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JIM
PICKS: THE BEST NEW MUSIC FROM SCANDINAVIA & FINLAND... |
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Welcome
to The Archives where all the best new Nordic music
gets stacked up each week. Some weeks are more "stacked"
than others. You will also find new titles on this page
that didn't make the front page, so check back often.
Do I feel compelled to mention that almost all of these
are import CDs and are available at extremely decent
if not decadent domestic prices? I do. Click
on the cover scan for more details about each release
and purchasing options. Bold
links in quotes within the descriptions are windows
media sound samples, try before you buy.
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Jim's
Best Of Nordic/Scandinavia, by year: 2007
•
2006
•
2005
•
2004
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Advance
tracks from upcoming releases:
Norma "Waste"
(radio edit) from Book
Of Norma
Park Hotel "Dead
Ringers" from
Free
For Friends
The Tallest Man On Earth "Pistol
Dreams" from
Shallow Grave
Antennas
"Lies"
from the upcoming album, TBA, currently
available as a
single.
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on the cover scans for more details, purchasing options. |
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Second
album from Blood Music,
AKA former First Floor Power dude Karl-Jonas Winqvist,
the follow-up to Sing
A Song Fighter!, his charming fizz-pop debut.
Don Quite, named for a childhood
misspelling, is a more melancholy affair, written after
his grandfather’s passing last year. Still, it’s
lilting, languid pop led by voice and piano, for fans
of the croony, orchestral-pop sounds of Jens Lekman
and Sufjan Stevens. Karl-Jonas sings in a voice imbued
with child-like wonder and wild-eyed naiveté,
backed by sweet harmonies, all of which are cavorting
baroquely with saucy synths, strings and ebullient rhythms,
the electric sound of joy, indeed. Get inside K-J's
"Lovely
Love", discover "Eagles
In the Water", and as a reward for
those of you digging deeper, experience "Moontalk".
Don Quite features guest appearances by James
Huggins (Of Montreal), Lars Skoglund (Laakso), Sara
Wilson (First Floor Power), Andreas Söderström
(ASS), Leo Svensson (The Tiny) and Simone Rubi (The
Rubies).
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Cathartic
proto-folk/cave-soul/meta-jazz with freak appeal, Wildbirds
& Peacedrums are a betrothed duo
from Gothenburg, Sweden who ply the audible frequencies
with cyclic rhythms and (in)delicate female vocals,
and little else, outside of infrequent bouts of glockenspiel
and zither! Their debut, Heartcore,
recently re-issued worldwide by The Leaf Label, has
much too offer in the way of challenges and rewards.
Most accessible is the lovely "I
Can't Tell In His Eyes",
while "Doubt/Hope"
gives you a taste of the wild song-scenarios you'll
encounter. Like a body reduced
to a pounding heart, two heaving lungs, and a stack
of clattering vertebrae; perhaps it’s what’s
missing that makes what’s here so visceral (minus
the viscera)… Fans of Bjork, PJ Harvey, Majessic
Dreams, Kate Bush, Diamanda Galas, Montys Loco, and
Fiery Furnaces chanteuse Eleanor’s oddest moments
will find wild-eyed salvation in W&P’s revelatory
art-rock minimalism. Impress your friends...
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Since
their humble beginnings in the mid-80s Finnish cult
act 22 Pistepirkko
have bestowed upon an unsuspecting planet's populace
a dozen full-length albums (including The
Others), an essential
double-album retrospective, a DVD, and a slew of
singles. With (Well, You Know) Stuff Is
Like We Yeah!, like 2006’s Drops
& Kicks before it, this quirky, veteran
trio employ their awesome super-powers on behalf of
song and songcraft, keeping things simple, but as always,
skewed in the most compelling ways. With deep, thirsty
roots in psychedelia, garage, pop, surf, folk and electronica
22-PP’s musical boundaries are elastic to say
the very least, and here, with the songs distilled to
their most primal essences, they have created their
most profound and most beguiling album yet, and oddly,
enough produced by Kramer. Check out the first single,
"Suburban
Ladyland"
and
the woozy-sweet "Zombie".
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Norwegian
psych-rock juggernaut Motorpsycho
follow-up the Indie Rock Valhalla that was 2006’s
Black Hole/Blank Canvas double-album with the
band’s 13th full-length, Little Lucid
Moments, their most hypnotic and heroic
work to date, and the heaviest prog-rock action they've
explored since the late-90s. Four immense, proggy tracks,
includes a prerequisite 'suite' of songs (shades of
"Starship Trooper" by Yes, harmonies included).
Motorpsycho seed their proto-stoner supernova jams with
Steve Reich-ian interludes, mind-expanding Deadheadsian
guitar-weaving and galaxy-wide jazz odysseys; spooling
up monstro riff-mongering and seismic traktorbass™
that evoke both Sonic Youth and Swervedriver; all simultaneously
anchored and propelled by the jazz-motorik stylings
of new drummer Kenneth Kapstad (former member of Gåte),
who totally shreds time & space, amen. Four molten,
mesmerizing tracks strung out over nearly 60 minutes,
recorded roughshod in late 2007, this is MP in epic,
zoomrock mode. Here's part of the second passage from
the 21-minute salutatory suite, "Little
Lucid Moments", and another open-throttle
edit from the monumental "She
Left On the Sun Ship".
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Things
get a little more ornate and orchestrated when Boy
Omega Man Martin
Henrik Gustafsson trades in the electronic backing
of recent efforts for a bevy of strings, horns and pianos
on his latest effort, Hope On the Horizon.
The songs start simply but soon immerse the listener
in grander-than-usual dynamics and epic arrangements,
like on "A
Quest For Fire" and
a chiming sweetness that belies the subject matter on
"Suffocation
Street".
While his desperate vocals still recall earnest troubadours
like Conor Oberst and Elliot Smith, this time out Martin's
waltzy folksongs are awash in a rootsy Sufjan Stevens-esque
grandeur unheard on previous efforts... |
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With
Montys Loco's last album, Man
Overboard, still in regular rotation we welcome
with open arms these Swedish electro-pop mavens' new
recordings. Farewell Mr. Happy
is yet another beautiful and bizarre collection of uncompromising
looped and sampled dark-dreamery, comparable to The
Knife and Bjork, and retaining that sinister Phil Spector
girl-group-gone-bad vibe. Their sonic habitat remains
a sleepy, hyper-sensual sonic otherworld, but the edges
here aren't softened at all, in fact the opposite is
true. The new songs are dangerously serrated and sprinkled
with oldchool industrial flourishes, but of course it's
Anja Bigrell and Marie Eklund's woozy and winsome vocal
aerobatics that stir the spirits and tug purposefully
at the heartstrings. Explore the first two singles:
"Farewell
Mr. Happy" and "Heavy".
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With
a sound that has matured from adorable to drop-dead
gorgeous in the space of time between releases, The
Second Band's new album, The Definite
Form, is more epic, more rapturous and
more assured than ever, an orchestral-pop gem that will
be in my Top 10 for 2008. The Örebro, Sweden combo’s
soulful brass-driven ecstasy is still evident, but this
time out, older and wiser, shadowed with a feeling of
heartbreak and melancholy that is undeniably Scandinavian.
Fans of The Beautiful South (arrangements), Headlights
(sweetness), Bright Eyes (earnestness), Okkervil River
(rustic charm) and Shout Out Louds (a manic melancholia)
will find plenty to swoon to here. Get dizzy with "The
Piano Machine" and "Funeral
At Sea". |
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An
Object is the debut album from Swedish
motorik-punk troika Paper, featuring
Calle Olsson from The
Bear Quartet and Paddington DC along with members
of Audionom.
They've been around for almost a decade, dropping the
occasional download or compilation track, but this is
their first official release, and on the esteemed Novoton
label to boot! Paper's sound is based around the frustration
of punk, the delicacy of pop melody and the hypnotic
power of repetition. Think early Wire meets early Wire,
simple, single-minded, powerful; with contrails of Neu!,
Silverbullit/Citizen Bird and Joy Division. Fans of
The Bear Quartet’s recent electronic eccentricities,
Audionom’s hypnotic avant-punk, and Paddington
DC’s zoom-pop will be spellbound, if you don’t
mind a bit of krautrockin’ cochlea-knocking. While
seemingly greater than the sum of its parts, check out
these highlights: the 12XU-ish "Out
Of It Into It"
and the album's first single "To
Her". |
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On
their new, self-titled album Norway's reigning rock
royalty Madrugada’s ferocious,
impassioned blues-rock is even more charged and heartbreaking
than ever after the untimely death of guitarist (and
My Midnight
Creeps frontman) Robert Burås last year. Taking
the songs that Robert had completed, and recruiting
guitarists like Kid Congo Powers (The Bad Seeds, The
Cramps, The Gun Club) and Emil Nicolaisen (Serena Maneesh)
to flesh things out, the remaining members of Madrugada
offer this album as testament to their lost brother,
a true rock-n-roll dude. Have an earful of the ominous
and portentious first single: "Look
Away Lucifer". Could
this be the band's swan song? Hard to say. I imagine
it would be hard to move forward after such a loss,
but we'll see... |
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Recently
nominated for a Swedish Grammy Nouvelle
D'Amour is the ambitious new album from
our favorite Swedish/Ugandan soul siren Jaqee
(Jaqueline Nakiri). For this new platter this songbird's
partnered with Swedish rock icon Mattias
Hellberg (Nymphet Noodlers, Hederos
& Hellberg, esteemed solo-singer-songwriter)
who voodoos up some killer songs and crafty arrangements
as well as some truly rambunctious and rootsy psych-country-dub-ragga-folk-blues
grooves, in a soulful sub-Sahara stylee. There's hints
of Massive Attack's hazy dubscapes and proto-folky Devendra
Banhart's Smokey Monuntain-esque genre-splicing;
throw in the kitchen sink (and a banjo!) and you're
golden. Check out the first single "Sugar",
the smoky "Zion",
and the plucky "Banjo
Lullaby". |
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At
long last, one of 2007’s best Swedish albums,
from one of our fave artists, finally arrives here at
HQ in early 2008…sorry it took so long! The
Fine Arts Showcase, led by post-modern popsmith
Gustaf Kjellvander (Christian's little brother and member
of Songs Of Soil), makes mecurial, melodic rock music.
When covering an album's worth of Rough
Bunnies tunes Gustaf continues to shine
as a vocalist and arranger. Cute, girly Rough Bunnies
ditties become grand, expensive, stentoroian-voiced
epics; he's creating polished art-rock baubles from
the cult-cultivating Rough Bunnies’ melancholic
lo-fi uncut gemmage. Dive into the album's first single,
"Modern
Love" and
the multi-referential "Rough
Bunnies Saved My Life" |
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Happens
every year, a spectacular late addition, in fact it's
not even here yet... Mattias Barjed,
glowering guitarist for The Soundtrack of Our
Lives, created and curated this double-album
soundtrack for a hip new Swedish miniseries (about twenty-something
rockers in early-70s Gothenburg) that plays out like
a gritty retro-rock opera! Features contributions from
Barjed's TSOOL bandmates, plus members of Elope, Hipwhips,
Jan Martens Frustration and many more. Also includes
a new, unreleased song by The Tallest Man On Earth.
Check out guest stars like Hipwhip's Markus Lindmark
on
"Set Us Free",
series female lead Fanny Risberg on a cover of The Hipwhip's
"Stay
With Me Forever" ,
and
an awesome guest vocal by TSOOL frontman Ebbot Lundberg
on
"Coming
Down Cold".
I'm calling this my Album Of The Year and just
in time to take the top spot on my
list of fave Nordic albums of 2007.
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Award-winning
Swedish songstress Anna Ternheim's
domestic debut is here, in EP teaser form, highly recommended
for Cat Power, Frida Hyvönen and Imogen Heap fans.
Six mostly-acoustic songs include the 'Naked Version'
of her recent single “Lovers Dream”, a cover
of David Bowie & Iggy Pop's "China Girl",
plus a live video of her righteous Broder
Daniel
cover, “Shoreline”, a piano
and vocal version of this classic Swedish rock track
so compelling I’m posting her
studio piano version and
BD’s bombastic original just
for kicks. U.S. Tour May 2008. |
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Back
in stock soon! Fans are still mourning the
passing of Madrugada/My
Midnight Creeps guitarist Robert Burås
on July 12th. Since that sad day we've belatedly and
finally come across a supply of Madrugada’s haunting
2005 live album, Live
At Tralfamadore,
at
a bearable import price. An album released just 12 days
after the astonishing gig at the Olso Spektrum in December
2005, documented here in glorious stereo. Feel it:
"Hard
To Come Back". Extras
include songs from the 2005 Oya Festival and a couple
other venues. Features special guest appearance by Kid
Congo Powers, one of Robert’s guitar heroes. |
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Currently
unavailable, sorry... I'm a fan of the EP format
to begin with and this highly recommended debut EP from
shoegazing Swedish trio Norma just
cements my fanaticism! Parlaying a monumental brand
of tripped-out hypno-electro-rock majesty driven by
motorik beats Norma creates gloomy, zoomy, post-rock
symphonies comparable in their epic scope, dynamics,
and totally cosmic bombast to fellow Scandinavians Eskju
Divine, Serena Maneesh, The Lionheart Brothers and Moonbabies.
So many adjectives, so few songs! Four epics, two of
them clocking in over 8 minutes, including "The
Storm". 180 proof shoegaze rock, invoking
the corporeal spirits of klassic krautrock, Spacemen
3 and Spiritualized, M83, Mogwai, Sigur Ros, etc. Norma
is a great new band and the Novoton label (home to Black
Belt, Antennas,
Existensminimum)
continues to impress! |
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A
domestic release for Swedish retro-psych-prog act Black
Bonzo's second album! With their debut album,
Self-Titled
AKA Lady of the Light (which I'm trying to
restock at a decent price), Black Bonzo made fans of
many Parasol staffers, pals, and customers, so it’s
extra cool to have their new album readily available
Stateside. This new album finds the band exploring even
more glorious 60s and 70s progressive rock trajectories,
stupendous stadium rock, the soundtrack to a hazy, hairy,
heavenly bygone era. Led by Magnus Lindgren prog-perfect
vocals and Nicklas Åhlund’s magnificent
organ Black Bonzo resurrects Queen, Uriah Heap, Yes,
Pink Floyd, Gentle Giant, even a hint of Kansas. From
the Hammond-o-riffic "Thorns
Upon A Crown", to the meaty, beaty,
big and bouncy "The
Well", to the five man acoustic jam
"Ten Feet Away" it becomes
apparently that Black Bonzo has become even more adept
at crinkling the time/space continuum. The band says
"It's more adventurous, original and mysterious
then you ever can imagine!" and knowing what
we know about their flamboyant and freaky debut we've
got two words for you: "WHOA!" Yes these classic
rock chameleons are back, and in fine "prog-was-punk-before-punk-was-punk”
form. |
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First
off, I LOVE grandiose boy/girl duets by Swedish twins.
You put that combo together and I’ll love it and
gosh bless 'em upstart Swedish guitar-pop duo Tupelo
Honeys have done just that! Even if you take
the twins out of the equation I’ll love it like
I love David
Fridlund and Sara Culler, Vega
(especially), and our own Moonbabies;
and I’ll harken back to The Delgados, The Go-Betweens,
and OK, I'll admit it, The Dream Academy. Three fine
examples include “Boy,
You’re All Right”,
“Andy,
Are You Sure?”, and “Without
My Princess”. We’re talking
popsongs here, so lyrically it’s pretty much about
feeling good, feeling very good, and feeling bad, but
only occasionally. Joel’s songs trend towards
epicry and grandeur (think Arcade Fire and even Johnossi),
while Linn’s sweeter sunnier fare has twee and
classic Swedish pop (think Club 8, The Tiny and Concretes)
dominating the graph. It’s when their voices come
together that the goosebumps go off, bigtime, and when
the twins do that amazingly effective shouty gang vocal
call and response thing I hear a very romantic and winsome
Love Is All. Anyone else? Now
available as Japanese import with two bonus tracks. |
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Rock
trio Elope’s 9
Distilled Dreams and their previous effort,
3WD, were recorded during the same marathon
sessions, but released over two albums, songs split
between rockin' and mello'. 3WD
made no bones about rocking out Crazy Horse style, while
long-awaited and chiefly acoustic companion piece, 9DD,
explores Elope’s dreamy side, their hazy mellowosity,
and as it happens could be the best album of their career.
"Black Eyed Citizen"
is one of the strongest songs of their career and the
blown-glass beauty of "No
Don't" is a sound to behold. Whereas
their 2004 debut, The
No Name Record, stirred Cream, Badfinger, and
The Beatles into their steamrolling stoner melodicism;
and 2005's 3WD offered throwback, electrified
prog(gier)-rock majesties; here within the misty-eyed
classic rock escapism and meandering psychedelia of
9 Distilled Dreams you'll find straight-up
references to Big Star, Pink Floyd, Neil Young, and
even CSNY... Dreamy. |
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Shoegaze
guitar-pop action from Swedish outfit Park Hotell
(two Ls) led by Christian Ramirez and featuring
members of Mattias Alkberg BD. Gauzy pop that can rock
when called for, harkens back to quality fuzz-guitar
bands like The Weddoes, Joy Division, The Bear Quartet
(an obvious influence), Razorcuts, and yes, The Close
Lobsters...sigh! EP #1 has a real propulsive Weddoesing
Present vibe, with fuzzy guitar lines like comets tails
("Size
Of Spain").
EP #2 sounds a bit like fellow New Order-lovin' countrymen
The Embassy ("Low
On Resistance"),
complete with Peter Hook-esque grinding basslines. We've
also restocked Park Hotell's only other available CD
release (as far as I know), a
fuzzy-wuzzy 2-song single from 2003, featuring
"Hearts".
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Helsinki's
The Hypnomen parlay a peculiar brand
of pan-euro psychedelia that is as effortlessly flambouyant
as it is accomplished, focused on the interplay between
guitarist Pekka's slippery leads and tinkler Sami's
droning Hammond. The Hypnomen have been at their dirigible
psych-prog for more than a decade (starting out as a
surfy freakbeat combo) and it shows in their ability
to seamlessly incorporate corporeal jazz, megalithic
riff bombast, Santana-styled afro-beat grooves, freaky
exotica and West Coast harmonies, baroque macro-instrumental
jams, even a freakin' drum solo. Check out The
Seeker and
Sacred
Mountain Revisited.
The band themselves work their mellowosity instrumentally,
enlisting guest vocalists from the Finnish indie scene,
and the end result is 100-proof Summer in a bottle,
surreal and serene. Fans of Motorpsycho, ? and the Mysterians,
Sleepyard (another pure Summer record from Scandinavia),
Spiritualized... SHINDIG MAGAZINE: "Scandanavian
psychedelia: think Soundtrack Of Our Lives with a touch
of Spiritualized." We’ve
also stocked The Hypnomen's available CD catalog, all
highly recommended. Need more proof? Listen...
"Autumn"
from Seasons
of the Mind EP
"Asleep"
from Crystal
Skies w/vocalist Jonna Tervomaa
"Oblivion"
from Andomeda
Airport w/vocalist Markus Nordenstreng |
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You've
probably figured out I am a sucker for Scandinavian
retro-rockers (Hipwhips, Elope, The Works), those artists
influenced mightily by the 60s and early 70s, but Mainliners
really open the throttle…racing back up the pyramid,
with a ferocity and intensity that take modern garage-rock
to a new (old) level. With loads of guitars, ample organs,
and an off-the-charts vocal gusto this album positively
swaggers, and vocalist Robert Billing truly does channel
The Animals’ Eric Burdon and young furball era
Mick Jagger. For fans of classic garage rock and fellow
Scandi rockers My Midnight Creeps, Wired For Mono, Ricochets,
Antennas, and even The Hives. Check out "Olivia"
and "Bourbon
& Ice"
and "Northern
Soul".
We’ve
also restocked the Crusher label’s Dead
Man - Self-Titled CD from 2006:
Dead Man mine the birth of stoner rock, from the Grateful
Dead to Iron Butterfly...fans of Black Bonzo will find
much to appreciate here, just as historical but less
hysterical. Trippy I tell you:
"Mumbo Gumbo"
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Second
album of megalithic garage-rock from Oslo, Norway supergroup
My Midnight Creeps, featuring guitarists
Bobby Cagehill, AKA Robert Burås (R.I.P.) from
Madrugada,
and Alex Kloster-Jensen from Ricochets,
the follow up to their celebrated self-titled
debut. Possessed by the vengeful specter of 50+
years of heroin blues, sinister psychedelia, and gargantuan
garage rock. Check out the epic "Don't
Let Them Bring You Down", the seedy
"Kitchie
Kitchie Ki-Me-O (Everything's Gone Wrong)",
and the heartbroken "Love
Is Gone". On this voyage one encounters
Willie Dixon, 13th Floor Elevators, The Animals, The
Rolling Stones, The Stooges, The Sonics, Spacemen 3,
The Gun Club, The Cramps, Union Carbide Productions,
Nick Cave, along with a bluesier take on modern psych
marvels like BRMC and Black Angels. Not so very surprisingly
Histamin occasionally harkens back to The Soundtrack
Of Our Lives’ mid-90s psych-rock Vikings era,
encompassed by the early EPs and the first two TSOOL
albums, lotsa sitars and castanets…and blazing
saxophones…and howling Hammond organs. |
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When
I learnt that key members of two of my fave Norwegian
rock acts, Madrugada
guitarist Robert Burås (R.I.P.) and Ricochets
guitarist Alex Kloster-Jensen, had formed a new garage-rock,
psych-blues supergroup called My Midnight Creeps
I certainly expected big things. Yet I was unprepared
for the blistering, buzzing, guitar-organ-and-black-leather-fueled
bombast that these Norwegian’s powered their late-2005
debut with… Namely the high-speed-energy, Union
Carbide Productions-esque “Die
For A Ride”, and the groovy Spacemen
3 spasm of “Nightmare, Nightmare”. Later
on it’s tracks like the boogie-stomping single
“I Fell Into A Hole” and the growling garage
monster that is “A
Perfect Kind Of Fall”, my fave of
the bunch. Also includes a slithering, soul-piercing
cover of Willie Dixon’s “Spoonful”,
which gives you an idea of where they’re coming
from (or heading to). More no-lie namedropping: Stooges,
Sonics, Gun Club, BRMC, and 13th Floor Elevators. |
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This
lovely import piece is out of stock at the moment. It
will likely re-appear as a domestic release on Galaxy
Gramophone in expanded form late 2007 or early 2008.
If you can't wait email us, we'll see what we can do...
Me and The Chrysler?
We're not trying to confuse you, promise… But
by the time I have a Chrysler album scheduled for U.S.
release on our Scandi-only Galaxy Gramophone label it’s
a good bet they’ve gone and released another album
in Sweden. So back in 2005 when we released Failures
And Sparks here in North America The Chryslermen
promptly delivered their second album Cold War Classic
in Scandinavia. Now it’s 2007, I’ve got
an expanded
version of Cold War Classic rolling out
to the Stateside masses this month and The Chrysler’s
brand new masterpiece, The Benelux Years, arrives!
Like clockwork I tell you! Not like I'm going to wait
for me to put it out here, and neither should you...
Housed in a handsome matte digipak, here are the latest
chapters of The Chryslernovella: more (and more magical)
mysterioso pop ("I
Keep My Eye On You Sparrow"), subliminal
psychedelia ("Precious
Darkness"), and crackling bonfire-folk
conflagrations ("Who
Do You Think Can Save Me?"). Truly
rich in melancholy, harmonies, and pastoral dynamics.
So new that I’ve only heard it a couple times…enough
to know that The Chrysler remains one of my most cherished
bands on the planet. |
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Speaking
of Madrugada...
One of modern Norwegian rock royalty’s most beloved
and compelling vocalists, Madrugada frontman Sivert
Høyem renders his solo albums within
a shadowy rock noir. With Exiles he calls upon
his “Arctic cowboy music and North Star blues”
muse and his backing band The Volunteers, more
Leonard Cohen than Nick Cave, extra-large arrangements
with more folksy elements shaded in… The seedy
underbelly’s still there, but it’s less
about day job Madrugada’s desolate blues bombast
and more about pop’s purple mountain majesties.
Heroic rock epics through and through, with an astounding
sense of intimacy, perhaps it’s all the minor
key magic? Check out the dreamy first single “Into
The Sea”, the mellowondrous "January
3rd", and the truly epic (8-minute)
title track, “Exiles”.
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Late
60s Swedish psychrock outfit born of orgiastic all-night
jams, had their debut released in Finland, and it remains
a psych vinyl fetishist's wet dream to this day. Not
only did Baby Grandmothers tour with
Hendrix in 1969 but upon their dissolution they morphed
into the lengednary Mecki Mark Men. Don't take my word
for it, check out the liner notes by Dungen guitarist
Reine Fiske! CD re-issue features the rare single ("Somebody
Keeps Calling My Name" b/w "Being
Is More Than Life") plus some cosmically-inclined
live tracks. Heavy duty jams! They're also featured
on the Psychedelic
Phinland DCD collection, which is
equally essential for fans of obscure psych... |
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Moonbabies'
upcoming new album, Moonbabies
At The Ballroom, will be released
by our own Hidden Agenda label in May, but we've got
a stack of their import three-song single from their
mega new Swedish label Startracks to whet your appetite.
Includes "War
On Sound", the edit version of "Weekend
A-Go-Go", and exclusive b-side "Painless". |
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Highly
recommended debut album from Gothenburg, Sweden duo
Hearts of Black Science, the latest
in a long line of Scandinavian phenoms. Fans of 80s
electro-poppers Depeche Mode and OMD ("Empty
City Lights") will find plenty to
appreciate here although there's a darker edge ("Revolvers")
to this with some seriously epic synth-rock arrangements
("Snowfall").
Comparable to the aforementioned 80s icons, anything
from Factory Records' heyday, Vitesse, Mew, Doves, M83... |
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Now
that Kemado has released this perhaps my hype is more
believable? Nine-member Swedish collective Audionom
caught our ear and then Kemado's ear with their high-velocity
strobe-rock and dark motorik magick. Retrospectiv
is a collection of the their mind-numbing guitar-mantras
and mesmerizing drone-rock, all propelled by cosmically
intense rhythms. Imagine Silverbullit (aka Citizen Bird)
prone to punishing krautrock extremes, Neu! bouncing
around inside Hawkwind’s “Silver Machine”,
and Stereolab on steroids prescribed by PIL…
Best enjoyed as one album-length guitar juggernaut,
highlights include the growling, cathartic You
Said I Was The Only One,
and a trio of bludgeoning zoom-rockers:
Kristall,
DC2,
and
Spindlar.
Also available as
an import, same tracks. |
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Sweden's
Black Belt traffic in gritty garage-rock
heaviosity and dirigible psychedelia, it's noisy stonerrock
with plenty of muscle and a righteous late-60s-early-70s
vibe, plus frontman Joen Carlstedt sports one
of the most majestic afros in Rock! Their second
album, Two Minutes To Midnight, will find favor
with fans of fellow Scandinavians Elope, Motorpsycho,
and The Soundtrack of Our Lives, and those bands' shared
passions for channeling rock gods of other eras. Deluxe
R-rated packaging holds songs as mighty as "Road
Crew"
and Turnpike,
while the free bonus single included with initial orders
features "Hold
On"
and "Noose", neither of which appear on the
album. |
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An
impressive, intriguing new import-only release from
Swedish songstress Frida Hyvönen,
entitled Frida Hyvönen
Gives You: Music from the Dance Performance 'Pudel'.
Here she and her piano are backed by a small orchestra
and the occasional choir for ten all new original
songs, including "Fall
Is My Lover",
"Came
A Storm",
and "This
Night I Recall You".
The results are spellbinding and
swoon-worthy, with Frida in fine voice and arrangements
bordering on sumptuous. Fans of Cat Power and Julie
Doiron's latest need this! If you haven’t, for
whatever reason, picked up her debut album, Until
Death Comes, recently released by Secretly
Canadian in the States, wait no longer… |
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My
gift to you: Free downloads of 19 songs
by 4 amazing/mysterious artists courtesy of soon-to-be-legendary
net label Go Jukebox!, a web-only imprint
that might be the coolest label on the planet at the
moment. Yes it is all Swedish…and no, I have no
intentions of taking the blinders off! As much as I
adore the stacks of Scandinavian music I’ve hyped
all year Go Jukebox offers four of the most compelling
artists in recent memory, and variety! Go Jukebox flagship
Reverend Big O has an
older album and a
covers EP available on esteemed Swedish label A
West Side Fabrication (home to The Bear Quartet), but
truly it's these digital-only EPs where the band's slowcore
majesty has really closed the circuit. Meanwhile You
Are My Everything (the art-rocking up-tempo
alter-ego of Reverend Big O) turns the epic-emo/drone-rock
knob to 11 and has one of my favorite songs of the year
in "I Was A Punk", so early-millennial-Bear
Quartet-b-side that it breaks my heart. Garmisch
Partenkirchen is a wickedly mesmerizing cross
between The
Knife and The
Kid, sultry and psychosexual, just the way we like
'em. When Pitchfork hears GP they'll have orgasmic seizures,
mark my words. Lastly, Baby Blonde & The
Downs do the haunting indie-pop duet as well
as my all-time-favorite haunting indie-pop dueters Vega,
but with a much more homespun, organic, folksy fuzzywuzziness;
less gloss, more moss…automatically I'm in love.
Here's THE BEST PART: It's
all free, it's all available in high-quality
mp3s (and streaming m3u), and like I said the bands
and tunes are the far side of excellent. So, go
download, go
worship, Go
Jukebox! |
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Friend
Of A Friend is the long-awaited second album
from Goteborg, Sweden piano-pop melancholists Leopold.
The follow-up finds the band matching if not surpassing
the aching promise of their brilliant debut, Dreaming
Is For Anyone, which is one of the
best-selling Swedish import titles we've ever carried
at Parasol. Heartbreaking orchestral pop that recalls
Biff Bang Pow, The Triffids, Belle & Sebastian,
Mojave 3, Go-Betweens... Check out the balancing act
of hope and heartbreak on these three songs: Work
• Johnny
•
These
Are The Things |
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Cheap
Deluxe is the debut album from Sweden's Samuraj
Cities, a mysterious duo creating compelling
electro-dance-folk with some trippy drones, mantric
vocals and plush melodies swaddled in effervescing lo-fi
fortitude. Likened to Bright Eyes' Digital Ash in
a Digital Urn meets Broken Social Scene's Bee
Hives, The Arcade Fire, The Firebird Band, The
Faint... Low-key, yet magnificent, and featuring one
of my fave songs ever, "All
Along the Shoreline", plus ditties
as desirable as "Hard
Rain"
and
"So
Sorry, So Sorry, So Sorry". |
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Wouldn't you know it...I get my list of the Best Scandinavian
Albums of 2006 together and an 11th hour challenger,
Consequences, comes along to shake
things up!
Within their self-titled
debut you'll find a band comparable to
Shout Out Louds (vocal idiosyncraticness, new waviness:
"Parasite"),
Peter Bjorn And John (songwriting smartness, melancholiness:
"Release
Me From Love"), and The Soundtrack
of Our Lives (psych-moodiness, guitar-slingingness:
"Pieces"),
then please welcome Consequences' debut... I'm falling
harder for it with each listen! |
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The
debut from a new Gravitation label signing The
Tallest Man On Earth. This self-titled five-track
EP is stacked with raw, rootsy, ragged bonfire-folk-blues
bleaknesses, hypnotic in it's simplicity. TTMOE is a
Swede named Kristian, with a Bunyan-esque voice (OK,
really it's more Dylan- & Guthrie-esque) strumming
his similarly-oversized acoustic guitar. I imagine him
striding through the Nordic forests playing songs like
"It
Will Follow The Rain"
and
"Over
The Hills".
Influences include Bob Dylan, Woody Guthrie, Son House,
Charley Patton, Van Morrison, Nick Drake, O’ Brother
Where Art Thou? The
Gravitation label is home to Bjorn Olsson, Elope,
and Diamonds In The Rough (among others), hands down
one of Sweden's finest rock imprints. |
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Ditt
hjärta är en stjärna (your heart
is a star) is the new album from Mattias Alkberg
BD, led by frontman for The Bear Quartet.
A magnificent pop album, harkening back to The Bear
Quartet's "pop gods" heyday,
with plenty of nifty orchestration, organs, acoustic
guitars, the occasional beautiful ballad and still a
healthy dose of bristling punk attitude. Still sung
in Swedish at any rate! Check out the horn-laden "Stockholm",
the first single "Reevolution"
and the rippin' "Kom
Kom". |
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The
last, and I mean final release from dreamscaping pop-etherealists
Elodie, a five-song farewell entitled
At The End Of The Line. Elodie have a hushed,
haunting sound which matches the sentiment, a bit more
elemental than their well-received album, It's
Too Bad You're Leaving, but perhaps the spooky
twilight atmospheres have always been there? This recalls
Husky Rescue and some Labrador gear, with a bit of a
supernatural bent… Check out the maudlin "At
The End Of The Line", and the morose
"Overload",
bookends to the story of Elodie's demise. |
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Swedish
songsmith Bjorn Norestig got high marks
for his debut EP, Come
Take Shine, and while his brand new album,
Hello Inside, revisits a couple tracks, Bjorn
expounds upon them in a plusher, more epic baroque-pop
fashion, big songs rendered wider-screen and more cinematic,
recalling Scandi-friendly artists like Ed Harcourt (Strangers)
and Nicolai Dunger (This
Cloud Is Learning). Explore Bjorn's yearning
voice and songwriting skillset on songs like the title
track "Hello
Inside", a revamped "Come
Take A Shine", and
"Little Oak". |
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New
album from esteemed Swedish pop outfit, David
& The Citizens, a Parasol fave led by Parasol
fave David Fridlund. This is The Citizens in overdrive,
a harder-edge, darker album, maybe a bit more epic than
previously, with plenty of David’s piano, and
maybe a tad less acoustic guitar. The lads have obviously
plugged in for this one, so the album starts out as
a barnstormer ("Out
Of My Hands"), gets meticulous and
melancholy in the middle ("48h"),
sneaks in the first single ("Are
You In My Blood") and ballady near
the end ("1000
Questions For You"). Among other guest
stars The Citizens are again joined by David’s
longtime paramour Sara Culler, who contributes vocals
to several tracks. Sara was a big part of David’s
solo album, Amaterasu,
released by Hidden Agenda last year. |
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Hellsongs is an co-ed trio from Gothenburg,
Sweden covering classic metal songs in acoustic “lounge”
fashion, led by a haunting female vocal. You get dreamy,
strummy covers of Metallica’s “Seek &
Destroy”, Black Sabbath’s “Paranoid”,
Judas Priest’s “Breaking The Law”,
Iron Maiden’s “Run
To The Hills” (magically spooked-out),
Van Halen’s “Jump” (where Hellsongs
out-feys Aztec Camera), and Motorhead’s “Orgasmatron”. |
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Norwegian
rock act Madrugada has been rockin’
it Olso-style since the mid-90s. Their music and muses
has always been about voices like Chris Isaak, Nick Cave,
Leonard Cohen and Jeffrey Lee Pierce; bands like 16 Horsepower,
Tindersticks, Grant Lee Buffalo, and for the sake of hammering
it home, The Gun Club. Epic, sprawling gloom-rock majesty
with an undercurrent of dark, wild menace… TIME
OUT NY: “Songs indebted to the drone of The
Velvet Underground and Jesus and Mary Chain, the bleak
grace of Nick Cave and the swagger of The Rolling Stones.” |
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Madrugada's
1998 full-length debut, Industrial Silence,
is one of the very best Scandinavian albums of the past
decade. An epic, melodic monster. And where words won’t
do this album justice, sound samples will, check out
“Vocal”
and “Shine”.
AMG: "Industrial Silence is unusually strong
and even for a debut album. This, of course, has to
do with the fact that they already had been playing
together for six years before its release." |
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With
their second record, released in 2001, the band eschews
the epic bombast of their debut, and instead finds discomfort
in the bleakness and despair that is The
Nightly Disease. AMG: "The lyrics
are more poetic, the songs are much more diverse, and
the production is wonderfully dirty, giving the record
a rather dangerous aura." Check out
"Hands
Up - I Love You",
"Black
Mambo"
and
"Nightly
Disease Part II".
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After
the harrowing yet hypnotic depths of The Nightly
Disease Madrugada set out to prove how hard they
could rock once again. On Grit,
released in 2002, the band channels The Stooges and
some of Scandinavia's most aggressive garage bands.
AMG: "Sure, Madrugada's previous album, the
dark The Nightly Disease, had its rockier moments, but
nothing as in-your-face as this...". Strap
in for "Blood
Shot Adult Commitment",
"Ready"
and
"Majesty".
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And
finally 2005's The Deep End finds
Madrugada harkening back to their debut, offering luminous
atmospheres, epic arrangements, and some of the most
accessible songs of their career. AMG: "A majestic
beast of a record, even by Madrugada's not-too-humble
standards." Witness "The
Kids Are On High Street",
"Stories
From the Streets"
and "The
Lost Gospel". Since
then the band has released a well-received live album
(I'm
looking for good price) and has began work on a new
album which will be released in 2007. |
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Fans
are still mourning the passing of Madrugada/My
Midnight Creeps guitarist Robert Burås
on July 12th. Since that sad day we've belatedly and
finally come across a supply of Madrugada’s haunting
2005 live album, Live
At Tralfamadore,
at
a bearable import price. An album released just 12 days
after the astonishing gig at the Olso Spektrum in December
2005, documented here in glorious stereo. Feel it:
"Hard
To Come Back". Extras
include songs from the 2005 Oya Festival and a couple
other venues. Features special guest appearance by Kid
Congo Powers, one of Robert’s guitar heroes. |
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They say a picture is worth 1000 words and it’s
this
picture of the Deltahead duo
that (oddly enough) sums up their sound better
than I’m about to… Cathartic scuzz-punk-blues-noir
performed on hollow-body slide guitar and stand-up bass,
both gents a-hollerin' and kicking the crap out of two
enormous bass drums. Sounds piped through ancient, fluted
amplification devices, an unholy racket, in the very
best way. Brutal blues riffs, swinging washboard, screaming
slide guitar and rockabilly upright bass, buried in
filthy blankets of noise and queasy vibrations…
“Don’t
Move To Finland!” is their finest
showing, has the least amount of foul language, and
expresses a snide Scandinavian sentiment. Love it or
leave it.
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Finnish outfit Shogun Kunitoki does
mind-altering instrumental throwback-krautrock epicery
leavened with nifty postrock strategies. A cosmic, karmic,
mantric, melodic, tribal, tidal froth that is akin to
fellow Scandinavian instrumentalists Bjorn Olsson and
Sagor & Swing, yet a bit more beholden to Neu!,
Eno, and even Spiritualized than their peers (in a good
way). Electronic music that’s lush and organic,
with elements of 60s psychdelia and minimalism, 70s
communal experimentalism, and 90s revivalism…
Triumphant, orgasmic drone-rock that sounds better the
louder it is and the more altered you are, from the
simplest Kraftwerkian micro-circuit minimalismo to rapturous,
frothy, epic electro-bombast, all within the same song!
Check out the blindingly incandescent "Montezuma"
and the equally tripped-out "Daniel".
Pitchfork says: "Finnish electro-instrumentalist
quartet breezily mix the minimalist repetitions of Terry
Riley with the analog shimmer of Broadcast."
Jim says "Pass the pipe, they're right!" |
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Nine-member
Swedish “supergroup” Audionom
does improvised, layered, skyscraping riffs and spelunking
drones infused with a dark mechanized magic, sleekly
chromed. Retrospectiv
is a collection of the amorphous act’s mind-numbing
guitar-mantras and mesmerizing drone-rock, all propelled
by cosmically intense rhythms. Imagine Silverbullit
prone to punishing krautrock extremes, Neu! bouncing
around inside Hawkwind’s “Silver Machine”,
Stereolab on steroids prescribed by Public Image Ltd.,
Joy Division ramped up to Bailter Space decibel levels…
A few examples of Audionom’s total godhead high-velocity
strobe-rock action: “And
You Said I Was The Only One”, “Kristall”,
“Dc2”,
and “Spindlar”.
This album will be released by the esteemed Kemado label
(Dungen, Elefant, The Sword) in the U.S. later this
year, apparently. |
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The Others is the garage-rocking cover-band
alter-ego of veteran Finnish trio 22
Pistepirkko. Unsurprisingly there are other bands
called The Others so this band’s official moniker
is The Others AKA 22PP. Really rolls
off the tongue, don’t it? So here’s where
the 22-Pistepirkko gents get to apply their freak-pop/garage-weirdness
to some of their most beloved influences… So what
you get is a handful of wraparound Link Wray covers,
a fistful of rockabilly legend Jody Reynold’s
tip-toppers, a Kinks cover ("This
Strange Effect”), a couple Troggs
tributes (including “Girl
In Black”), a Buddy Holly song...and
my fave of the whole bunch: a genuine, gentle rendering
of The Everly Brothers’ “Love
Hurts”, which ranks right up there
with classic versions of the same song by Gram &
Emmylou and Nazareth in my book! |
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The
Tiny are a trio, purveyors of a minimalist
jazzy lushness led by the exquisite voice of Ellekari
Larsson who’s backed by multi-instrumentalists
Leo Svensson and Johan Berthling. Ellekari has previously
lent her often-otherworldly, jazz-worthy, ethereal,
Joanna Newsom-esque warble to albums by Vega
and Heikki
and even made a special appearance on Ed
Harcourt’s last album. Ed returns the favor
here and sings a duet with Ellekari on “Sorry”,
one of the album’s many truly magical moments,
along with the first single “Dirty
Frames”. Play the name game for each
song: will Ellekari channel Kate Bush, Bjork, or Billie
Holiday…or all three at once? |
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Highly recommended solo-debut from Diamonds
In The Rough AKA Ian Person, IFK
Goteborg hooligan and guitarist-stage-left for The
Soundtrack of Our Lives (and the legendary
Union Carbide Productions before them). Not surprisingly
Ian offers excellent songs, peerless guitar-wrangling,
and a rapturous Beatlesque vibe… The surprise
is the wondrous West Coast pop sound strewn among these
diamonds. Achingly beautiful "Lone Summer Dream"
popsongs, and of course Ian's TSOOL comrades are all
over this effort. Check out "Spiders",
the tripsy instrumental "C'Mon
In", the Dylan-esque "Miss
Elusive", and Ian as string-plucking
folksy balladeer on "Make
You Mine". Yet another incredible
release by
the Gravitation label, home to Bjorn Olsson's seafood
series, Elope, Spring In Paris, etc. |
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The
Lancaster Orchestra is a Malmo folkrock act
led by melancholy-maestro Calle Mathson, whose songs
are gilded and embroidered by some of Scandinavia's
finest alt-country session men and even members of the
Malmo Philharmonic Orchestra. Overcast, sepia-toned,
harmony-laden folkrock that recalls The Band, The Byrds,
fellow countryman Nicolai Dunger, Gram Parsons, The
Jayhawks, and anything/everything by the Oldham/Palace
posse. The stormy "Bad
Horse" was featured on the Fargo label's
acclaimed Cowboys In Scandinavia compilation
released earlier this year, but it's the album's single
and lead off track, "Newfound
Friends", and Calle's even-more-heartbroken-than-the-original
cover of The Smith's "Please
Please Please Let Me Get What I Want"
(overwrought with despairing vocal, plaintive piano)
that have set their hooks into me. |
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Dark and delirious debut from Denmark’s Skywriter,
one of the strongest debuts in recent memory and likely
to end up in my Top Ten for the year! Led by vocalist
Jakob Dahn, he of the Leonard Cohen/Nick Cave/Morrissey-esque
pipes and otherwise ruthless charms. Urban-noir as rendered
by flaring guitars and ridiculously retro-cool epic-rock
arrangements, as monumental as Madrugada, as demented
as Nick Cave, and reveling in the genre-splicing echoing
arch-coolness that makes new-wavers from several decades,
like The Stranglers and Interpol, so appealing. Immerse
yourself in "For
Heaven's Sake", "Passengers",
and "New
York", and see if what compelled me
compels you. |
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The
new album from The Bear Quartet has
caused even more consternation than their last album,
Saturday
Night, which ended up being quite a charmer,
especially in retrospect! Eternity Now features discombobulating
electronica, ghostly harmonies, and noise. Songs created
entirely on electronic instruments, by one of the planet’s
finest guitar bands. Go figure! Special guest vocalist:
Mats Levin from Yngwie Malmsteen’s Rising Force.
Should’ve guessed! The first single is "The
Repairing Of The Red Sea", but both
"Faces"
and "Broken
Heart" certainly are...um...shorter!
Check out this amazing
and current interview with BQ frontman Mattias Alkberg,
in English and French. He speaks about Eternity
Now, the band’s history (and future) and
his own punk band: Mattias
Alkberg BD. |
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1999 is one of those contrail-spewing
zoom-rock juggernauts that Sweden is becoming more and
more famous for, like Silverbullit/Citizen
Bird, Franke,
Svenson…
Colossal jetstream riffs, mechanized krautrock rhythms,
serrated punk noise, and a crazy-ass vocalist/keyboardist/manchild,
who also graces the album cover. Riff-mongering like
"Beauty
Is The Winner", the single "Legends",
and the dangerously simple-minded "Hated
People" are all the wrong things wrapped
up thw right way. Think early-Wire and, oddly enough,
recent Wire. Think The Stooges, early-Cure, Kim Gordon's
Sonic Youth, Big Black, entire rosters from Homestead/Am
Rep/Touch & Go/SST Records heyday, and your cult-heroic,
all-time-favorite local band from wherever you were
in 1989. |
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Long-awaited
full-length album from Stockholm garage-glory rockers
Wired For Mono, who follow-up their
fairly awesome debut
EP with a whirling storm of classic rock resurrection.
Like their (pretty obvious) idols The
Soundtrack of Our Lives (TSOOL’s Ebbot Lundberg
is a big WFM fan) and Union
Carbide Productions before them (and UCP disciples
like Mazarine
Street), the band clarifies retro-riffs to absolutely
stunning effect on combustible open-throttle rockers
like "All
Set Up" and "No
Straight Story" and their epic garage
manifesto "Calling
Down A Hard Rain". Wired For Mono
tread a similar path to TSOOL, absorbing the soundtracks
of their lives and straining it through a millennial
filter that allows Mick Jagger to strut alongside The
Charlatans, and The Saints. |
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One of this year's most beautiful and bizarre albums!
Man
Overboard from Swedish female duo Montys
Loco starts out spectral and crystalline but
in no time the hip-swinging girl-group smile-pop of
"Give
Me More" draws you in. But it's the
fact that "Give Me More" is about addiction
in its myriad forms and the edgy darkness and sultry
spite of title track "Man
Overboard" and the incendiary "Accident"
that keep this from being your basic Swede-pop romp
or Concretes-clone or Bjork-wannabe. It's not any of
these. It is outlandish and enamoring, it is produced
by the studio-genius Bjorn Yttling (Peter
Bjorn And John) and it does come across like some
sleepy, hyper-sensual sonic otherworld. |
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The sounds of Swedish septet Dexter’s
Moon have been haunting me for many months,
so it’s nice to finally make this available. Songs
like the title track “Come
Rain” and “Voodoo
Girl" have been in heavy rotation
in my lair for whenever a good mellowing was needed.
Their debut album Come
Rain is all about filmic folk-pop, with melodica
and accordions droning away. Elemental music for stars
in the spinning wheel of the sky, music for nightflowers
and mushrooms that appear miraculously between dusk
and dawn, and for the moon waxing between them. Likened
to Low, Cat Power, Folksongs For The Afterlife, Mazzy
Star, Kathleen Edwards… |
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Melancholy pop-spiritualism and dreamy harmonies coalesce
o the new album, Easy
Tensions, by Norwegian orch-drone-pop outfit
Sleepyard. Equal parts straight-up
orch-pop and tripsy, droning, schoing noddingness. Can
it be mostly sun-dappled instrumentals but still loaded
with luscious moonlit harmonies? Yes, it can. Check
out “My
Lush Friend” and “Memories
of a Moondog”. Euphoric ethereal
art-pop, dreamsicle choruses that don’t need verses,
chanted mantras that sooth any troubled soul. Likened
to XTC and The Byrds, Mellow and The High Llamas, with
plenty of Beach Boys harmonic convergence. |
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Monumental garagerock from Swedish duo Johnossi.
John sings in a Jeff Buckley-esque range and plays acoustic
guitar through half-a-dozen effects pedals and several
amplifiers, while brother-in-arms Ossi provides Bonham-esque
drums. Listen to “The
Show Tonight” and “The
Lottery” and "Glory
Days To Come" from their swaggering
self-titled
debut and you’ll know why I’m putting
this album in my Top 3 for 2006, right between The
Fine Arts Showcase and Hell
On Wheels… Domestic
release now available. |
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Gothic dance-rock in the pale hands of The Kid
gets all passionate and hallucinogenic, two female voices
detailing erotic hauntings with raven-winged musical
accompaniment. Check out the incredible first single
"Kit
Club Hotel" and lead-off track "The
Noble Art of Jealousy". Think New
Order/Joy Division meets The Knife meets The Cure meets
Love Is All. In addition to the full-length La
Societe Nouvelle we also have limited stock
of The Kid's self-releasd debut EP, entitled Pas
De Chance and featuring "Bluebird". |
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on the cover scans for more details, purchasing options. |
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Eight
new songs from Orebo Sweden septet The Second
Band! Like their last EP, What’s
Up Tigerlilly, the spark and fire of Your
Dark Side Is On The Phone still recalls a bubbly
Bright Eyes or an apoplectic Ed Harcourt, and the band's
West Coast 60s pop stylings continue to be rendered
in a folksy heartwarming fashion, as joyfully and soulfully
as possible! Check out "Wild
Is The Wind" where something-in-the-water
Swedish melancholy is traded in for high-spirited righteousness
and a wholesome exuberance! |
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Searing
guitar rock, soulful pop, nimble prog, and acid-drizzled
psychedelic from Norwegian prog-pop-rock act Motorpsycho.
Yet another totally amazing Scandinavian band who have
been around for more than a decade and release an album
every year or so. As if to make up for far too many
years without a new album (their last was way back in
2002), Black
Hole/Blank Canvas is 19-track DCD! A huge,
sprawling, epic and stormy rock masterwork that the
Norwegian music press is calling the best album of their
storied career. Check in two standout tracks:
Hyena
and
In
Our Tree. Check out
Limited
edition book version here. |
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on the cover scans for more details, purchasing options. |
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Hell
On Wheels are pretty much my new favorite Swedish
artist and it's always nice to "discover"
a band who's been putting out records for a decade or
so!
Oh My God, What Have I Done? came out in
2003, and among the many highlights, tracks as powerful
as "She
Was A Milkmaid , And I Was A Gentleman"
and "It's
Wrong Being A Boy" stand
out. But then there's the sugary viciousness of "Our
Sweetness Has Become A Problem" in
all its ballady effing goodness. Amazing record, 9 astounding
noise-pop songs, highly recommend! Also, their
new album (also see below), their 2001
debut album as well as their collection
of EPs, singles and extras. |
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Debut
full-length from Firefox AK (Andrea
Kellerman, wife of Tiger Lou frontman Rasmus Kellerman).
Heady and euphoric dance-pop not far removed from Annie,
ABBA, and your fave bpm-friendly aerobics tunage! Madame,
Madame! is sugar-coated electro-pop-invention of
thee highest order. Check out Andrea's cover of Assid's
"Habibi"
and her own "What's
That Sound". There are also two recent
EPs as well, worth checking into! |
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on the cover scans for more details, purchasing options. |
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Rusty
Flores is a band hailing from far Northern
Sweden, and like fellow Arctic Circlers The
Perishers, Kristoffer
Astrom, and Isolation
Years they are often the sum of their meteorological
and climactic influences. Sonic dramas drawn from the
darkness, melancholy, elemental folk-rock rendered with
exquisite charm and an undeniable handsomeness. Check
out "Waiting
Room" and "Bomb
The Cabaret" and make room for Rusty
Flores around the bonfire. |
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Sweden's
Antennas (fomerly known as Novak)
retrofit dirigible British soul pop with existential
electronics and the effect is headswimming, minboggling
pop with Buckley-esque vox. Music For Robots calls it
"Totally off the hook, pure-pop genius...gorgeous
melodies, big swells of orchestration, and Björkman's
high, lilting vocals." Lend an ear to the
album's two singles: "Always
On My Mind" and "Adapt". |
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on the cover scans for more details, purchasing options. |
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Hell
on Wheels is one of Sweden's best kept musical
secrets, until now. Influenced by the American/British
indie scene from the late 80s and 90s, comparisons to
The Pixies (a name I don't drop lightly!) are well-founded,
in the very best way. Listen to the first single "Alexandr"
from new album The
Odd Church, plus "Heard
You On The Radio", and "Stealing
Notes from the Devil's Notebook".
Catalog available too. |
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The
Black Tango is the new album from Gothenburg
Sweden’s Boy Omega. A 20-track
opus, a collection of velvety folk-pop songs and hallucinatory
interludes, where the Bright Eyes-esque blend of electronic
and acoustic is (as expected) wonderful, and a nice
contrast to his previous work. Have a listen to "Blocks"
and "By
Midnight We'll Give It A Go"
and "Explode".
Also available: Boy Omega's previous
album and recent
EP. |
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Click
on the cover scans for more details, purchasing options. |
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Isolation
is the third album from Norway's Ricochets.
A big classic rock sound bolstered with Hammond B3 organ
and led by an even bigger voice. Includes the sultry,
heartbroken “No
Good”, one of very best woman-done-me-wrong-songs
EVER WRITTEN. Meanwhile the single “Little
Bit Of More” shows off the band’s
roar (guitars, vocals, that organ again, all roaring)
to fine effect. A truly great Scandinavian rock record.
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On
their second album, The Ghost Of Our Love,
Ricochets' dirty Norwegian bohemian
blues and crooner rock-n-roll recall The Doors and The
Animals alot (Hammond organ, Fender guitar), although
fans of Nick Cave, The Gun Club and The Afghan Whigs
will find plenty to love here... Check out the title
track, "The
Ghost of Our Love", and "I
Know You're Gonna Leave Me". Glitterhouse's
DCD
version includes the band’s
entire debut album Slo-Mo Suicide as a bonus
disc! |
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Norway's
Cadillac is likened to At The Drive
In, Queens of Stone Age, and fellow rock vikings The
Hellacopters... All I know is that lead off single “Locomotive”
is some of the best behemoth indieguitar heaviosity
I’ve heard in years, total strobe light/fog machine
rock. Magnetic
City is chockfulla rock like this, including
their cover of Siouxsie's “Arabian
Knights”, yet another study in control and
menace… |
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Click
on the cover scans for more details, purchasing options. |
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Click
on the cover scans for more details, purchasing options. |
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Monkeystrikes
is band featuring former members of The Souls, most
importantly vocalist Cecilia Nordlund, who's thermonuclear
vocal range along with some truly gnarly guitar action
are the highlights here. Check out "You
Hate My Beautiful Love" from their new
full length album of the same name and a sweetly
sinister cover of Echo & The Bunnymen's classic
"Killing
Moon". Their previous
EP was killer as well! |
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Britta
Persson writes songs that are somewhat understated
for someone with a voice as compelling as her's. On
her debut
EP entitled Found At Home songs like "Defrag
My Heart" add a bit more zing, but either way
the songs are luminous. Britta has been pairedup with
labelmate Kristofer Astrom before and Kristofer produced
this EP. Think Gemma Hayes, Rosie Thomas, and even Hem.
Subtle, shadowy, beautiful songs.
. |
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Click
on the cover scans for more details, purchasing options. |
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Laakso
is one of those critically acclaimed and beloved Swedish
(and partially Finnish) acts that might present a challenge
to American ears, but with their new album My
Gods the band has married their folksy guitar
catharsis with a glossier popsense. Markus Krunegard's
vocals still propel the songs in grand fashion on the
first single "High
Drama", and even get a bit Psychedelic Fur-ry
on album opener "Once
Again Late At Night". Laakso's previous albums
and two EPs are equally genius.
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El
Perro Del Mar is a gal named Sarah who hangs
out with Jens Lekman (they had a split 7" released
by Secretly Canadian a ways back) and this new International
Version of her recent full-length EPs collection El
Perro Del Mar sounds like a long lost Phil
Spector reel. Check out "Candy"
and "I
Can't Talk About It" and "God
Knows (You Gotta Give To Get)" and you'll see
what I mean. Her brand new You've
Gotta Give To Get EP features three new songs... |
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Montt
Mardie (pronouced mont mard-ee-ay) is the new
Swedish pop hope, chasing the Acid House Kings' and
Moneybrother's coattails but inflecting the soulful
pop numbers which adorn his
debut album Drama with snatches of classic
stuff like The Stule Council, The Colourfield, and,
um...Wham! In addition to the single "Highschool
Drama" and the Colourfield-esque "How
To Kill A Mockingbird" and 9 other originals
there's a strangely unrecognizable cover of "Come
On Eileen".
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Click
on the cover scans for more details, purchasing options. |
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Switching
gears entirely we expect the lascivious and bawdy over-the-top
garage rock sounds created by swishy Stockholm duo The
High Heeled Honeys to convert and pervert anyone
in earshot. Check out “Ride
My K’Ruh” from their
new Self-Titled EP. Many thanks to Brass Button
(home to The Hip Whips and The Jan Martens Frustration)
for getting me a stack of this Swedish rock action. |
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Click
on the cover scans for more details, purchasing options. |
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As if Bjorn Yttling’s work with spectacular guitar
pop band Peter
Bjorn And John wasn’t enough to place him
on his own special pantheon, he turns to Yttling
Jazz. Check out "Tokyo
Hyatt" and "Mr.
Sophistication At The Losers Club". I'll admit
I'm no jazzhound and I love this because it’s
Bjorn Yttling, but by all accounts from those who know
their jazz this is a remarkable achievement in any realm,
with a great sweeping bow to his influences: Mingus,
The White Noise, Ennio Morricone, and Joe Meek. |
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This
Is Where Our Hearts Collide
is the debut from Northern Sweden outfit Amandine,
a collection of lush, atmospheric country and moonlight
dappled soft rock meandering. Songs that becomes more
and more elegant with each passing track. Check out
the luminous new single "Halo"
and the heartrending "Blood
And Marrow". Fans of Leopold and fellow Umea
residents Isolation Years will find much to love here,
while reviewers are dropping names like Oldham, Songs:Ohia,
Crosby Still Nash & Young, Iron & Wine, and
The Band. |
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Click
on the cover scans for more details, purchasing options. |
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here for PAGE TWO... |
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