Shadoks 
V.A. : Love,Peace & Poetry :
Chilean Psychedelic Music (CHI,1967-1974,pub.2008)***°
Before this release I had already checked once the musical history of “progressive” rock / folk music in Chile, which is actually a very sad story, because just before any of the groups could evolve towards a real highlighting period musically with free reign in expressions, the country was taken over by a military coup, which erased all the left wings attempts to make it a better country, killed thousands of people, and especially those who had an ability in real creative thinking. Rock, folk-rock and even folk bands and singer-songwriters were forced to stop making music or get out of the country. To make his point, Victor Jarra had his hands cut off in the midst of a huge crowd. (He was of one the most important singers). Various important folk(rock) groups fled to countries like France. Especially Los Jaivas was able to maintain certain strength in their expressions and to evolve further with an interesting repertoire. When in 1990 finally the Pinochet regime ceased existing, the country and society had become more criminal. Nowadays there exists once more a small underground scene, of mostly heavy electric guitar-and-bass dominated progressive rock. Some musicians and groups had since then returned to their native country.
This rather popular series, Love, Piece and Poetry, is known to give introductions from foreign 60s/70s psych scenes in certain countries or areas, with tracks from LP’s worth tracing. I noticed immediately that the choice of albums was a rather obvious one, although there are also a few rather unknown to me albums.
In this period of Chile you could more or less notice two types of bands : mid and late 60s psychedelia, (Kissing Spell, Los Vidrios Quebrados, Aguaturbia, Sacros, Los Mac’s Embrujo, Los Beat 4, Tumulto, Escombros) and more folk-inspired groups that were getting into an independent style (El Congreso, Congregacion, Blops, Los Jaivas, -of which especially Blops made a huge step forward to a more progressive sound on their latest album, and also Los Jaivas had certain psychedelic attempts from the beginning, -which proved the rather improvised track included-, although they evolved to more symphonic folk-rock later-). Most of these albums were reissued before, (some by the label), a few of them were just recently re-released by the same label (like Sacros).
The compilation sounds well put together, because it is not only a good collection and good presentation of the scene, it is also a nice compilation to listen to from start to finish. The two Aguaturbia tracks got me more curious about this this band, because I previously missed checking that release well enough. From them, “Erótica” is a female orgasm driven funkpsych improvisation with wild electric guitars, on a repeated bass drive ; “I wonder who” has a bit more bluesrock undertone, with a reverse echo to the female singing, giving a strange effect to it ; also the electric guitar solo balances in this reverse field. This compilation will be liked much especially by those interested in late 60s psych and who also like to hear creative influences of bluesrock and folk-rock.
