The Heliocentrics have always been crossing borders from… well… from where, actually? Soul? Funk? Organic grooves? Even that kind of reduction would be falling short when trying to describe the band from the UK. Because The Heliocentrics have always taken those patterns away from their origins, have turned them into jazz and afrobeat and thereby liberated them from their pop-cultural dead-weight. Hence, »13 Degrees of Reality« does exactly what the collective is known for, albeit in a simple manner. »Eastern Begena« brachiates from rhythm to rhythm, drops a few strings and other sounds from a synthesizer. The build-up of »Wrecking Ball« almost takes eight minutes, including feedbacks from a guitar and a distorted idea of a melody. The Heliocentrics somehow manage to draw the listener deeper and deeper into their sound on this record. »Path Of The Black Sun« comes along as a shy version of a horror-film, only taking part in the human mind. »Hall Of Mirrors« drops a few bars, while the bass is murmuring underneath. The trick of this album is that it never actually goes too gloomy. What’s foregrounded is the psychedelic, the game, the desire to exhaust melodies and beats – it’s all about fiddling around. That’s what makes »13 Degrees of Reality« as irritating and yet as appealing as it is. Dissonances like in »Mysterious Ways« never become unlistenable, but turn into a track with understandable structures, eventually. There are no more borders. And still, The Heliocentrics never go to the max. Because they don’t have to. That’s what makes this record so very convincing.
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