Top 25 Albums Of The Decade (#20)

20) GHOST – Hypnotic Underworld (2004)

There are two bands named Ghost, and both of them are from Japan. I know nothing about the newer, more straightforward Ghost, other than the fact that they aren’t as good. I haven’t validated this empirically. I also don’t know if they are more straightforward—I just assumed both. And I’m right. Honestly, I’m not even sure if this Ghost (founded in the mid-eighties) actually even exists, at least not on the same space-time continuum as the rest of us. Band bios on the internet claim that they spent their early days living in communes, busking for money in subways and hiding out in abandoned temples in the countryside. Somehow along the way they semi-learned English and fed their heads on classic Western psychedelia such as Amon Düül II, Earth And Fire, Syd Barrett and German motorik. For example: the first four tracks on the album comprise a suite called “Hypnotic Underground” (the title of which is not a fuckup on my part), an overture that lasts for twenty-four minutes, most of which is comprised of occasional bass notes, jangling chimes, “Neuköln” saxophones and whatever else on God’s Green Earth is creating all those noises (is that a washboard?). The rest of the album is a buffet of serpentine guitar solos, Japanese folk, movie soundtracks (Lord Of The Rings = “Poper”), LSD, rainy fields, bongos, flutes, poor pronunciation and just about everything else that kicks ass. This is what the 90s would have sounded like had 1977 never happened, and I’m not entirely convinced that this isn’t what music will sound like in 2148, when the Amish Psychonautic Party takes Washington by a landslide. You have been warned.