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A 4 piece hard rock outfit from Mainz in Germany, Fluid excel themselves with this totally entertaining heavy ended 5 track ep that showcases a number of styles. An excellent vocal performance throughout the length of the ep from Martin Vollrath & ably backed by some serious percussion, bass & cool riffs from the rest of the band.

There are a series of influences that come to mind, but the most notable for me was on the second track "Moonboots", where there seems to be a Helmet-esque sound from around the Betty album era, that rings throughout the track, perhaps due to the insistent nature of the rhythm & percussion sections.

A little faster paced is the brilliant closing number "Die By Disco", which is certainly an impressive number, though my favourite would probably be the repetetive strains of middle track "Space Invader". A very cool set of tracks that shows a band ready for more. Rock fans need to look fairly hard at this band, they'll be on the rise fairly shortly.

For more information, write to Martin Vollrath, Lauterenstrasse 27, 55116 Mainz, Germany or vollm008@mail.Uni-Mainz.de

F.U.L.L. - HELLO

As nearly as I can tell, this is the West Australian based 3 piece band's 4th release, which culminates in a somewhat diverse blend of styles for the great songs found here. Already having some great music behind them & some equally impressive press, the band achieve some wonderful listening moments here, which will impress any serious listeners.

The 6 track ep opens up with a great example of the band's pop styles on "Parade", which rouses you out of your seat, moving slickly into the rather more urgent "Sweet", which tracks a pretty mean riff & a great deep bass edge line running along the length of the song.

Closing out is a track which will interest a great many fans, a very cool cover of the old Psychedelic Furs track which is most certainly a brilliantly constructed cover, here speeding the pace of the original by quite a bit. "Hello", the title track is an interesting stylistic anomaly here, taking no real reference points at all & pointing to a potential new & original style for the band, though my favourite is "Unsane", which has an unusual beat timing, along with a pretty good vocal performance. A great deal yet to be found on this ep, which will stand many listens before tiring you out, if indeed that were to happen at all.

For more information, write to 404 Grand Promenade, Dianella, WA, 6059, Australia or full@opera.iinet.net.au

ROTCOD ZZAJ & MR PAINFUL / ROTCOD ZZAJ & ERNSETO DIAZ INFANTE - EXQUISITELY PAINFUL / IMAGINED EXISTENCE

A guy coming out of the US, who's obviously into improvisational music in a big way, working on one of the albums here with someone who sent a solo CD for review, Ernesto Diaz Infante, who is also quite heavily into improvising genres.

Exquisitely Painful is definitely a challenging listen & you'll need an appreciation of many different styles, but there are a couple of tracks which show a different side to the music, one being the opening track "Mr Painful's Blooz", which has a quite evident blues influence, while the 16 minute epic "All In The Knowing", could certainly have been a jam influenced by Hendrix-esque guitar flows.

Imagined Existence on the other hand takes the improv-styles much more seriously, though opening track "Tunnel Under The Yellow Sea" has a large helping of funk & an interesting vocal set. You'll need to like experimental music such as some of the John Lennon & Yoko Ono collaborations, but if so, then you will certainly have an interesting time.

For more information, write to 5308 65th Ave SE, Lacey, WA 98513, USA or rotcod@olywa.net

SEEDER - FUNNY LOOKING BABIES

A very impressive 4 piece from the Sydney area, Seeder have been playing since 1994, the band here present the debut album Funny Looking Babies which is a very accomplished piece of work, featuring a diverse set of songs which will surely set them in line for bigger things in the near future.

I'm very impressed by the closing number "With You All The Way", which makes itself felt with a sound reminiscent of the sounds of Talking Heads, which is no bad thing at all. This remains one of my favourite songs out of the whole album.

Likewise, another favourite for me was "Asylum", which, like much of the rest of the songs here, remind me of the sounds of bands like The Blackeyed Susans & The Jackson Code, this particular track the darkest in mood throughout. Other great highlights include "Dorian Gray", the brilliantly constructed "Get On Top" & "Sea Of Love". A very impressive effort that will surely grab fans of diverse & variable musical sounds.

For more information, write to Red Arrow Management, mjc@acon.com.au

20 MINUTE LOOP - (SELF TITLED)

If ever there were to be a perfect pop band, it would be a joining of a couple of bands, namely The Pixies & The Clouds, both of which came up with fabulous harmonies, eclectically constructed melodies, wonderful loud & fuzzy guitars at times & a superb percussion section. A band which is certainly a near perfect example of that joining would be California based 20 Minute Loop, who have given us 11 tracks of simply wonderful guitar driven pop which the band call 'freak pop', but which I called near heaven.

The band have a great 'combative' way of putting their vocals together with Greg Giles & Kelly Atkins creating a real woven pair of vocals which really does remind me of The Clouds, while the backing instrumentals are perfectly paced to create the moodiness of songs like "Everybody Out" to the slightly more conventional sounding "Face Like A Horse", which is one of my favourite tracks here, a nicely aggressive lead-in plus again a brilliant vocal pairing.

There are some occasional eccentric lyrics, like "Bunnyman & Chickengirl", which are certainly a little different than what a lot of people might be doing these days, but no more exotic than some of The Pixies' music ever was.

Another couple of great tracks which must be mentioned are both "Hookworm", which incorporates all the essential components of a slow starting / fast finishing pop gem, plus my favourite, the building epic of "You Know So Much" as well as the darker psychotic edges of "Disconnect", which many people will identify with. All up, this is a truly amazing album that will surely be an essential listening requirement for any serious music fan.

For more information, write to PO Box 132, Kentfield, CA 94914-0132, USA or katkins@antenna-audio.com