Bleep

Black Mass is the only LP that the important early Moog composer Mort Garson put out under his Lucifer moniker. First emerging in 1971, this is a record which maintains the inventive synthesizer and keyboard techniques that one hears on Garson classics such as Mother Earth's Plantasia but utilises them to altogether darker ends.

Rather than pretty and whimsical keyboard music exercises, several tracks on Black Mass find Garson entering a shadow world of unnerving drones, whooshing atmospherics and ambiences that can only be described as occult. ‘The Evil Eye’, for instance, is a devilishly disorientating collection of synthetic sound while ‘ESP’ closes the record out with a rush of unsettling textures. When Garson does come closer to Wendy Carlos-style vignettes here he maintains the witching-hour feel of Black Mass’ more darkside numbers - ‘Incubus’ and ‘Exorcism’ find their baroque keyboard runs disturbed by stormy background sound.

The album’s otherworldly air means that, as well as Garson’s usual points of comparison like Jean-Michel Jarre, Black Mass also prefigures the innovations of Coil and Nurse With Wound. This new Sacred Bones edition of Black Mass features remastered audio and comes complete with the liner notes from the album original release.

Originally released in 1971, Lucifer's Black Mass LP is a far darker record than one may expect from the synthesizer music pioneer Mort Garson.