MAGIC BULLET –

Multiplicitas (Music & Elsewhere)
This is an experimental music project from Mick Magic who has been around for so long (maybe more than 30 years) as a pioneer of the underground tape movement. There are a lot of Post-punk, experimental and other bands that released their music through the tape label of Music & Elsewhere. This time Mick Magic returns after 23 years (!) by releasing new music and exploring the path of the digital world with a special 2 disk set called Multiplicitas. Disc 1 is called Solidarietas and it is a lengthy track (60 minutes long) featuring strange mechanical sounds that offer you a noisy and chaotic  experience!  Disc 2  is  called  Curiositas  and  consists  of 7

tracks that sound close to the Space Rock experience of bands such as Hawkwind and Pink Fairies. Most of the parts are electronic experimentations and to the best of my knowledge there is also a heavy use of field recordings that create value to the word “experiment”. This is an obscure trip to the experimental sound of early 1980s, full of passion for the psychedelic and the dark romantic culture. Tune in and travel in space…

PUBLICATION LINK - 7th August 2020:

http://skylight.gr/index.php/2020/08/07/magic-bullet-multiplicitas-music-elsewhere/

Reviewed by Billy Yfantis

Multiple sonic pleasures:

Multiplicitas by Magic Bullet
Multiplicitas, the extra special double debut album by Magic Bullet, another artistic incarnation of the underground and independent music guru that is Mick Magic. This blog, too had the pleasure over the recent years of savouring and writing about Mick's long-standing travails in the underground music scene - and this is yet another epic creative venture unleashed on the rather surreal world of 2020...
The double album consists of Solidarietas and Curiositas - and they take us from something firmly rooted in experimental sound galaxies to head-bobbing high-octane progressive rock.
Solidarietas was reportedly born out of a creative wave that initially provided a shorter work for a musique concrète compilation. This hour-long experimental composition is demanding attention - which is quite different from what often seems misconceptions about the genre state.
It may well start with elements of ambient noise, radio broadcast fragments in Russian language, natural sounds - but, like all imaginative musique concrete, it is not background ambiental music. It is clearly a product of the digital era, this is not Varèse experimenting with rudimentary tapes... Thus, there is much more precise control in sculpting sounds - and considerably more processing possibilities that propel the listener into another world.
In a many ways, the mindset that is required for an introspective work like Klaus Schulze's Sebastian im Traum is needed here. The overall effect, not the individual elements matter here as we are taken on a sonic journey. The processed 'raw materials' certainly seem to fuse time and space, evoking imagery from the Soviet era, moving through the cogs of some immense Pink Floydian machinery, then floating off to some alien corners of outer space...
The second disc, Curiositas brings a mighty energy injection with the opening track, M.M.A.T.T. 33 - which is a mash-up of earlier Magic Moments At Twilight Time works, mainly from Creavolution (latter having been reviewed on this blog, too). It feels remarkably fluid for a mash-up, and with a driving rhythm that   will   certainly   recharge   battery   cells   after   the  previous

meditative journey.

The A.F.C. Song continues on an energetic note, and rightly so - as it is a tribute, firmly rooted in space punk, to A.F.C Wimbledon. Dance, Freak gives us an ambiental, mysterious-sounding repose with sampled and processed voices, with a return to high-octane and tight riffs that have serious head-bobbing potential.
Stille Nacht follows as a re-interpretation of the traditional song, which will definitely surprise many. It starts as an ambiental journey, with a sonic imagery evoking winter scenes, with a dreamy, but playful, piano arriving on the scene... until a firm and eminently electronic section cranks up the energy levels.
As Christmas, its natural setting, and the whole sacred/secular juxtaposition of things around that time of the year got a thorough(ly) prog-rock treatment, why not look at (and dive into) Easter, too?
Thankfully, the following two tracks do just that - the first of those, Jesus Is Dead (Let's Eat Chocolate!) has a charming family connection, too with the mastermind behind this double album - as it features a very young family member (undoubtedly also a great fan of, uhm, secular aspects of Easter, namely the aforementioned chocolate).
We keep the energising and forward-driving, even propelling, rhythms and riffs, with a tempo that stays with us for the Jesus Has Risen (Let's Mow The Lawn) track, too - where we have more electronics joining the arrangements, with (no pun intended, or maybe a little bit...) spirited modulations of synthesised sounds.
The bonus track, which ends our sonic journey from experimental to high-octane prog rock realms, is Live In Session (On Tudno FM) - an edit in three parts of a recent radio appearance, with special live versions of tracks from Curiositas.
Thus, definitely not shortage in creativity and inspiration, which means that hopefully other concept albums from Magic Bullet await us in the future. In the current rather unusual, often well-and-truly mad times, it is certainly a very welcome escape from everyday surrealism.

PUBLICATION LINK - 12th September 2020:

https://notesfromanebula.blogspot.com/2020/09/multiple-sonic-pleasures-multiplicitas.html

Reviewed by Levente Toth

Magic Bullet:

Multiplicitas (2020)
When it comes to underground music, real underground music, then there are few people who have had as much impact as Mick Magic. Not only did he have his own band in Magic Moments At Twilight Time, but he set up a cassette label which during its existence released nearly 600 albums. In recent years he has started recording again, as well as releasing material by other artists, and here we have a double CD of his latest project, Magic Bullet. In fact, this is actually a combination of two albums, ‘Solidarietas’ and ‘Curiositas’, both of which were released last year, almost by mistake. The plan was to release an album called ‘Digitalis’ as the debut, but on talking with a Russian label the decision was made instead to release the single-track hour-long album , ‘Solidarietas’ , instead.
That piece of music is now called “Lengthy Audio Work With A Pretentious Title In Russian” and is a strangely compelling piece of music. It is mostly white noise synths, yet they create something that is incredibly analogue and visual. I am sure that everyone who hears this piece of music will “see” something different, but for me it starts as a rolling sea in a moonlit night before  becoming  a storm.  The  first  time I played  this  was  on a

lengthy car journey and I found it incredibly compelling, although I am fully aware it will not be for everyone, and it really does need to be played from beginning to end in one sitting otherwise all impact is lost. ‘Curiositas’ is literally that, a collection of curios and bits and bobs which Mick felt ought to be more widely available. There is a mash-up of old MMATT material, an edited version of their first ever live radio performance, “Stille Nacht” is a rather strange electronic take on the carol while “Jesus Is Dead (Let’s Eat Chocolate!)” and “Jesus Has Risen (Let’s Mow The Lawn!)” are even more weird in a somewhat techno and EBM style.
Mick produces music which is totally off the wall, yet always with a sense of humour, and it definitely resonates with me. For more information on this, and everything he has ever been involved with, then visit http://www.mickmagic.net/ which is surely one of the most detailed and informative sites around.

Rating: 7/10

PUBLICATION LINK - 27th March 2021:

https://houseofprog.com/blog/2021/03/27/magic-bullet-multiplicitas-2020/

Reviewed by Kev Rowland

MI CASA, SU CASA