Beyond the ease with which I can illegally stream NBA playoff games, the best part of living in the present might be the wealth of lost tapes that seem to pop up every year. Old Tesla reels to reels lost to time suddenly emerge and sound better than anything recorded in recent memory. Rodion G.A. is one of those discoveries: a previously unheard conflagration of psychedelic prog-rock and mad science from the Godfather of Romanian electronic music.
Released by Strut next week, The Lost Tapes sound like something scientifically constructed for The Alchemist, Madlib, or Dilla to sample. Recorded during the mid-70s and 80s, you can hear the automaton ghosts of early Kraftwerk, Goblin, and esoteric Bucharest fusionists, but the sound is something else entirely. It’s part a reaction to the polished pop-rock favored by the Ceausescu dictatorship and part the desire to develop a homegrown electronic music. The label is letting me serve up “In Linistea Noptii” as a free download and if you like music you should probably download it. If you are a producer, you should probably make a beat of it out. It sounds like a coronation march for a second world freedom fighter fueled by obscure grains and opium. It is some beautiful music. You can buy the album here. You can stream more songs and watch a Rodion interview below the jump. You need no more encouragement.
