Ghost Funk Orchestra – A Trip To The Moon (2024) [FLAC 24bit/44,1kHz]

Ghost Funk Orchestra – A Trip To The Moon (2024)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 43:35 minutes | 471 MB | Genre: Funk, Psychedelic, Exotica, Surf Rock
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Karma Chief Records

Coming off the heels of 2022’s A New Kind of Love, A Trip To The Moon sees Ghost Funk Orchestra diving even deeper in the worlds of film music, exotica, and psychedelic surf rock. The aim is to create a layered and collaged listening experience with more elements than you could possibly pick out in a single listen.

The guitars are fuzzy and flooded with spring reverb, and the horns are arranged in a studio big band fashion. It’s full of big compositions with garage rock attitude.

Influences range everywhere from Eddie Palmieri and Esquivel to The Lively Ones, Dusty Springfield, and War. The tracks are tied together by real recorded transmissions from the Apollo moon missions. The concept for the album is a story about a woman stranded on earth by her cosmonaut partner, left to ponder his whereabouts and whether or not he’ll make it back from the cosmos alive.

For Fans Of… Orions Belte, Temples, Allah-Las, Unknown Mortal Orchestra, Khruangbin, David Axelrod, Man or Astro-Man?With staying power that would amaze its creators, funk continues to be refined and redefined. Once a studio-only project that featured the varied talents of producer Seth Applebaum, New York City-based Ghost Funk Orchestra has also grown into a formidable live act that can raise up a groove and carry it to new heights. While he writes, arranges, and records all the music, Applebaum is also the chief instrumental voice responsible for bass, guitars, drums and various percussion, keyboards and synths including Ace Tone organ, Hohner Clavinet and Moog Model D. And unlike earlier purely studio creations, where endless obsessing over tracks was the rule, on A Trip To The Moon, Applebaum and the band play live.

Megan Mancini and Romi Hanoch provide vocals and spoken word asides and Stephen Chen (saxophone), Billy Aukstik (trumpet), Mike Sarason (flute), James Kelly (trombone), and Stuart Bogie (flute, bass clarinet) are the adventurous horn section. After a minute of scene setting with spacey bleeping synths, this excursion opens with the perky “Eyes of Love,” which is all 1960s flute-led grooviness. Mancini delivers lines like, “No, he wouldn’t dare, not if he knows what’s good for him.” The band continues to hit short, convincing grooves interspersed with bits of actual radio traffic recorded during the Apollo 11 moon mission. In “Where To?” 1960s pop is again clearly the inspiration and Applebaum convincingly gets the necessary bounce, powered by organ licks, just right. “Totality” is sunny pop complete with wah-wah guitar and Mancini singing “Can’t keep searching constellations/ For hints of sunlight from/ Your eye.” Though slower—and with more brass and bursts of wordless vocals à la bachelor pad music—”To The Moon!” continues to weave in more recordings of vintage radio traffic. “Nova” features fuzzy surf guitar. The novelty of the radio transmissions become more of a distraction than a unifying element as the voyage continues but Applebaum’s studio mastery makes this a listenable journey to the funky outer cosmos. – Robert Baird

Tracklist:

1-1. Ghost Funk Orchestra – Opening (01:01)
1-2. Ghost Funk Orchestra – Eyes of Love (03:01)
1-3. Ghost Funk Orchestra – Where To? (02:41)
1-4. Ghost Funk Orchestra – To The Moon! (03:37)
1-5. Ghost Funk Orchestra – Achluo (03:28)
1-6. Ghost Funk Orchestra – Nova (02:55)
1-7. Ghost Funk Orchestra – Helios (03:16)
1-8. Ghost Funk Orchestra – Into The Abyss (00:43)
1-9. Ghost Funk Orchestra – Again (03:56)
1-10. Ghost Funk Orchestra – A Solar Wind (02:31)
1-11. Ghost Funk Orchestra – Space Walk (03:10)
1-12. Ghost Funk Orchestra – Casadastra (03:29)
1-13. Ghost Funk Orchestra – A Rare View (02:38)
1-14. Ghost Funk Orchestra – Totality (03:50)
1-15. Ghost Funk Orchestra – Infinite Dark (03:13)

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