Doperider

The life of a psychonaut can take one to many plateaus of reality. Opinions vary as regards which of these are either desirable or optimal. All things considered though, it’s fair to say that once the average cerebral wanderer finds themselves a stoned skeleton on a motorbike, it’s a sign that they’re going places. Such were the movements of The Utopia Strong, in making their third and arguably trippiest full length album for Rocket Recordings. As the band explain: “When recording we tend to have books, bits of art and interesting things lying around the place. (Kavus) had recently bought the Paul Kirchner compendium, Awaiting The Collapse.” Paul’s character ‘Dope Rider’ (the skeleton in question) drives around the desert, getting into all manner of high jinx and spouting cosmic philosophy, highlighting the absurdities of life, death and the American mythos. “When we had created that particular track, one of our most beautiful and outré, it seemed to name itself.” Serendipity has