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MindFunk > People Who Fell from the Sky > Reviews
MindFunk - People Who Fell from the Sky

Mindfunks foray into Doom Metal. - 77%

erickg13, November 21st, 2006

“People Who Fell From the Sky” represents Mindfunk’s 3rd album, with their 3rd different lineup, 3rd different label and 3rd different genre change, you could say they changed between each album, to say the least. Sadly, this also represented their final recording effort.

Mindfunk, who started as a glam/funk band on their self titled debut, then morphed into a grunge/groove metal band on “Dropped”, and explored doom metal on their final album “People Who Fell From The Sky”.

“People Who Fell From The Sky” could be called a “live studio album” due to the raw (but not bad per se) production and the simple music. It has a disctinctly psychedelic feel to throughout. In many way this sounds nothing like any previous Mindfunk album, at least on “Dropped” you could see where they progressed from on their debut. This album just seems to have come out of left field. And worst of all is that Pat Dubar’s vocal work have greatly slipped, no longer is it a shriek reminiscent of Chris Cornell’s, it just sounds tired. In some spots it adds quite an eerie effect, so this isn’t a total loss cause.

The album possesses a few tracks that doom metal fans would appreciate such as the heavy as hell “Superchief”, by far one of the heaviest songs I have ever heard. “Deep End” is another good track, while not as sludgy as “Superchief” is still very doomy. The most psychedelic song is by far the title track, with a distorted acoustic guitar and vocals, this screams psychedelia. Some tracks however are not completely doomy like “Weird Water” which sounds like something that would have fit on “Dropped”. The latter half of the album has a jam band quality reminiscent to the latter half of Black Sabbath’s debut.

Overall, Mindfunk’s “People Who Fell From The Sky” is a decent album. When listened to you can clearly see the cracks and it was no surprise that they broke up. This album is recommended for fans of doom metal, Black Sabbath, and to a lesser extent Alice in Chains fans. However fans of Mindfunk’s debut album may not enjoy this, and there is almost nothing that links the two albums.

A Doomy Swan Song - 70%

worgelm, March 12th, 2005

Of Mindfunk's three albums, People Who Fell From The Sky - as the logical end of the journey started on album #2 - is the toughest release to admire, mostly because of the very loose songwriting and raw production. There are very few overdubs, giving the record some live energy and immediacy (also likely because the recording budgets were way lower).

Mindfunk experiments with more psychedelic sounds and textures, and start out impressively enough on the eastern-sounding Rift Valley Fever through to the slow-as-balls Superchief which sort of sounds like Sabbath stumbling all over themselves in a stoned haze. Lead singer Pat Dubar, once the fiery straight-edge siren of So-Cal hardcore band Uniform Choice, sounds very tired here. Gone is the sneering sarcasm of the self-titled first album, replaced by an almost tuneless-but-not-soulless world-weary chant, effective notably on Seasick and Deep End where they almost become a doomier version of Alice In Chains, with some nice keyboard flourishes on the latter. People Who Fell From The Sky floats serenely by, delicately atop the insistent roar. Through the incense-and-weed haze there is some nice guitar work in Aluna.

After this solid beginning the album starts to lose focus, culminating in the cacophonous din of Acrobats Falling. Its as if the meander and drift that was beginning to show itself on Dropped started to really overwhelm the songs. Really, putting any of these morose, moody shoegazer-metal songs up against the infectious punk-like energy of the self-titled debut is a study in contrasts. Better production would have definitely helped this album and present its wide-open spaces and textures in a clearer light. As it is, with the leaden, drugged-out drift of these songs and flat, D.I.Y. production values it sometimes sounds suspiciously like the band is mailing it in.