Acid Mothers Temple Live at The Knitting Factory

Psychedelic has been used to describe a variety of objects and artistic endeavors, but few embody the very spirit of what it means to be Psychedelic. The Acid Mothers Temple Soul Collective are a group of musicians from all over the world who play the best electric experimental psychedelic rock and roll in the world. While the collective are many the core members are bassist Tsuyama Atsushi, Synthesizer and guitarist Higashi Hiroshi, drummer Shimura Koji and lead guitarist and founding member Kawabata Makoto. The band releases several albums on many international labels under several different tag names and their music can display alien spaces and heavy with electric fuzz to esoteric synths and horns chanting holiness.

The band began playing in 1997 and last week they played an electrified set at Brooklyn's Knitting Factory. I had the fortune of walking through the doors to the newly installed bar when I found myself faced with the Speed Guru himself Kawabata! I passed him a high five and enjoyed the hot air from the early Spring winds.


The Knitting Factory is essential to the growth of music in New York. The original location was in Manhattan on East Houston in 1987 giving local experimental bands like Sonic Youth and Sound of Urchin to only name a couple. It gave city dwellers a place to dance and listen to new and unknown bands for twenty one years, but rising rents in Tribeca forced the owners to relocate to a smaller, but better location in Brooklyn that holds 300 against their previous 400 capacity. The separated bar is sound proof and with access from the street it's great for dropping in for a drink even if you don't want to see the show.


Acid Mothers Temple played a great set, displaying all their qualities of psychedelic majesty. They played their anthem Pink Lady Lemonade and finished with an encore of Dark Star Blues. They played soft melodies swaying in a colorful sea and then excited frantic rock and roll that ended with Kawabata hanging his guitar from a pole on the ceiling eternally screaming feedback. Some strangers came through the crowd acting like space aliens, but even they couldn't escape the beautiful vibrations penetrating their bodies.
They only come by once or twice a year and I hadn't seen them in a few years and I was glad to be there among friends and fans. Their albums are awesome and the live shows are heavy so check them out if they play near you because they deliver the psychedelic goods!

Here is a video of a recent performance


Some of my own Acid Mothers Temple albums