I always get a delightful surprise listening to Blue Orchids for some reason...it's probably something to do with the fact they are really forgotten and hardly even a cult band. Other neo-psych groups of the era with whom they have a spiritual affinity like Meat Puppets or even a band Blue Orchids influenced like The Chills have their place in the history of 80s rock with fanbases to match. The debut Blue Orchids LP The Greatest Hit (Money Mountain) from 1982 despite being a big independent hit has never been reissued on vinyl and only ever got released on cd once, back in 2003. It's hard to believe a group made up of ex members of The Fall who made an idiosyncratic masterstroke of acid fried anti-establishment Pagan post-punk neo-psych are not celebrated by the underground. Perhaps they are just too unique and will only appeal to those with a penchant for the esoteric.
Sun Connection is the opening song off The Greatest Hit. Once again Martin Bramah is in druid mystic mode. A very LSD vibe where his drug addled mind is trying to square away paradoxical notions such as the purity of a spiritual utopia and the encroaching reality of the necessity of money to survive. These existential dilemmas are delivered via that vocal trick of all of a sudden metamorphosing tunelessness into melodic elation and back again. All the while a mesmeric web of guitars and keys organically shift from tense passages to pastoral flourishes which has an added alchemical frisson as Bramah and organist Una Baines were romantically involved.
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