DISTANT HORIZONS (1997)

Now this is interesting: Davey doesn't think that Tree and new touring guitarist Jerry Richards are Hawky enough, so he takes his football and goes home to play with his Bedouin. Tree assumes bass duties, and stops trying so hard to be Bob Calvert. And they strike a chord, somewhere between the drifty wiftiness of The Business of the Future and the clunky rock of Alien 4, and, wonders, marvels, surprises, it is actually quite a good chord, where BLANGA does indeed bubble in the digital era.

Unfortunately, no one appears to have heard it. This has long been one of the hardest late period Hawkwind albums to find, a seeming collectible right from the day it was released. But persevere, good soldiers of BLANGA, and you, too, may lay your hands on this rare treasure, which won't take you back to, say, Space Ritual, but might at least get you thinking comparatively of PXR5 or Electric Tepee, especially on standout tracks like "Phetamine" and "Alchemy." That's good enough for me, at this point.

Blanga Score: 7