[et_pb_section fb_built=”1″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_row _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_code module_class=”custom-cat” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n
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[\/et_pb_code][et_pb_text module_class=”article-title” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” header_font=”||||||||” header_text_align=”center” header_text_color=”#111111″ header_font_size=”68px” custom_margin=”40px||||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n
[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”intro-text” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_orientation=”center” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n
MOJO selects the strangest records from music\u2019s furthest reaches.<\/p>\n
[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”credit-main” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font=”||||||||” text_font_size=”16px” text_orientation=”center” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n
Words by Chris Catchpole<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section][et_pb_section fb_built=”1″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_row _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/02\/GettyImages-74256493.jpg” title_text=”Captain Beefheart And His Magic Band” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text module_class=”image-gallery-caption” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font=”|300|||||||” text_font_size=”16px” text_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”-10px||||false|false” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band (l-r): Zoot Horn Rollo, Captain Beefheart, Drumbo, Antennae Jimmy Semens and Rockette Morton c.1969. \u201cThe Mascara Snake\u201d not pictured\u2026<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n In order to truly blow one\u2019s mind, one must travel to the far reaches of the music cosmos \u2013 to a place where Throbbing Gristle, Barbra Streisand, Captain Beefheart, Bongwater, Tim Buckley and Sun Ra reign supreme and sonic adventures into the unknown are an essential part of daily life. A dimension where flipped-out acid rock rubs shoulders with records that reconfigured our conception of what music could be while manifestations of further-out lunacy \u2013 some barely recognisable as music at all \u2013 hover while laughing maniacally.<\/p>\n Welcome, then, to MOJO\u2019s list of the 20 most \u201cout there\u201d albums of all time. Dig in, and hold on tight\u2026<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_divider color=”#111111″ module_class=”custom-divider” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” custom_padding=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][\/et_pb_divider][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/02\/500×500-000000-80-0-0-1-1.jpg” title_text=”500×500-000000-80-0-0-1″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n 20. Pink Floyd, The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn <\/b>(EMI Columbia, 1967)<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n \u201cPiper was Syd\u201d, said bassist Roger Waters, \u201cand Syd was a genius.\u201d Under the stewardship of Waters and Syd Barrett\u2019s replacement David Gilmour, Pink Floyd would go on to become one of the most commercially successful rock bands of all time, so it\u2019s easy to overlook just how close to the sun they were flying on their Syd-helmed debut. Switching schizophrenically between eerie nursey rhymes (The Gnome, Bike, Scarecrow) and frightening whooshes of LSD dissonance, The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn is the aural approximation of Barrett\u2019s own crumbling mind, reaching for mental freedom but risking mental collapse.\u00a0<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/02\/500×500-000000-80-0-0-20.jpg” title_text=”500×500-000000-80-0-0″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n 19. Throbbing Gristle, Second Annual Report <\/b>(Industrial, 1977)<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n Punk might have preached chaos and anarchy, but of all the groups who broke through in \u201976-\u201977, only Throbbing Gristle truly created it. Known for their Arts Council-funded pranks involving the public letting of blood and semen, Throbbing Gristle took punk\u2019s audience-baiting philosophy and ran with it. The titles on their debut hint at some of the sonic slaughter within (Slug Bait, After Cease To Exist) but only listening can reveal the true terror frontman Genesis P-Orridge and co. unleashed in their maelstrom of disfigured guitars and bass, proto-industrial electronics, screams and samples of true crime reports. Definitely not for the faint-hearted.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/02\/bongwater-double-bummer-Cover-Art.jpg” title_text=”bongwater-double-bummer-Cover-Art” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n 18. <\/b>Bongwater, <\/strong>Double Bummer <\/strong>(Shimmy Disc, 1988)<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n Opening with maniacal shrieking about Russian lesbians over contorted rockabilly guitar, followed by schizophrenic covers of Soft Machine and Johnny Cash numbers and Led Zeppelin\u2019s Dazed And Confused (sung in Mandarin), it was clear from the off that Bongwater were never guided by commercial intent. The artful assemblage of producer\/Shimmy Disc boss Kramer and singer\/actor\/performance artist\/waitress Ann Magnuson split acrimoniously in 1992 after a seven-year pop-schizoid avant-cabaret, best represented here.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/02\/JOHN_20ZORN_20Naked_20City.jpg” title_text=”JOHN_20ZORN_20Naked_20City” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n 17. John Zorn, Naked City <\/b>(Elektra\/Nonsuch, 1990)<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n \u00a0Taping Looney Tunes soundtracks from the TV as a kid, saxophone player John Zorn later adopted a similar surreal and mellifluous approach to music. Hence Naked City\u2019s debut album saw him squeeze jazz, country, film music and eight under-50-second blasts of underground Japanese noise into his musical meat grinder. A 26-song set that appealed to Napalm Death and Ornette Coleman fans alike.\u00a0<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/02\/500×500-000000-80-0-0-2-1.jpg” title_text=”500×500-000000-80-0-0-2″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n 16. Mercury Rev, Boces <\/b>(Beggars Banquet, 1993)<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n How might one describe Mercury Rev\u2019s second album to those more familiar with the grand cosmic Americana of the band\u2019s post-Deserters Songs oeuvre? Eight-year-olds on heroin are unleashed in the school music room and play imagined soundtracks to Walt Disney cartoons while a Balinese gamelan group crash a New Orleans funeral, gnarly garage rockers The Groundhogs fall from the sky and a scary tramp impersonates Billie Holliday? Mercury Rev\u2019s last record to feature lose cannon co-singer David Baker, they went on to far greater success and acclaim but would never again venture so far into the freak zone as they did here.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/02\/500×500-000000-80-0-0-3-1.jpg” title_text=”500×500-000000-80-0-0-3″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n 15. Tim Buckley, Starsailor <\/b>(Straight, 1970)<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n By the late \u201960s Tim Buckley had swapped baroque folk for jazz impressionism and wordless shrieking. Often singing like a man having his liver removed through his head \u2013 over Bunk Gardner\u2019s freeform sax and flute \u2013 Buckley embarks upon surrealistic manoeuvres through shapeless bucolic landscapes. Aural punishment and musical rite-of-passage, Starsailor is also, conversely, your ticket to the sighing beauty of the immortal Song to The Siren.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/02\/500×500-000000-80-0-0-4-1.jpg” title_text=”500×500-000000-80-0-0-4″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n 14. CA Quintet, Trip Thru Hell <\/b>(Candy Floss, 1969) [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n Although formed in 1966, Trip Thu Hell was Minneapolis garage rockers CA Quintet\u2019s debut album. Why the wait? Drugs? Possibly. A sonic descent into thew acid underworld the record\u2019s wordless female wailing organ wig-outs, screams for help, backwards distortion epic drum solos, blaring trumpet, mixed-into the red mastering and spectral not-there vocals had but one message: the \u201960s are over, we\u2019re all doomed.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][et_pb_row _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/02\/500×500-000000-80-0-0-5-1.jpg” title_text=”500×500-000000-80-0-0-5″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n 13. Barbara Streisand, \u2026 And Other Musical Instruments <\/b>(CBS, 1970)<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n \u2026 And Other Musical Instruments is a record so bonkers that even the likes of Frank Zappa might have thought twice. The soundtrack to Streisand\u2019s fifth TV special was designed to explore the entire word of sound and music. Cue: traditional Japanese music, bagpipes, snake charmer pungi, darabukas, new-fangled synthesisers, tape loops and more helping to bend some of Babs\u2019 standards into unrecognisable new shapes (getting into the spirit, she sang One Note Samba dangling from a rope). Perhaps strangest of all is The World Is A Concerto, a piece \u201cin tune with the rhythms of our daily lives\u201d and so made from toasters, orange juicers, hoovers, kettles, a washing machine, blenders and telephones. Fans of Woman In Love be warned, this is some crazy shit.\u00a0<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/02\/500×500-000000-80-0-0-6-1.jpg” title_text=”500×500-000000-80-0-0-6″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n 12. Scott Walker, Tilt <\/b>(Fontana, 1995)<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n When former teen idol and Walker Brother Noel Scott Engel broke 11 years of silence with Tilt, he presented a journey into evil and despair. Featuring an oblique narrative of global murder, and a soundtrack that veered between hammering industrial and shrill operatic \u2013 the organ of the Methodist Central Hall appeared on three tracks \u2013 Tilt finally delivered on that 1966 Walker Brothers promise that The Sun Ain\u2019t Gonna Shine Anymore.\u00a0<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/02\/500×500-000000-80-0-0-16-1.jpg” title_text=”500×500-000000-80-0-0-16″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n 11. The Beatles, Sgt Pepper\u2019s Lonely Hearts Club Band<\/strong> (Parlophone, 1967)<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n In which the most popular group of all-time blow everyone\u2019s mind. Forever. Forget the concept album tag: Sgt Pepper\u2026 is nothing less that rock\u2019s equivalent of abstract art\u2019s transcendence of the flat as The Beatles build a new universe with every song, each with its own infinity of laws. A Day In The Life\u2019s existential five and half minutes \u2013 brilliantly sabotaged by a 41-piece orchestra in false noses and party hats playing car crash nonsense \u2013 is devastating. OK, we\u2019ve all heard it, but just imagine hearing it for the very first time upon release and knowing that nothing would ever be the same again.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/02\/500×500-000000-80-0-0-7-1.jpg” title_text=”500×500-000000-80-0-0-7″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n 10. Joe Meek And The Blue Men, I Hear A New World (An Outer Space Music Fantasy) <\/b>(Triumph, 1960)<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n Even by his own eccentric standards, Joe Meek\u2019s concept LP about the adventures of imaginary groups of aliens was the definition of \u201cout there\u201d. With song titles including March Of The Dribcots, Love Dance Of The Saroos and Disc Dance Of The Globbots, the producer\u2019s obsession with space and UFOs fires a record that sounds like little else on this planet, or any other. Speed up chipmunk-like voices, Meek\u2019s pioneering use of stereo and echo (later used to far more commercial effect on Telstar) imagines what little green men might have been spinning at the disco while they watched Sputnik whizz overhead.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/02\/500×500-000000-80-0-0-8-1.jpg” title_text=”500×500-000000-80-0-0-8″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n 9.<\/b> Frank Zappa, Lumpy Gravy <\/strong>(Verve, 1967)<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n Even for the supposedly hip, mind-expanding tastes of the hippie crowd, Frank Zappa\u2019s 1967 \u201cfailed ballet\u201d was a trip too far. A post-modern orchestral work in two movements \u2013 both over 15 minutes long \u2013 Lumpy Gravy provided the listener with brain-scrambling collage of sounds. The equivalent of rapidly spinning through a radio dial and being hit with snatches of unconnected dialogue, moments of static and random music ranging from surf rock to surrealist toy tunes and classical menace. Of the 62 albums he recorded in his lifetime, Lumpy Gravy was reportedly his favourite. He would say that though, wouldn\u2019t he?\u00a0<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/02\/500×500-000000-80-0-0-9-1.jpg” title_text=”500×500-000000-80-0-0-9″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n 8. Perry & Kingsley, Kaleidoscopic Vibrations: Spotlight On The Moog <\/b>(Vanguard, 1967)<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n Cover versions of Moon River, Spanish Flea and Winchester Cathedral aren\u2019t usually the stuff of brain-searing madness. Thanks for Franco-German Moog innovators Jean-Jacques Perrey and Gershon Kingley, however, these innocent jingles were transformed into analog avalanches of electronic squawks, roars and belches. Each required a week of tape splicing to complete, prompting Kingsley to describe their work as both \u201cfun and painful\u201d. He wasn\u2019t bluffing.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/02\/500×500-000000-80-0-0-10-1.jpg” title_text=”500×500-000000-80-0-0-10″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n 7. The Jimi Hendrix Experience, Axis Bold As Love <\/b>(Polydor, 1967)<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n Like one of those space age pill we were told would offer a 12-coirse meal in one does, Axis Bold As Love packs all the eclectic claptrap of the 60s counterculture (e.g. UFOs, The Books Hopi) into an opiated dream, while a horizontal Hendrix makes guitars sounds \u201clike jellybread\u201d on the cubist Little Wing, promises a trip through cotton-candy clouds on his, er, dragonfly, on Spanish Castle Magic and strives for a stereo sounds that, in his own words, \u201cgoes up and behind and underneath\u201d. Far out indeed.\u00a0<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/02\/500×500-000000-80-0-0-11-1.jpg” title_text=”500×500-000000-80-0-0-11″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n 6. John Coltrane, Ascension <\/b>(Impulse, 1966) [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n A year after the release of A Love Supreme, the ever-restless John Coltrane placed his tenor sax in the service of the New Jazz Revolution and unleased Ascension \u2013 a squalling one-track quest for musical and spiritual freedom. A guttural, five-sax orgy of improvisation during which the participants were known to scream out-loud, five decades on Ascension remains a uniquely draining, frighteningly human and intense experience.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/02\/500×500-000000-80-0-0-12-1.jpg” title_text=”500×500-000000-80-0-0-12″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n 5. Faust, The Faust Tapes <\/b>(Virgin, 1973)<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n When Faust\u2019s previous label complained that the band\u2019s second album, 1972\u2019s Faust So Far, wasn\u2019t commercial enough (one does wonder quite what they were expecting from the krautrock experimentalists) they signed to Richard Branson\u2019s Virgin records. Part of the deal involved the group handing over the miles of tape they had recorded while living in a disused schoolhouse in W\u00fcmme, Germany. A still dazzling, disorientating collage whose 26 parts leap between hammering motorik, musique concr\u00e8te, machine noise, massed vocal chorales and mutated pop songs, thanks to a marketing gimmick where it went sale for just 49p (the price of a single at the time), The Faust Tapes sold 60,000 copies in the UK and in the process blew 60,000 minds.\u00a0<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/02\/500×500-000000-80-0-0-13-1.jpg” title_text=”500×500-000000-80-0-0-13″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n 4. Butthole Surfers, Locust Abortion Technician <\/b>(Blast First, 1987)<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n While tripping on acid in San Francisco, Texan art punks Butthole Surfers had the idea to relocate to Athens, Georgia for their next album. The hometown of one of their current favourite bands, R.E.M. However, holed up in Winterville, a small community on the outskirts of Athens, rather than recreate the jangling alt-rock sounds of Stipe, Buck, Berry and Mills they cooked up one of the most unsettling records of all-time. Locust Abortion Technician is an unholy cacophony of sonic experimentation, a bad trip of demented sludge rock, prog, psychedelia and avant-garde cut and paste tape effects (the terrifying Hay features recordings of the screams emanating from a nearby slaughterhouse). Shiny Happy People it aint.\u00a0<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/02\/500×500-000000-80-0-0-14-1.jpg” title_text=”500×500-000000-80-0-0-14″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n 3. Miles Davis, Agharta <\/b>(Columbia, 1975)<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n Alongside Pangea, Agharta was one of two albums Miles Davis cut live at Japan\u2019s Osaka Festival Hall on February 1 1975. Tired and sick (disintegrating hips, bleeding ulcers), it finds him at the furthest reaches of his post-Bitches Brew avant-funk mission. The already dense sound conjured by Davis\u2019s \u201973-\u201975 band enters even deeper waters here, guitarist\/synth maven Pete Cosey goes full Hendrix in space as Sonny Fortune\u2019s feral sax goes 15 rounds with Davis in his mutant, minimalist pomp. The trumpeter\u2019s musical explorations at this stage had taken him so far out, in fact, that following a concert on September 5 that year at New York\u2019s Central Park an exhausted Davis didn\u2019t perform again for five years.\u00a0<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/02\/500×500-000000-80-0-0-15-1.jpg” title_text=”500×500-000000-80-0-0-15″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n 2.<\/b> Sun Ra, Space Is The Place<\/strong> (Blue Thumb, 1973)<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n According to biographer John F. Szwed, Space Is The Place was Sun Ra\u2019s attempt to interpret The Urantia Book \u2013 a 2,000-page account of the history of the universe which claimed to be the work of celestial beings and was designed \u201cto present enlarged concepts and advanced truths\u201d to further the advancement of mankind. Regardless of how far he succeeded in uniting human consciousness with the cosmos. Ra – accompanied by the Astro Intergalactic Infinity Arkestra ad June Tyson\u2019s Space Ethnic Voices \u2013 still created space jazz\u2019s most out-there statement: a mind-blowing voyage to the outer limits propelled by African rhythms, proto electronica, wild group skronk outs and saucy exotica.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/02\/tmr546_albuma_720x.jpg” title_text=”tmr546_albuma_720x” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n 1. Captain Beefheart, Trout Mask Replica <\/b>(Straight, 1969)<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n The result of seven gruelling months living in a shared house under the tyrannical leadership of the Captain – aka Don Van Vliet \u2013 who also enforced a strict soya bean diet and new names on the members of the Magic Band (\u201cDrumbo\u201d, \u201cThe Mascara Snake\u201d, \u201cAntennae Jimmy Semens\u201d), Trout Mask Replica\u2019s 28 tracks were largely recorded in one four-and-a-half-hour session, overseen by Beefheart\u2019s old school friend and fellow freak Frank Zappa. So intricate is the musical language inside its surrealist mutant blues that it makes Miles Davis\u2019s pioneering Bitches Brew, also released that year, sound like a one-note samba. \u201cUnlike anything else you\u2019d ever heard in your life\u201d declared lifelong TMR evangelist John Peel. Over 50 years later, Beefheart\u2019s widest hour sounds as weird, wonderful and startlingly original as ever.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_divider color=”#111111″ module_class=”custom-divider” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” custom_padding=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][\/et_pb_divider][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The 20 Weirdest Albums EverMOJO selects the strangest records from music\u2019s furthest reaches.Words by Chris CatchpoleCaptain Beefheart and His Magic Band (l-r): Zoot Horn Rollo, Captain Beefheart, Drumbo, Antennae Jimmy Semens and Rockette Morton c.1969. \u201cThe Mascara Snake\u201d not pictured\u2026In order to truly blow one\u2019s mind, one must travel to the far reaches of the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":2172,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2173","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mojo-presents"],"acf":[],"modified_by":"akindell","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2173","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2173"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2173\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2182,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2173\/revisions\/2182"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2172"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2173"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2173"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2173"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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