Astra: Pretends Playing Prog unPretentious

Despite a new San Francisco exhibit of Roger Dean’s work from the past, this disc doesn’t represent some resurrected project that the artist was involved with. No. It’s a band that sounds as if it crept up on listeners from the ‘70s – and probably grew up getting’ stoned and staring at Yes album covers for hours. After taking a cursory listen to The Weirding from Astra, it’s shocking to read that the band hails from San Diego, despite working with a British imprint to issue the disc. There’s a fey bent to all of this that makes the band being American a bit disconcerting.

I suppose taking your band name from a 1985 Asia album points to a certain entrance point into music. But while that alleged super group was surely able and more than competent at elongating jams past the point that they should be played, that doesn’t mean the act was in anyway justified. But with the ever deepening reverence dispatched at ‘80s ridiculousness – fashion, music or otherwise – Astra is the decade’s newest buncha devotees. It’s just troublesome since everything about this album – and this band – should be distasteful, but its not and I can’t understand why. It’s a problem

Most likely the fact that Astra’s bio includes tripe that I can’t digest – “With their heads floating in the mist of Europe's original psychedelic and progressive eras….” – has something to do with my disinclination to enjoy this. Of course, there are instrumental passages that beat out pretty much every other band working in or around this mold. But those moments have to be there to counter balance the 10 minutes of schlock that constitute “Silent Sleep.”

Yeah, Astra does occasionally summon some Black Sabbath – vocally and instrumentally – but every once in a while isn’t really good enough. On each one of Astra’s 8 tracks here, there’s a bit of an interesting idea pummeled into the ground after a five minute guitar solo or some analog sounding keyboards. And while a previous mention of Richard Vaughan’s singing acumen might sound like a nice compliment, there’s as much of him mucking it up as anything else – see “The River Under” for such proof.

Other reviews mention the overt, old tyme edge to the precedings here and while that can’t be dismissed, Astra surely doesn’t come off as the genuine artifact. Of course, a few instances of the band’s ability to compose pretty in-depth work ends up balancing The Weirding out a little.

“Ouroboros” splays out some elderly keyboard work intertwined with a nimble fingered guitar to introduce the track. And as unfortunate as a 17 minute song is, this one works for at least a quarter of the time prior to sounding tired, worn and bothersome.

Being into music like this takes a patience that most don’t have. The pay off – which should be understood as slight at best – usually gets over shot and destroyed. Too much of anything isn’t good anymore. As Astra proves this about eight times on the disc, their live show’s most likely pretty decent – they should probably still all wear muzzles, though.