First Impressions: All in the Mind by the Strange Encounters

True story: While vacationing in Beirut in 1972 or ’73, I bought the Brooklyn Bridge for a few lira. My parents were likely bemused or annoyed, or a mixture of both, while the fast-talking Lebanese man I purchased it from was, I think, surprised that I’d fallen for his sales pitch. He looked middle-aged, and wore a battered coat, blue shirt but no tie, black or navy slacks and scuffed shoes. He may have been tipsy. I was 7 or 8 and decked out in naïveté. 

I think of that encounter often, these days. Someone’s always pushing something, while others are always willing to believe them. On the one-on-one basis, no big deal. Everyone gets rooked a time or two. On the grand scale? Rock is dead, they say. Guitar bands are on the way out. We hear and read it all the time, right? Hip hop, pop and country reign supreme. Yet, though on its alleged deathbed, rock music still attracts a third of all listeners, as this 2022 CBS News article shows. 

The Strange Encounters are doing their part in keeping rock alive. All in the Mind, their debut, is chockfull of jingle-jangle guitars, catchy chord progressions and harmonies sure to keep listeners up into the wee hours of the night. Think Big Star, Shoes and Gin Blossoms, aka acts and artists who channel(ed) the early Beatles as well as the Gene Clark-era Byrds. The Berlin-based duo consists of veteran musicians Joe Armstrong and Guido Kreutzmüller, who joined forces in 2018 and toured throughout Germany until pandemic lockdowns short circuited live gigs. They made use of the downtime, however, recording All in the Mind with producer Thomas Wosnitza.

While there are dollops of blues and psychedelia mixed in, by and large the 12-song, 54-minute set is one guitar-laden hook followed by another. It’s not perfect by any means, running about two songs too long, but highlights are plenty. “Don’t Hold Back” and “Recognize,” for instance, are earworms guaranteed to take up residence in the brain, while “Under the Sun” provides a ticket to ride into the mind’s eye. “Don’t know where we’re going,” they sing. Doesn’t matter. It’s a lot of fun. “Different,” on the other hand, ably captures the bittersweet element of running into a long-ago love. The person in front of us is rarely the person they were—just as we aren’t. Life has a way of changing us.

“A Smile for Everyone” is an atypical number on the album, opening with just a piano, while the lyrics paint a thoughtful portrait of someone who hides their hopes and pain away. The bluesy “The Boy in the Mirror,” for its part, offers heady self-analysis to a Stones-like riff. It’s the longest song on the album, at 7:37, yet sounds half it.

All in the Mind isn’t the greatest album of the year, but is definitely one of the most fun. If, like me, you have a hankering for some old-school rock, give it a go.