Heavy Moon is the studio project of Canadian multi-instrumentalist Jakob Rehlinger. Fueled by his kosmische synths and psychedelic guitar work, Rehlinger has used Heavy Moon as an astral bridge to take listeners to the outer reaches of space.

The project has been active for 15 years resulting in 20 albums. The sound of Heavy Moon is blending classic late ’60s acid rock with early ’70s prog, krautrock, and proto-metal. Jakob Rehlinger is creating a sonic tapestry of trippy, mind-bending sounds and textures to aid the listener in their own astral travels.

Would you like to talk a bit about your background?

Jakob Rehlinger: What’s interesting is that I don’t really consider myself as having a background. I grew up comfortably in Canada, on Vancouver Island in a small town called Coombs. There wasn’t much to do there in my teen years except learn guitar and how to record. I took guitar theory for a few years in my teens but I’m mostly self-taught.

How did you get first interested in music?

Sometime before I was born in 1972 my parents bought a stereo and as part of the store’s promotion they were given ten new albums from around 1969 or so. So my earliest musical memories, around seven or eight years old, are of listening to Leonard Cohen, King Crimson, Jeff Beck, Simon & Garfunkel and CCR. That definitely formed the bulk of my musical tastes. But I didn’t really get into music until around 1982. Mostly by way of The Police and Men At Work and the other big radio acts of the time. My dad also had an acoustic guitar he didn’t really play much that I was fascinated with.

You’re a multi-instrumentalist, what would you say is your main instrument and do you think you have a certain advantage when it comes to music making and not being dependent on others?

I definitely fall into the “Jack of all trades” category. The closest I’ve come to mastering an instrument would have to be the guitar. Though I’ve never progressed past a certain level of competence. I play well enough to get the textures I want down and that’s what really matters for me. A certain level of versatility as opposed to virtuosity. I’m no Robert Fripp. My main instruments in the last few years have probably been synthesizers, again at a merely competent level. I’m no Herbie Hancock. Absolutely the most fun I have is playing drums. I’m certainly no Bill Bruford. I’m currently learning sax but I’ll never be Pharaoh Sanders.

I’d say yes, there’s definitely a pragmatic advantage in being able to record a Heavy Moon album as inspiration hits and not having to schedule time with drummers and bassists and keyboardists. Especially now in these pandemic times. The disadvantage of course is not having the unique artistic input other musicians bring to a project. The whole being greater than the sum of its parts. I try to get around that by doing a bit of role-playing. What would guitar player Jakob do on bass here? Ok, don’t do that. How can I make the organ part sound like it’s played by a different person than the Moog part? I’m not sure how well it works.

When did you decide that you wanted to start writing and performing your own music? What brought that about for you?

Predictably, there was a girl in seventh grade I had a crush on who I wanted to write a song for. I didn’t know how to play guitar but plunked one out on one string of my dad’s guitar. Of course I never played it for her. But later that year I decided I wanted to become a rockstar—specifically I wanted to be James Hetfield of all people—and asked for an electric guitar for Christmas. It kind of went from there. My guitar teacher taught me the requisite songs like ‘Stairway To Heaven’ and ‘You Really Got Me’ but I was always more interested in doing my own thing.

How do you usually approach music making?

Generally I use an improvisational, intuitive approach. I’ve probably been inspired by the “feel” of something I’ve heard and then I sit down and noodle around on an instrument, recreating that vibe inaccurately. Hopefully inaccurately enough to come out the other side and be original.

You have so many releases out, but let’s focus on ‘XX’. Can you share some further details on how your latest album was recorded?

Because Clostridium had graciously offered me a vinyl release, I knew I wanted to take advantage of the format and record two epic sidelong suites instead of a collection of shorter tracks. That was my goal going into it and I wanted to hit it out of the park. I also wanted it to be the culmination of everything I’d done with the previous 19 albums since 2006. Anyhow, I started by recording the drums. I just played a groove imagining in my head how the bass part might go and what other instruments might be playing, and then after a reasonable amount of bars I’d change it up. In my head I’d be like “Okay, now we’ll go from this early Floyd kind of thing into a hippy-dippy King Crimson part. Okay, maybe time for a Sabbath/Zeppelin vibe…” and so on.

<a href="https://heavymoons.bandcamp.com/album/heavy-moon-20">Heavy Moon 20 by HEAVY MOON</a>

I tried to keep a balance between each of the “movements” being long enough to get a nice improvisational jam going, but also switching it up enough to keep the listener on their toes. Anyhow, I did that for twenty minutes twice. Then I laid the bass down. “Ok, channel Roger Waters here. Ok, now John Paul Jones comes in with the pentatonic riff…” et cetera. And so on with each instrument — “What would John Lord do with the organ here?” et cetera. And that’s how it went. It was recorded and mixed in a couple weeks.

“I definitely wanted it to sound more like punky early Hawkwind”

How pleased were you with the sound of the album?

I was very happy. It’s really the album that had been floating around in my head since 2007 with ‘Heavy Moon 2’. I was actually considering having a more proficient drummer work on the album, but when the pandemic hit that decision was made for me. And I do maintain my sloppy drumming is part of the Heavy Moon aesthetic. It’s not too slick. It’s still rock’n’roll and not that kind of almost Muzak prog sound some records in this retro space rock genre have. I definitely wanted it to sound more like punky early Hawkwind than Yes or ELP.

Do tell us more about your gear. What kind of synths and effects do you have?

Most of my gear is relatively budget. I have the same Telecaster and Precision bass I’ve used since about 1990. My organ and electric piano are from the Yamaha Reface line. My Moog is a Behringer clone. I have buckets of pedals but for Heavy Moon it’s mostly a few cheap Chinese analogue delay pedals that get used. And also the classic Cry Baby and Fuzz Face because some corners can’t be cut. My tape echo however is an Arturia clone inside the DAW I use for mixing. I don’t use amps to record but have Zoom amp modeler multi-FX pedals I run guitar and bass through. Any phaser or vibrato probably came from them.

This might be a very difficult task, but on Discogs your name appears on so many projects, including Babel, Epididymis Rex, King Pong Dub System, Rev. Sebum, Reverend Moon, Semen Priest, Spume, The Urbane Decay, Tranzmit, Zsa Zsa La Borg… would you like to take some time and comment each of the projects you were part of?

Most of those are solo projects and stage names within those projects. God bless the Discogs users who enter that stuff.

BABEL was my main musical project for a great many years (roughly 1999-2019). It was primarily a dark ambient and experimental industrial drone project, though it went on a number of stylistic tangents as well — each of which eventually became offshoot projects. The first two Heavy Moon albums were actually issued as BABEL releases before I decided I clearly needed a new project name for this 180-degrees shift in genre.

TRANZMIT also came directly out of BABEL, and is an industrial radio-art project. As did Moonwood, though that began as solo freak-folk thing before becoming a full-fledged psychedelic space-rock band with my wife (Moonwood.Bandcamp.com)

King Pong Dub System is a post-punk dub project of mine and King Pong is my producer name. The Lo-Fi House Syndicate is an offshoot of that, and is electronic house music. SPUME is an ambient-dub dreampop project under the King Pong umbrella. Semen Priest is also related to King Pong but is a sort of vaporwave goth project. Mind Thief is a John Carpenter-inspired synthwave project.

Reverend Moon is my punk-blues songwriter project (and my stage name in Moonwood). The Urbane Decay is my new wave indie-rock singer-songwriter project.

I also play bass and do production in the improvisational avant space rock band Stargoon, and the post-punk sprechgesang trio Void Fill.

You are also releasing music under your own name, the last being ‘Wooden Moon’?

Yes, on my Jakob Rehlinger site there are a lot of albums that had previously been released under the BABEL moniker. In 2018 I decided it felt weird and pretentious to perform solo synthesizer music live under a “band” name, so I started recording and performing under my own name. Also the music had become less gothic and more kosmische. ‘Wooden Moon’ would’ve actually been a Moonwood album, if that project hadn’t become a full band.

What are some of the biggest influences?

Definitely Klaus Schulze, Eno/Fripp, Loren Mazzacane Connors, and Scandinavian saxophonist Trygve Seim are all over that album. I have a new album coming out in spring 2022 called ‘Ten Sorrows’ where some of those influences are again felt, perhaps more strongly. Along with a heavy dose of Terry Riley. Really, Klaus is probably my biggest influence on a lot of Heavy Moon recordings as well. His phrasing comes out in my synth solos. But Heavy Moon obviously has a lot of pre-Dark Side Floyd, along with A.R. & Machines, and Agitation Free, and everyone on those classic Brain Records releases.

What are some future plans?

I mentioned the ‘Ten Sorrows’ album. That’s really important to me as it deals in part with the death of my mother. I’m quite proud of it.

I do plan on firing up the rocket for another trip to the Heavy Moon, but since I’ve done 20 albums solo, I think I want to finally bring in some more people to mix things up. At least a rhythm section. I know I’d like it to get trippier and more abstract though. Further out into the cosmos.

“I can’t play a song the same way twice”

How important is improvisation for you?

Incredibly. Honestly, I can’t play a song the same way twice. My brain just rebels against it. It’s absolute torture for me. It’s been a real roadblock in my career. The idea of putting a Heavy Moon live band together to play ‘XX’ live as it’s heard on the record? That thought makes me want to vomit. The spark of discovery you feel when you’re improvising… You can’t beat it. That’s what I like about composing music. Not recreating it again and again.

Let’s end this interview with some of your favourite albums. Have you found something new lately you would like to recommend to our readers?

I feel like given the focus of It’s Psychedelic Baby! I should pick something psychedelic but to be honest lately I’ve mostly been listening to the new John Mellencamp album, ‘Strictly a one-Eyed Jack’. It’s fantastic. He’s clearly been listening to a lot of early Tom Waits and has the gravelly voice for it now.