My Cat Is An Alien "Cosmic Light of the Third Millenium" CD (Important)

3 fantastic pieces of time-erasing levitational drone from the Opalio brothers. The opener is stunning - intense and heavy drone with shiver-inducing spectral wails from Roberto Opalio. Those ghostly vocals continue into "Section II", hovering disembodied above tinkling metal xylophone and portent-of-doom timpani like the Northern Lights on an ice-bound night, before descending into murky blue depths of space electronics and beams of vibrating strings. The final section finds simple guitar lines refracted as though through infinite prisms and caught in a vast cosmic echo chamber. One of MCIAA's finest.

My Cat Is An Alien "Listen Before Black Falls" LP (Root Strata)

There's something quite cinematic about this lp. Maybe my impression has something to do with sounds that suggest events within a story: a distant 'phone, for example. Perhaps it's the section of what sounds like electronic Clangers in conversation. Maybe if Oliver Postgate had made 2001 instead of Kubrick... maybe if Kubrick had made the Clangers instead of... no, I can't imagine that! Anyway, this album continues MCIAA's path with something quite distinct from their previous work and your reviewer fels another purchase coming on. Now someone should make the film to go with it! (JC)

My Cat Is An Alien "The Secret of the Dancing Snow" CD (Ikuisuus)

Another voyage into the inky blackness with the cosmos-loving Italians and another gem. MCIAA have gone from making dronescapes that were merely beautiful to listen to (merely!) to vast vistas of sound that seem to exert an almost gravitational pull into their depths. This opens with Roberto Opalio's parched vocal trances and the calming ching of Oriental bells and builds into a soporific sea of echoing guitar notes with bells rippling through it like a warm wind. For some reason, the line from "Astronomy Domine" about "the blue you once knew" comes to mind. The sound then appears to collapse in on itself before ebbing into freefall. Divinely beautiful.