Formerly of Kyuss and Fu Manchu fame, drummer "Brant Bjork" revels in the spotlight on his latest venture into solo terrain with "Jalamanta." Could it be he's trading in the desert sands for sandy beaches? More importantly, does this now cover the entire lot of the past Kyuss members hitting their own stride individually or what? On his new release, Bjork is found to still retain that feel of the desert, but rarely hides the fact that he's given to leisure travel as the mood suits him.

Bjork's new music features a stripped-down and very skin and bone recording, reigning in plenty of '70s stimuli, as well as encroaching on a more soulful design that many have yet to realize, their heads evidently still clouded from the incessant blare of the bass. Classic rock and jive presents itself most prominently on "Jalamanta," and in a stunning turn of events, the atypical, fuzz-driven feedback often becomes the sacrificial lamb to the prevailing beat that sets the tone all the way from the trippy "Automatic Fantastic" through the relaxing "Oasis Layback" and blue water dash of "Indio." Bjork's obviously got his finger on the pulse with this one and shows he's unafraid to take chances, albeit fairly modest ones in most cases, and more and more it becomes known that as influential and innovative as Kyuss once was, the whole doesn't always prove greater than the sum of its parts!