I don't have a clue as to how this Los Angeles space-punk band managed to elude me for all of these years, as A Wound In Eternity is Farflung's seventh (seventh!) album and this is the first time that I have ever had a chance to listen to them. As always, better late than never, and I am totally hooked on Farflung's fx-drenched, SUPER ROCKING jams now that I've heard 'em. Released on the recently rejuvenated MeteorCity label, Farflung's latest album is an eight song blastoff into a swirling cosmic vortex of seriously fucking ripping riffage, heavy pounding drumming, atmospheric strings, and layers upon layers upon layers of swirling spacey effects and synthesizers. Imagine a much harder, metallic version of Chrome combined with Hawkwind and Kyuss' blazing riffs and early Monster Magnet, a blazing crushing stoner-space-metal juggernaut cruising through space like the Corvette at the beginning of Heavy Metal. Farflung have been at it since the mid 1990's when they released their 25,000 Feet Per Second album on Flipside in 1995, and

the members have a weighty resume that includes stints with Hawkwind's Nik Turner, Hawkwind-worshipping industrial rockers Pressurehed, and Damo Suzuki's Network. From the heavier rocking numbers to the more laid-back krautrock jams, the songs are consistently mesmerizing, the Sabbathian grooves, blasts of raging skate-thrash, hypnotic glammy punk and narcotized fuzz jams all rife with amazing hooks that will glue themselves to your head, everything drenched in space effects, reverb and delay and droning synths, and a killer vocal performance that does an expert job of switching between hard shouting vocals dosed in delay and a creepy hushed croon. The first couple of songs kick the album off righteously, from the amped-up Hawkwind worship of "Unborn Planet" to the crushing spacefaring punk and motorik beats of "Endless Drifting Wreck" through to "Like It Has Never Been", which alternates between spacey country twang and a crushing metallic sludge riff that could pass for a segment off of Sleep's Holy Mountain. Later, Farflung ease off of the driving riff-heavy rockers and jam on a series of druggy tracks like "Silver Shrooms" and the almost shamanistic "IX", and if you haven't noticed yet, everything about A Wound In Eternity is obsessed with outer space, or travelling through outer space, or getting really, really high in outer space. This album is awesome! I've literally been spinning this on a daily basis ever since it first came in a few weeks ago. I had already been on a huge Hawkwind kick that started at the beginning of the summer, and Farflung's heavier version of that classic psych/space/prog rock sound came at just the right time.

This is recommended big time to any of you guys that loved that Kosmos album from last year, or any of Circle's heaviest stuff, or Hawkwind or Litmus (yeah, ESPECIALLY Litmus!), Tarantula Hawk and Ufomammut and Sons Of Otis or any heavy, rocking space-rock action that mixes up metallic might, circular krautrock rhythms, 70's rock, fist-pumping riffage and an overdose of trippy cosmic FX. Oh yeah, and to top it off, MeteorCity sent us a pile of promotional Farflung posters that we will include with every order for A Wound In Eternity while they last.