Review: Colonel Petrov's Good Judgement - Moral Machine

I get sent some great stuff for review, music that makes me sit up and think 'Wow!' - case in point, the new album from Colonel Petrov's Good Judgement, 'Moral Machine'. The band, hereafter referred to as CPGJ to save my fingers, hail from Cologne in Germany and make music the likes of which I have never heard! They comprise of: Sebastian Müller - guitar, Leonhard Huhn - sax & vocals, Reza Askari - bass, Nils "Slin" Tegen - drums and Rafael Calman - also on drums (gotta love a twin drum attack!). (After some 'research', Colonel Petrov was a bit of a hero, saving the world from nuclear annihilation! I quote from Wikipedia; "On September 26, 1983, just three weeks after the Soviet military had shot down Korean Air Lines Flight 007, Petrov was the duty officer at the command center for the Oko nuclear early-warning system when the system reported that a missile, followed by another one and then up to five more, were being launched from the United States. Petrov judged the report to be a false alarm, and his decision is credited with having prevented an erroneous retaliatory nuclear attack on the United States and its NATO allies that could have resulted in large-scale nuclear war. Investigation later confirmed that the satellite warning system had indeed malfunctioned")

'Moral Machine' opens with 'Everybody's Gut One' (which is also featured on my most recent podcast) and a cacophony of feedback which soon coalesces into some deranged prog meets stoner rock. When the riff comes in it is a killer...hard and heavy. The track takes us down so many simultaneous avenues it's amazing - the general structure is proggish, the riff is heavy psych/stoner and there are some gutteral vocals a la death metal - it is a refreshing blast that hits hard. 'Dark Star' throws some skronky jazz into the mix for good measure, Huhn blowing like a punk rock Coltrane. What initially strikes as discordant all seems to makes sense - the sax complementing the scratchy prog guitar stylings that also seem to have fed from the grunge trough - as I said, this is like nothing I've ever heard! Title track 'Moral Machine' continues in the same vein but there is a sinister vibe to this track - the sax sounding like it is from a free jazz horror soundtrack and the guitar is heavier (when these guys break out the riffs you really know about it). The track is continually morphing and evolving, never content to stand still. 'Sappattack' comes over like Lightning Bolt playing Gong....heavy and deeply trippy while 'Hole Of Love' (available on CD and download only) is a slow builder that melds jazz with prog rock to good effect....it's mellower than the preceding tracks, in part due to the sax laying down some deep, mellow jazzy - but the underlying prog vibes do imbue it with a more restrained heaviness. 'Launch On Warning' opens with some straightforward heavy psych guitar and the twin drums and bass giving it a rock solid structure. There are occasional blasts of sax but this is a much more guitar orientated track....but still angular and spiky. 'Dick Laurant Is Dead' ( A David Lynch 'Lost Highway' reference) is my favourite track on the album, full of psychedelic riffs & garbled, gutteral vocals. It is uptempo track with some genuinely fine guitar playing and sax blowin' - again, a very prog rock structure but taking cues from noise rock and grunge. Closing track 'Next Time We May Not Be As Lucky' with some heavy doom overtones and a general atmosphere of melancholic dystopia.

'Moral Machine' is one of those rare albums where I would say ignore everything I have written...it's an album that needs to be listened to and your own mind made up about it....I'm sure there will be purists that will not dig it, but, for what it's worth, I found it a highly enjoyable album - full of character, humour and some pretty darned good playing. The mix of heavy riffs, crashing rhythms and jazz may sound a bit jumbled but it works. Since I received the mp3s of this, I've found myself going back to it time and time again...and that, to me, is worth any review. Startling and chaotic genius! The album is available from the band's website here and comes as vinyl, CD or download.