Lunch With Beardo was created in 2003 from the ruins of some New York punkbands – namely The Sex Machines, Deprivation and Murdershift – whose members shared a crush on psychedelic music, free jazz and post rock. On Surrealistic Picnic they unleash their collective sense of otherworldly music on the unsuspecting masses. Consisting of 3 tracks, which are titled to be official communications from the planet Lunch (don’t ask..) that flow seamlessly into one another, Surrealistic Picnic makes for quite a ride.

The first ‘official communication’, called Innocence to Wisdom starts of with the sound of a spaceship landing and aliens talking. Then a slowly strummed guitar comes in and we’re off for a psychedelic trip on planet Lunch. From thereof, little reminds us of our lives back on Earth, and anything is possible. Guitar work that - oddly enough - recalls Neil Young’s Dead Man Soundtrack on quite a few occasions, is backed by deformed and slowed down voices that repeat the same phrases over and over.

While the second track seems to be more of a transition than a real track, the third one, Space is the Plate, seems to be the centre piece of the album. The track runs for an exhausting 26 minutes, filled with dissonant noises and, dare I say, an almost melancholic undercurrent that reminds me of Godspeed You! Black Emperor in all its sober resignation, despite the storms going on on the foreground.

After the infinite ebb and flow and objects flying around-feel, the album neatly closes down with an easy strummed acoustic guitar, much as if you were coming home from a long trip to places you wouldn’t dare to tell a soul about out of fear of being declared mad. Like a planet called Lunch for example.

There’s an awful lot going on throughout this entire album, that makes you encounter new and interesting stuff each time again. In fact there’s so much going on, that on first listen everything seems to be just a big pile of noise. Repeated listens show that the pile is constructed very well-considered and that few things are actually out of place here. Sitting the whole thing through makes for an exhausting but rich and fulfilling experience. A very interesting release.
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"Inhabiting a fucked-up landscape of post rock, free-noise, psychedelic chaos, Lunch With Beardo, employ every effect known to man (and possibly some that don't) to create the unholy racket that is “Surrealistic Picnic”, a spaced out, euphoric and unsettling album that creeps and writhes from the speakers. Seeking nirvana through oblivion the band take no prisoner, Tibetan Ritual music colliding with ATM and Sun Ra in undiscovered corners of the galaxy. Final Track the 26 minute “Space Is The Plate” starts of in deep meditation drone mode before exploding into a dissonant howl of psyched out fury, that threatens to re-arrange your molecular structure, low magic of the highest order."
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"From the ashes of various punk bands, such as The Sex Machines, Deprivation, Murdershift came in 2003 a new band: Lunch With Beardo. No more punk, but free form experimental improvisation music. The band consists of Jeff Bumiller, Jesse Heffler, Eric 'The Ill', Jon Wazoo and Timh Gabriele and they play the whole rock kit, but also synthesizers, saxophones and perhaps other sound generators. It seems to me that this is culled from a variety of recordings, and then pasted together again in a collage fashion. Not of the abrupt kind, but gentle gliding into each other. Especially in the first two tracks this works well: a spacious built up, free form psychedelic music running amok, all quite uncontrolled and yet quite controlled at the same time. The third track, by far the longest of the three, things erupt into the world of noise and here sometimes things collapse under their own weight. The tension that is present in the first two tracks is gone, certainly after the eight minute (which I thought would have been a suitable ending of things). For those who love their rock music to be free form, psychedelic and also a bit noisy - and by my account there should be a few - keep an eye open for Lunch With Beardo."
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OK, get this...Apparently there is a planet called Lunch. This planet is communicating with us through these ambient/ experimental recordings. I can see actual pictures of the aliens on the inside cover. They look a bit like humans wearing monster masks and carrying instruments (sorry if that offends the Lunch people. Didn't mean to insult and harm diplomatic relations.) The sound is odd. They use the word "Space-A-Deliclic." Thats not a bad description. The "muisc" is improvised. The sound is very dissonant and chaotic. It also has a slow, sort of meandering pace that creeps through the blood vessles of the brain like a slowly spreading chill. There is a jazzy feel to it, though this has a lot more going on around it noise wise than your typical freeform. The use of real guitar, played in a fairly conventional way keeps the whole thing somewhat grounded. It allows the band to comunicate its weirdness through an ear friendly medium. They do a good job at portraying their chosen theme - strange otherworldly casual consumption. I hope I get your dinner invite to the planet lunch pretty soon, because this has to be a sight to see live. Apparently they pull it off like some sort of atmospheric blissed out gwar show in a dream. That, my friends...I've got to see.
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