Out of print for a year or two now, Circle's essential 2002 hypno-kraut-kosmiche-metal masterpiece Sunrise is finally reissued here in the States

courtesy of No Quarter! It's basically the same album with the addition of some slick metallic embossing on the cover, but it's a crucial entry for any

newcomers to Circle's irresistable riffage and trance inducing rock that missed out on the original release.

Much like the latest Pharaoh Overlord album #4 (which is itself a Circle side-project), Circle have embraced the muscular power of primo 70's/80's

retro metal riffage and have filtered this element through their unique style of elliptical krautrock/spacerock. All of the heavier songs on Sunrise

focus on a central heavy guitar riff that is repeated over and over, locked in with a mechanical, metronomic drumbeat that creates a trance-like atmosphere,

while the band layers on an assortment of ambient sounds from violins and some amazing, new wavey 80's style Moog synthesizers, over which Circle singer

Ratto emits some crazed, impenetrable Halford/Udo style vocal histrionics that are mixed with his unusual singing that's like a weird mix of Native American

and Middle Eastern chanting. Eerie and mesmerising, it's like a perfect combination of Can, Judas Priest, Monster Magnet, and Hawkwind, the songs stretching

out to 7-9 minutes in length, mighty circular riffing cutting through the swirl of psychedelic phaser haze. There are also some weird, softer forest folkish

songs here, like "Satulinnut", where Ratto's singing changes into an elfin nursery rhyme over pastoral acoustic guitars, pretty and gentle with childlike

"la-la-la's" and gnomic melodies. Then it's back the motorik, metronomic pulse and heavy riffage, each song getting more tripped out and cosmic, finally

closing with the fifteen-minute long drone/kraut/psych bliss-drive of "Lokki". Incredible third eye riff power, and highly recommended. I love the artwork on

this CD package too, lots of colorful crude rainbow ellipses adorned with multicolored skulls.