Wet Tuna :: Vast
Album Art: Dawn Aquarius
Vermont-based multi-instrumentalist and prolific mastermind behind all things MV & EE, Matt “MV” Valentine, has been a household name in the universally acclaimed underground scene for over three decades. Holding in one hand the electrifying essence of the late 1960s and in the other the popular power of the mid-to late-1970s guitar heroes, Valentine’s dedication to his cosmic craft is something out of a science fiction story. Rooted in the revolutionary reaction of poetic power and the spiritual sustenance of the hippie generation, we need folks like this who will continue to carry the tonal traditions of the past, while simultaneously submitting those radiating realms of sound and texture to the sophisticated surface. While waging war on the personal psyche of our population, Valentine quickly shapeshifts and is off to another distant planet, where an extraterrestrial ecosystem welcomes him with open arms and teething tentacles. The only discography and lysergical legacy that could even compare to the overwhelming output of psychedelic purity the veteran musician has released over the years is the Grateful Dead, and rightfully so. Once the melodic machine of metaphysical material starts, it’s nearly impossible to stop its revolutionary rampage, and Valentine has no intentions of letting off the galactical gas anytime soon. Welcome to Wettunaverse!
With dozens of releases with his partner in cosmic crime, Erika “EE” Elder, as the dynamic duo MV & EE, and several under the MV/EE Medicine Show moniker, Valentine’s alchemical ability to creatively capture the epic essences of the prophetic psychedelic scene that engulfed the West Coast with giants such as Young, Hendrix, and Canned Heat, to name a few, is something of legend as the tonal troubadour embarks on a brand new fever dream filled with sonic seduction, and trance-like temptations. Wet Tuna, a harmonious homage to the Jefferson Airplane-based supergroup Hot Tuna, founded by cultural titans Jack Casady and Jorma Kaukonen, Valentine brings the holy worship to the forefront with jovial jams and a never-ending landscape of pure psychedelia. Having first formed nearly a decade ago, Valentine and company have returned to the rudimentary realms of the jam world with their latest effort as Wet Tuna, “Vast” on the Jamestown, North Carolina-based label Three Lobed Recordings.
A blissed-out collection of ecstatic entries into the band’s crystallized catalog that features several self-released titles on Valentine's and Elder’s Child of Microtones imprint, this is the second record from the dystopian duo on Three Lobed since their 2022 classic “Warping All By Yourself”, and their fourth as this unprecedented unity, and it couldn’t have come at a better time. A mind-numbing body of work that ignites the introspective intensity of the human condition, the album takes off like a biblical bat out of hell, while swarming above listeners like a bunch of visceral vultures looking for easy food in the heroic heat of the high desert. Joined by Jim Bliss, Samara Lubelski, Vega Valentine, Erika Elder, Dawn Rider, Ged Gengras, Roe Land, Ain'e Droid, and Coot Moon, the group’s core three sees a remarkable shift not just in its critical collaboration in community, but in the overall oscillations that seep from the vessel’s creative energy as it eagerly soars above the planet’s thick outer shell just before taking off into the vibrations of the void. Across the album’s ten tracks, a roaring stream of subconscious sounds screams from within its singing spine, while efforts to achieve true enlightenment from one number to the next are the ultimate goal. With numbers like “Apex Of High”, “Love Is A Universal Thing”, the opener’s obliterating opener “Epic View”, and “Phenomenal Bullshit” all melting together into this cohesive melodic madness, Valentine and company take us on an epic expedition through the textured trenches of some of the greatest gestures in music over the last six decades.
