“White Magician”
by Sky Sunlight Saxon Universal Stars Peace Band
1984 song
The band is boiling and fearsome on the late 1970s recording "White Magician", released on Sky Saxon’s 1984 LP Masters Of Psychedelia. But as frightening as the grungy psych-metal is, Sky’s Armageddon-soaked vocals are even more disturbing. While big fat E chords gurgle and churn, Sky’s abrasive vocal chords, already raw at the song’s outset, get torn to shreds. “Magic is about to happen!” he howls, and you don’t feel like this sorcery is going to be something generous from the Good Witch.
But hey, you might be wrong. The song is called "White Magician", after all. Maybe the bootleg sound quality, that extrasolar echo from the eye of a hurricane of fire that envelops the band, is what makes "White Magician" so evil-sounding. Could it be that when more lucid, the mood of "White Magician" is in fact softer, more hopeful? Maybe Sky even has… good news for us?
Nope. When he begins chanting “Ya Ho Wha” and unrelenting drums are pounding out patterns like a thunderous death rattle, the picture begins to take a clearer shape and our worst fears are confirmed: the world is burning, and god, or Ya Ho Wha, tried to warn you. Oh well. Nobody ever said doomsday psych was going to be a smooth ride.
More than any other of the songs on Side 2 of Masters Of Psychedelia, "White Magician" bridges the gap between the LPs two halves. This connects the post-Yod recordings of Fire, Water, Air on Side 2 with the drowning-in-lava morass of the new heavy metal songs on Side 1. A cowbell towards the end of "White Magician" even completes the musical connection. It’s dark and scary. You’ve been warned.
