16 May 2014

Bearded Magazine reviews Lay Llamas debut album 'Ostro'


Lay Llamas – Ostro (Rocket Recordings)

A psychedelic album from spiritual Sicilian temples and sunshine then mashed into eerie highs and chugging come downs

By Ian Stanley

Lay Llamas – Ostro (Rocket Recordings) Sounds drawn from around the Mediterranean, inspired by spiritual Sicilian history and pulled from psychedelia saturate Ostro, the debut album from Sicilian band Lay Llamas. As Gioele Valenti from the band explains, “I think that Sicilians are more like Africans than Europeans in some way…in our music Africa is such a metaphysical place…different levels of enlightenment; a sense of a mystical path to follow.”

That mysticism and African groove is easy to spot in each introduction of feedback before each introduction of song on here. It’s not a quickfire album. It was recorded in a 6th Century BC Temple of Hera and most of the time it shows. Most of its production can be imagined as starting life bounced off those ancient temple walls and caught as a couple of samples. 

It’s no surprise Lay Llamas admit they were “so influenced by the place’s mood, with that ancient presence in the air” and all of the places they have lived have somehow influenced them. Nicola Giunta, the second member of the group, has lived in Spain, Italy and the UK all in the past six years. And in every place he has recorded down sounds. It’s a heady metallic mixture that – when it works – wraps around you like hugging someone in a suit of armour. Sharp. But with a solid emotion….

Read the rest of the review here: Bearded 

And don't forget, if you live in London, you can be the first to hear the albumin full at Nothing is… is Dalston, playback starts at 9pm, more info here: Nothing is…

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