ASTRO SOUNDS

Original Released as LP Alshire S-5119
(CANADA, 1968)

It's 1968. Imagine the average consumer of 101 Strings-brand mood music settling into his or her easy chair to enjoy the latest offering, "Astro Sounds From Beyond the Year 2000". The cover art seems a little odd, but a softly burbling moog could add a hint of hipness to an otherwise relaxing aural massage. Then track one kicks in with freaky treated guitar, a heavy rock drumbeat, and dissonant sound effects. Immediately the record is ripped off the turntable and replaced with Romantic Songs of the Sea to soothe away the upsetting memory of 101 Strings gone horribly wrong. This fantasy scenario must have played out often enough in real life that 101 Strings, under a hail of complaints, stopped offering "experimental" albums. But for those who enjoy camp classics and colossal marketing blunders, "Astro Sounds" is a fun and far-out instrumental album that, in places, rocks nearly as hard as any psychedelic pop group of the era. (Greg Adams in Allmusic).