Fire! Orchestra is a renowned Norwegian avant-garde psychedelic rock/free jazz band that is made up of Fire! and other artists they collaborate with. They have released two great and critically acclaimed albums ''Enter'' and ''Exit'', and ''Ritual'' doesn't dissappoint in any way as well. ''Ritual'' was released earlier this year by the Norwegian record label Rune Grammafon, and the album packs five lengthy tracks of improvisational avant-garde free-jazz influenced psychedelia in a krautrock coating.
The first track on the album is titled ''Ritual, Part 1'' and it packs some fine free jazz saxophone improvisation on top of a repetitive forward propelling krautrock motion along with some interesting female vocals. Fire! Orchestra are known for their interesting female vocals, but I must say the vocals worked somewhat better on ''Enter''. Which does not mean they don't work on this album of course. All the tracks on this album are by the way titled simply as ''parts'', and ''Ritual, Part 2'' starts off rather slow to move slowly into some highly addictive psych rock bits with the usual Fire!'esque sax impro. The second half of this song might just well be my favorite bit from this fine album. The third track on the album starts off with some unorthodox noisy glitch manner only to move into a mellow female vocals and sax mixture, while the fourth track on the other hand starts off with a drum and guitar impro similar to some Japanese psych outfits. This however doesn't last too long and what follows is some really catchy and memorable krautry psychedelia. The last track on the album however offers some slower Earth'like basslines and drums to the mellow sound of sax, sounding kind of like a mixture of Earth and Mona De Bo.
All in all ''Ritual'' is a damn fine album, and although it perhaps isn't as good as ''Enter'' then it is still a great album, and one of the best releases of 2016. Anyone who is into some improvisational avant-garde psychedelia with a free-jazz core will definitely dig this album.
Some related links:
Discogs: https://www.discogs.com/Fire-Orchestra-Ritual/master/995441
Ritual, Part 1 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GTVA16kM7rs
