Jon Hassell - Psychogeography (Zones of Feeling) (2014/2023)

The bombastic explosions of worldly sounds in Jon Hassell’s City: Works Of Fiction dropped in 1990, depicting an imagined future of thought provoking oxymorons: urban ancients living everywhere and nowhere blasting hypermodern folk hymns from their speakers. Over thirty years later, it still sounds far out yet totally familiar. It was a fruitful time for Hassell, who later drew a map of the city with alternate takes, demos, and studio jams in the form of Psychogeography, released in 2014 and reissued here in all its glory.

Charting this oneiric metropolis, Hassell and co wander aimlessly through sonic highways where global architectures meld seamlessly together. “Psychogeography” stems from Situationist philosophy, where one disregards the designed layout of a city and instead moves through its “zones of feeling”. Combined with Hassell’s fourth world concepts, this companion album to his 1990 epic forms an even deeper melting pot of times, spaces, moods, and places, drifting through hypnagogic ambience and electrified sensory overloads.

‘Aerial View’ conveys a vastness with its windily morphing passages, overlooking the kaleidoscope of sounds to come: from the nocturnal dub of ‘Neon Night (Rain)’ to the maximalist whirlwind bop of ‘Cityism Superdub’, a landslide of fuzz and wah. ‘Freeway’ portrays the rhythmic chugging of vehicles and the soporific feeling of long, long drives, “a blur of taillights” drawn in sunset coloured chords. The abstracted jazz visions of Hassell’s signature trumpets on ‘Waterfront District’ go from foggy murmurs to forceful yodels in seconds, while the gnashing drums, blues inspired guitars, and “limping bass groove” on ‘Favela’ wouldn’t be out of place in the most experimental of grunge jams.

Fusing infinite influences, Psychogeography is a necessity for anyone looking to broaden their musical horizons.