WOMAD

Electric Groove Temple

From United Kingdom

An organic dance outfit, with its mycelia feeding on the pulsing undercurrents of the rhythms of life, Electric Groove Temple lay an enticingly funky path into the trance-like heart of their musical house in the enchanted forest. Once you're inside, bongo-driven sonic witchcraft ensures there is no desire to find a way out. A door opens to display an intense frenzy of ritual beats, a wall evaporates into the staggering psychedelic void, with swathes of guitar shooting across the star-speckled expanse of infinity. You teeter on the edge, playing with the urge to jump, then you're suddenly chilling in an acid jazz café in a clearing in the woodlands of Bohemia.At their most powerful in the sensorama world of the Temple Ball - a club night they organise in Reading - the Electric Groovers have a reputation for creating a unity of bliss amongst their audience. Still waiting to be discovered by the world at large, they have been building up enthusiastic hotspots around the country where they are invited back time and again. Although it's a delight to share the intimacy of small venues with them, one can't help wishing for them to be given a chance to play with a big production budget and stretch out their cramped creativity. On the Velvet Revolution tour, an anti-Criminal Justice Bill inspired rolling festival of anarchic madness, they rose time and time again to the challenge of seducing a new audience under the most chaotic of conditions.If you fancy paying a visit to their offworld planet of groovedelia, you can get their CD from Trichone Records, PO Box 2210, Reading RG2 0YY. Or pick up one of their excellent tapes if you are fortunate enough to see them play.