kind of question. Our latest musical journey is connected to that. It’s dealing with how we live/accept life, our coping mechanisms, distractions and dreams/nightmares”.

On first listening to “Smoking with the Devil” the opening track, I was immediately drawn into the many-layered musical landscape by Rob Williams on guitars/synths, evoking progressive 1970s ideas alongside jazz rock crossover territory.

Karen’s unique dark tones unravel and fold into Zappaesque couplets and deep dystopian blues, describing a chance meeting with Lucifer…….it descends accordingly….

On the second track “Learn to entertain yourselves”, we move into what initially sounds like a brighter plane, but which swiftly dives down into an expose of modern life under the eyes of CCTV and hours in front of screens and pads.

“Take off your shoes, go walk in the wet, wet, wet grass, and let this neural highway pass you by for a while”, invites Karen in a sweet jazz vocal that softens the impact of the dreadful time-wasting consequences of our over-connected lifestyles.

The track then lurches toward the fragmented with Rob and drummer Jon Sharp bringing an almost circus-like quality as Karen depicts a world that is “dazzling, dizzying, coming undone”. It ends in a most unexpected quasi-spiritual feel that brings a certain hope from the craziness.

Out of that and into “Radical” – the song BABAL has chosen (rightly in my opinion) as a single release. This really is meaty! Reminiscent again of jazz crossover pieces of the finest 1970s-era caliber, this song is completely on-point for the present times. “No more soft-peddling, I want to be radical! Speaking from the front of the car, not the back-seat driving or skiving in my 9-5 late lunch latte long meetings”.

On the page, it looks weird, but when Karen sings it with her eccentric phrasing and sarcastic passion, it sounds perfectly hard-hitting.

The middle crazy chorus section is a high point; envisage Patti Smith and early P.J. Harvey mixed in with Lottie Lenya (and maybe some Ethel Merman) – we get Brechtian existential avant-garde jazz-rock! BABAL outros to songs tend to be quite a trip in themselves, and “Radical” has a great one.

“Going Home” came out of a day’s reverie at a special place in the Southwest of England Karen tells me. “Being near the coastline always makes me think of how small we are and how we came into being, and where we are going” she says, “Going Home” feels like reaching out to get an understanding of humanity and life on Earth. It evolved even more when Rob played the plangent opening chords and everything followed on from that” It really is a vocal blitz of harmonies and ecstatic lengthened notes (all actual; no tech tricks – Karen is keen to keep the singing as ‘real-time’ as possible) The synths and guitars are achingly beautiful to support the voices. Rob Williams’ guitar/synth mastery held me in an entranced state throughout. Definitely not a piece to listen to while driving…. In fact, this track really invites you to lie on the floor and melt away with it – it’s divine.

So, these are the tracks, but BABAL has always believed in giving “extras” to listeners. “Radical” and “Going Home” are served up at the end of the album in different ways; an instrumental mix for “Radical”, and a vocal-only mix of “Going Home”. Both are stunning. The “Radical” instrumental shines out, displaying Rob and Jons’ talents to the full, consolidating years of playing together in this tight, sassy version.

“Going Home” will lull you onto a dream ship of angelic voices, an almost mythical voyage with no land in sight….

“Let’s Get Lucid” will satisfy BABAL fans and hopefully stretch out to some new ones, as it is original, daring, and beautifully produced; a real avant-garde classic in embryo.
(Review by Whigham Sykes).