Lend Me Your Underbelly is the work of Dutch musician and biologist Christian Berends. The artist finished 2019 with a limited edition release entitled Campfire Acid Folk out on the Enfant Terrible subsidiary label Vrystaete. Perfect for your next mushroom-fueled excursion into the forest, Berends recorded the album’s four tracks using instrumentation that includes a bulbul tarang (a string instrument also known as an Indian banjo), acoustic guitar, mandolin, and electronics.
“Residue” opens the collection and it is a great introduction to this musician’s psychedelic ambiance. The Bulbul tarang Shahmukh literally means “waves of nightingales,” and its mysterious droning quality lends the track a crepuscular solemnity. Harmonizing lines interweave a hypnotic pattern before additional strings and electronics build into a field of buzzing resonance. Gaining focus before nodding off into an altered dream zone, “Residue” sure seems to attract some strange creatures to the campfire’s edge.
