Showing posts with label by:Larm News. Show all posts
Showing posts with label by:Larm News. Show all posts
Saturday, 19 February 2011
Live Review: "Treefight For Sunlight" (by:Larm News)
Live Review: "Silje Nes" (by:Larm News)
"Nes’ music is all about space and intimacy, and as her short set progresses it seems that she’s managed to turn this large space into the equivalent of a huge feather bed." Click on the pic to read the fill review...
Friday, 18 February 2011
Live Review: "Jenny Hval" (by:Larm News)
If you click on the pix you'll read my rapturous response to her by:Larm showcase. It sounds in places like this: "Hval pulls no punches nowadays, a supreme confidence in the direction she’s taken her music evident in her ability to switch from whispers to wails in the swoop of a note, in the extraordinary lyrical content of her songs, and in the intricately arranged, experimentally textured backing..."
Live Review: "Cold Mailman" (by:Larm News)
Thursday, 17 February 2011
Feature: "Safe From by:Larm" (by:Larm News)
Wednesday, 24 February 2010
Live Review: Ingrid Olava (by:Larm News)
YOU GOTTA LOVE OLAVA
Oslo’s Nordic maiden seduces a packed Folketeateret with a set of lush and heartfelt magic.
These days, thanks to an implicit lazy sexism within mainstream media, it’s almost impossible for a woman to sit behind a piano with just a hint of kookiness to her character and not be compared to Tori Amos. Ingrid Olava, however, one of Norway’s brightest hopes, claims never to have heard the “flame haired songstress” until people started throwing the name around with reference to her first album. In fact Olava never even considered herself a singer until her early twenties. But whatever twist of fate brought her to the microphone was a happy accident, and that the trail has now led her to what must be one of the country’s finest backing bands is cause for further celebration.
EAGER DIVA
She arrives on this cavernous stage to the rumble of thunder, dressed in an impossibly short skirt that belies her momentary early shyness. But within the first minute, thanks to a melody that unravels with delicate, hypnotic grace, she silences this vast, grand theatre. ‘Passenger’ sets the template, its structure carefully considered and a perfect foil to Olava’s sultry, occasionally smoky voice. She follows it with ‘The Queen’, which swells and surges like the ocean, and while she may be operating in a musical realm that’s often as original as that last tired simile, she’s clearly the mistress of its domain, allowing the song to crescendo to a glorious climax that sounds not unlike one of Sigur Ros’ more jubilant moments.
What sets her apart is hard to define. Perhaps it’s the sweetness of the tunes she inhabits so fully, or her obvious sincerity, or maybe it’s the respectfully restrained backing. Whatever it is, this is much more than dinner party fodder. “I won’t be silenced any more,” she howls desperately at one point, and you can only hope it’s true.
PRINCESS CHARMING
This is music for mature ears, of course: Olava’s unlikely to win over many Lady Gaga fans thanks to the underlying impression that, beneath her excitable bouncing on her piano stool and her breathless between-song patter, she’s on first name terms with her demons. But her dirty laugh as she introduces a song about sex – Lord knows I hope I understood that right – gives away a fun loving nature that draws whoops from an audience who clearly identify with the warm honesty of her onstage persona.
She receives a well deserved and convincing standing ovation from the packed crowd, but then, already overwhelmed by the response, she spots an old friend in the front row and stagedives into his arms. It’s a typically endearing moment, and her decision to return to the piano for one last song is more than welcome. She signs off with a solemn solo rendition of ‘Poster Child’, before running off the stage with childish exuberance. It’s a heavenly end. Ingrid we trust.
Live Review: Johann Johannson (by:Larm News)
CALMER CHAMELEON
Iceland’s Prince of Neo-Classical Chillout calms and goes, he calms and goes…
Every music festival needs its quiet oasis, and Johann Johannson is this year’s Olafur Arnalds, the fellow Icelander who last year spellbound an audience desperate for a little respite from the onslaught of guitars and pounding beats that tend to dominate these gatherings. Like Arnalds, Johannson is all about the space between the notes as much as the patterns they carve. His 2006 concept album, ‘IBM 1401 Users Manual’ (his debut for 4AD records), was something of a contemporary classical masterpiece, and while his early albums may have initially been awash in soothing electronica that Air fans really ought to have been buying, he’s more recently embraced the minimalist arrangements of Arvo Pärt or Michael Nyman. This has heightened the elegance of his early work, leaving him floating in a world of electronically enhanced chamber music.
BIG MAC AND BOW TIES
Of course you know you’re looking at a serious musician when a four piece string section takes centre stage, while Johannson and a colleague, seated behind a bank of keyboards and a Mac, flank them either side, and it’s the strings that open proceedings with a short prelude, Johannson then sending ripples of piano phrases over their surface. The only other sound comes from the audience, a collective sigh of relief at being able to extract their earplugs.
Johannson’s skill lies in his formidable reserve and his belief that a simple phrase, the tremors that the right notes can trigger, are more than enough to still an aching and weary heart. But he’s not afraid of dropping in distant percussive tics like echoing submarine bells, or letting a low bass note spread like melting wax while he traces out piano lines like Erik Satie. But then, just when you fear he might slip off into slumberland, he bangs out threatening octaves while the pitter of electric circuitry distorts beneath it all, unnerving, increasing, unsettling.
STRING US ALONG
But though he operates in soundtrack fields, Johannson is not writing this for the kind of Hollywood movie that he could so obviously score. That, presumably, inevitably, still lies ahead, and until then no one is going to tell him how to set a mood. This is not to say that he gets the balance right each and every minute of this serene half hour. At times he searches perhaps a little too hard for a sense of yearning that sees him drag his feet through sticky sweet avenues, but these are brief aberrations. For the most part there’s nothing excessive, no unnecessary embellishments, and consequently there’s nowhere we’d rather be. What makes this so wonderful is the realisation that, thanks to the lack of theatrics or even a significant lightshow, this place we’ve been is actually inside our own heads.
He ends with the final movement of ‘IBM 1401 Users Manual’, a computerised voice somehow out of place after the purity of what’s preceded it. But such is the emotional tug and pull of this final arrangement – a distant relevant of both Samuel Barber’s ‘Adagio For Strings’ and Gorecki’s ‘Symphony Of Sorrow’ – that it does nothing to detract from the intensity of his sentiment. Big calm indeed…
Feature: All Tomorrow's Parties (by:Larm News)
FAN FAIR
Warp Films’s documentary about legendary British music festival All Tomorrow’s Parties will be screened for free on Saturday in the by:Larm Teltet at 1915.
Ten years ago an ambitious Englishman called Barry Hogan, who at the time was working in a London club called Dingwalls, was asked by friends in Belle & Sebastian if he could help them put together a special one off festival, curiously named the Bowlie Festival after bowl haircuts. They wanted it to take place in a British holiday camp, a form of seaside resort that offered accommodation, entertainment, food and drink and which had become popular as an out of season location for Northern Soul Weekenders, parties that celebrated the mod revival of 1960s soul music. The Bowlie Weekender event was a rousing success, and Hogan realised he had a formula on his hands. He kept it alive and called it All Tomorrow’s Parties.
Since then, Hogan has gone on to promote countless of these weekend bacchanalian events, their line-ups chosen by curators such as Sonic Youth, Vincent Gallo, Slint or Simpson’s creator Matt Groening. They offer a sense of camaraderie absent from most festivals, and despite having grown in size Hogan’s initial intent remains intact: musicians and audience live side by side, corporate sponsorship is rejected, and the indie purist dream remains alive.
All Tomorrow’s Parties: The Film documents the festival in typically democratic, almost DIY form. The fans are credited as directors – they provided most of the footage from mobile phones and cameras – with contributions from Jonathan Caouette (Tarnation) and Vincent Moon. The result is a unique and surprisingly high quality (given the source material) insight into what has made this event such a success. There’s also the chance to see rare footage of Grizzly Bear, Patti Smith, Portishead, Battles, Iggy Pop, Shellac, Grinderman and more. It’s the only thing that comes close to actually being there, and as the many fans who keep on returning will tell you, it’s a place you want to be…
Live Review: Oh No, Ono (by:Larm News)
TESTING POSITIVE
Wyndham Wallace’s jaw drops as he witnesses Danes Oh No Ono unveil their new masterpiece, Eggs…
Where do you start? Really: when it comes to Oh No Ono where do you even begin? Do you start with the helium-inflated vocals, or their mastery of their craft, or the fact that they not only have their own thing going on, but each one of them has their own thing going on within that own thing? Seriously, Oh No Ono: where do we start?
GREAT DANES
Well, where they start is with tribal drums and swirling strings like George Harrison just lent them his soul, and they continue with squalls of guitar, Beach Boys harmonies and melodies that aim for the stars and then keep on going. These five Danes make a panoramic and cinemascopic sound that may borrow from countless sources – including ELO, Harry Nilsson and Supertramp, hardly the most fashionable of reference points – but they understand that influences are merely flavours rather than a meal. And this – take a deep breath – is a five course gourmet meal with added amuses bouches.
To add to the fun, they look fantastic. It’s almost impossible to take your eyes off their two singers: one, dressed in a poncho, looks like a young David Bowie auditioning for a spaghetti western, albeit one filmed in the rain judging from the fact he’s wearing Wellington Boots. He’s also sporting make up that makes him look like half clown, half pixie, something that deserves a medal. His companion is equally preposterously dressed, lost in a fashion world somewhere between Spandau Ballet and Tintin starring in a Charles Dickens BBC TV drama. This, it has to be said, is also a good thing. And while the rest of the band are somewhat overwhelmed as a result, with their drummer lost in the shadows and shrouded in smoke, their presence is never forgotten as they drive their songs onwards and upwards.
WHAT A LONG, STRANGE TRIP
Furthermore, they have that rare ability to make complex pop sound like pop confectionary. If one of them were to shout “Take me to the bridge!” you can be certain the reply would be “Which one?”, but, lost in their trippy, psychedelic world, their songs follow their own logic, played with such commitment that there’s no time to even question the wisdom of their muse. So if Animal Collective can enjoy the curious kind of crossover success that ‘Merriweather Post Pavilion’ has offered them, then there’s little reason why a band as colourful and ambitious as Oh No, Ono can’t do too.
What makes such potential success even more desirable is the simple but often overlooked fact that they seem to be enjoying themselves so much, exchanging glances and smiles at one another as though they’re bemused by their own brilliance. And, to top it all, they not only manage to match the brilliance of ‘Eggs’, their latest record, but they arguably improve upon it. Given the fact that this is a band whose working methods involve automatic writing techniques – giving rise to such masterful lyrics as “I have seen the queen and danced with her puppy / She’s already made a movie about me” – alongside the endless sampling of unusual sounds like frogs and (one for the fact fans) “the sound of “the cloth washing rituals of the West African Baka pygmies”, this is no ordinary achievement. But their sense of drama and dynamics means that, despite being only a five piece, they come across like a Philharmonic Orchestra.
So where do you start? It doesn’t really matter. Because wherever you start, you may not want it to end. Oh No, Ono? Yes, Yes Yes!
Live Review: Lucy Swann (by:Larm News)
SWANN SONGS
You’ve missed Lucy Swann this year but, writes Wyndham Wallace, you don’t want to make that mistake again…
By the time Oslo’s Lucy Swann takes the stage for her Pre-Larm performance, Mono is so packed that the only people they’re letting in are the police. Quite how so many people know about her is hard to say: her debut album is still at the pressing plant, and she’s not actually a part of the main by:Larm programme. But Swann is obviously not going to be a secret for long.
Half English, half Norwegian, Swann actually has most in common with French artist Camille: she too plays with sampled vocal loops, triggered by a pedal rack beneath her keyboard that she stabs with bare feet to build up angelic choirs around her melodies. Like absurdly underrated Trust Me Records label mate Rockettothesky, Swann manages to combine the sugary appeal of pop and a giddy love of experimentalism that makes her both challenging and highly seductive. Dressed in a pinstripe suit jacket and a scarlet dress, she comes across as confident and charismatic, and though her lyrics, when audible, tend towards the naïve – “When I was a little girl I had a rag doll / The only doll I’ve ever known” – this is mature, thoughtful music full of brooding synthetic tones and skeletal, simple melodies.
It’s also soul of the finest variety. At one stage she samples herself singing “River Deep, Mountain High”, and her voice recalls many a great singer of the late 1960s, though inevitably comparisons will instead be drawn with Amy Winehouse. But Swann is considerably more imaginative and far from concerned with being hip, instead dancing round the stage for an a cappella finale with such glee that she nearly trips over her discarded Doc Martens. The audience don’t care: as she closes her show by testifying “I feel like shouting”, they too give witness. Say it loud and say it proud: Lucy Swann will give you goosebumps…
Live Review: Susanne Sundfør (by:Larm News)
THE DARK STUFF
Susanne Sundfør may be the toast of Norway, but Wyndham Wallace remains uconvinced…
The first thing one notices about Susanne Sundfør is that this is a woman unafraid of an overdraft at the bank. Lined up on stage like beauty queens at a beauty pageant are a phalanx of guitars that would most likely be the envy of almost every single other band hauling second hand amplifiers through the snow in Oslo this week. Feted by the Norwegian press since her appearance at by:Larm in 2007, Sundfør has clearly become a significant priority for EMI Norway, and there’s no way they’re going to let this opportunity to impress an international audience pass them by. And so she appears surrounded by instruments beneath an impressively muted light show, her band rehearsed like their lives depend upon it. Then one remembers that EMI’s life may depend on her too. It may not oly be her bank balance that’s at stake.
BUDGET MENTAL
Her production values match her music, an expensive, somewhat luxurious melange of Tori Amos singer songwriter stylings, gothic rumblings and occasionally dangerous forays into ambitious territory that most major label artists might fear. With two backing vocalists holding up the rear, Sundfør proves herself more than capable of switching between ethereal whisperings and banshee wails, but at times she exhibits a mildly dissatisfying sense of detachment. Her band, meanwhile, hover in the shadows like session musicians perfectly content to wring gently dissonant tones from their instruments. Jesus Christ Superstar this is not.
BANK NOTES
She’s clearly loved by her hometown audience, however, and it’s exciting at first to witness something so obviously grand. But, as her show progresses, something starts to niggle. Like Celine Dion and the divas that have followed in her wake, Sundfør seems to think that the addition of vocal flourishes – sometimes known by cynics as a case of “using fourteen notes when one would do” – can make amends for the fact that her songs themselves lack any definitive sense of purpose. They cling to you much as chewing gum sticks to shoes, but as each one draws to a close it’s not the melody that lingers so much as the proficiency of her performance. Because Sundfør can sing, and at times she can belt it out, but the sense that the most controversial thing about her is the title of her album – ‘The Brothel’ – is hard to shake, especially when she engages in such histrionic flutters.
Of course, there’s no denying the manner in which she has managed to bewitch a packed Sentrum Scene, and when she slides into the kind of brooding, rhythmic complexity of ‘Protection’ era Massive Attack it’s not so hard to understand what they see in her. There’s just an ongoing fear that she may, if she’s not careful, stagger in the wrong direction and end up sounding like Enya. Not that EMI would have any complaints about that…
Feature: by:Larm 2010 - Walk This Way (by:Larm News)
BYLARM 2010: WALK THIS WAY!
Wyndham Wallace, a veteran of ByLarm returning for his fifth year of Scandinavian musical discovery, is suited, booted and ready to rock…
SHOE ARE YOU?
By the time ByLarm started in Oslo last year, the snow was melting with a vengeance that would make George Bush look like a pacifist. It felt like every step I took landed in a puddle that reached my ankles. My beloved Ben Sherman trainers never stood a chance. They were subjected to brutal torture for three days, from one dawn to the next. They trod every damned street in the centre of Oslo until their seams were splitting, and they leapt countless mounds of disintegrating ice as they rushed from café to seminar to concert to bar and back to my hotel. They were dragged through mud on the floors of dingy venues, they were coated in ketchup at 7 Eleven counters, they were left to steam on the heated floor of my hotel bathroom, and they were roasted by the fires that crackled in the main tent’s outdoor smoking area.
But oh, oh! What stories they would tell! If they weren’t just a pair of shoes they’d thank me for all that trouble. But my shoes weren’t made for talking. Like certain A&R folk, my shoes don’t have ears and eyes. Unlike A&Rs, though, they also lack a mouth. In fact, thanks to ByLarm 2009, my shoes now barely have soles. (I’ll skip further comparisons with A&Rs. I know they’re sensitive folk: I was an A&R once.) There are no regrets, though, no tears goodbye. I don’t want them back. I’ve got new shoes now. I’m ready for ByLarm 2010.
VIRGIN ON THE RIDICULOUS
You never forget your first time, and my introduction to ByLarm was as memorable as any industry convention I’ve visited. It took place in the Northern city of Tromsø, surrounded by mountains that looked down over a twinkling harbour close to which delegates slid and tumbled in their rush to check out the best talent. But ByLarm has never let me down since. It may have grown up and settled down in Oslo, but it’s still the same unpredictable spirit it always was and it’s not even a teenager yet.
Gathered together around you now, in just one single city, is the cream of Scandinavian up-and-coming talent. It won’t all be to your taste, but somehow the various countries that make up this picturesque region of Northern Europe are capable of producing some of the most innovative, entertaining, witty, unhinged and downright splendid acts on this planet. Whether it be indie rock or hip hop, death metal or neo-classical, singer songwriters or indigenous folk revivalists, all musical worlds collide here. So put down your drink, browse through the programme, then get online and check out the ByLarm jukebox. You’re going to find something there like nothing you’ve ever heard.
NAME THAT TUNE
Given that I’m called Wyndham Wallace I’m obviously in no position to judge, but some of the daftest names you’ll ever hear can always be found at ByLarm. Last year’s line up included Under Water Sleeping Society, I Was A Teenage Satan Worshipper and Tommy Tokyo & Starving For My Gravy. This year’s selection maintains that glorious tradition, what with Bjørn Hellfuck, the fabulously named Vinter In Hollywood, the welcome return of Children & Corpse Playing In The Street and of course the unforgettable KAKKMADDAFAKKA. And that’s not to mention The Cumshots, led by the notorious TV host, comedian and author Kristopher Schau. (The man has pedigree, it’s worth mentioning, since he’s also one of the men behind the equally improbably named Hurra Torpedo.)
Don’t be fooled by the names, though. Do you really think Bat For Lashes is any better? How about Lady Gaga? There was a time when people used to laugh at Duran Duran and Pearl Jam, but neither of them did so badly. So get out there no matter what they’re called: go check ‘em out. I’ll see you down the front for Death by Unga Bunga.
TALKING HEADS
But you didn’t come here to snigger at funny names. You came here to do some business. You came here to network and learn a little more about how to survive in this sandblasted industry. So it’s lucky that this year’s seminars and debates offer a line up that’ll make ByLarm the envy of every music conference that exists: Alan McGee, the man who released seminal records by My Bloody Valentine, Jesus & Mary Chain and Primal Scream, and who discovered Oasis – well, you can’t be right all the time – is popping by for a chat. Karl Bartos, whose work with Kraftwerk makes him arguably one of the most influential musicians alive, is here to talk about the development of sound recording. Peter Hook, whose mighty basslines were the DNA that flowed through both Joy Division and New Order, is ready to chat about The Hacienda and of course Manchester, while Kevin Cummins – whose definitive photos of both of those bands, as well as other legendary Manchester acts like The Smiths, Happy Mondays and The Stone Roses – is flying in to talk about his book ‘Looking For The Light Through The Pouring Rain’.
Then there’s Geoff Travis, the man behind Rough Trade Records and therefore an infinite number of life-changing bands, who’s here to talk about his career, while Rolling Stone contributing editor Steve Knopper is in town to discuss the digital revolution. Graphic designer of quite some repute Hjalti Karlsson is also here to discuss his work, and there’s a free screening of cult Depeche Mode fan documentary ‘The Posters Came From The Walls’ directed by Jeremy Deller (a Turner Prize winner) and Nick Abrahams (video promo director par excellence), at least one of whom will be on hand for a Q&A. And those are just the ones that I want to attend. You don’t get this at the Camden Crawl.
SOLE MUSIC
So at times like this you’ve got to count your blessings. You earn a living in one of the most exciting businesses in the world. It might be struggling at the moment but you’d never go back to working in a bar. You work with music, an intangible tangle of notes that still touches your heart every day. And you get to come to ByLarm, held in one of the most beautiful countries in the world. If it’s snowing again you might well ruin your shoes. If you don’t pace yourself you might even ruin your reputation. (You wouldn’t be the first.) But decent shoes are never hard to find. A decent band, on the other hand, is worth going the extra mile for…
*******
WHAT’S IN A NAME?
Double The Pleasure:
Duran Duran seem to have set the template when it comes to the names of new bands at this year’s ByLarm. Watch out for:
Twins Twins
Pica Pica
Kira Kira
Denga Denga
LidoLido
Pow Pow
Oh no Ono
Noora Noor
Twice As Nice
Do you know your Supertramp from your Supergrass? Do you know your Killers from The Kills? Take care when perusing this year’s programme. There’s plenty of room for confusion, as this handy aide-memoire highlights:
Razika vs Rakija
Jonathan Johanson vs Johann Johannson
Dunderbeist vs Dunderhonning
Asha Ali vs Negash Ali
Jesse vs Jesse Jones
Manna vs Manheads vs Jabaman
Blood Command vs Purified in Blood
Urban Tunels Kletzmerband vs The Urban Blues Band
(With thanks to Øystein Ronander)
Feature: Kevin Cummins & Peter Hook (by:Larm News)
OH, MANCHESTER:
SO MUCH TO THANK YOU FOR!
This year ByLarm is graced with the presence of two of Manchester’s finest, musician Peter Hook and photographer Kevin Cummins. There is still a light that will never go out…
According to academic and writer Professor Richard Florida, flourishing creative communities often give birth to thriving and prosperous urban environments, bringing business and money into a region. There are few places where this is truer than Manchester: once a grim industrial hub, this Northern English city has increasingly flourished since the late 1980s, with its endless stream of great music helping to capture people’s imagination. Whatever your tastes, the chances are you have at least a handful of records by acts that grew up there: The Stone Roses, Oasis, Happy Mondays, Take That, The Smiths, Doves or even The Bee Gees, who spent their childhood in its Chorlton suburbs.
Nowadays Manchester is vibrant, with much of the dilapidated environment that initially inspired artists now ‘regenerated’ to become bars, apartments, shopping centres and the like. Music may no longer represent one of the few escape routes from the city – indeed such is its dramatic growth that perhaps there no longer needs to be an escape route – but its spirit lives on, giving birth to a new generation of bands such as The Ting Tings, hotly tipped Delphic or BBC Sound of 2010 nominees Everything Everything.
Peter Hook and Kevin Cummins were both caught up in the Mancunian musical revolution. As bassist for Joy Division and then New Order, Hook was central to two of the most influential English bands to cross over to international success, and they - and indeed Hook himself – remain synonymous with the city. Cummins, meanwhile, is the photographer whose iconic shots of Hook’s two bands, as well as countless other local acts, helped define the way that they were viewed by the world at large. In so doing he has documented the growth of a city and its culture, shaping people’s perspective on a place so damaged by the downturn in heavy industry that between 1961 and 1983 it lost 150,000 jobs, but which now hosts more visitors than any other English city apart from London. If proof were needed for Professor Florida’s theories – that the existence of a ‘creative class’ helps provoke urban recovery – then Manchester could provide a model example.
Peter Hook has just published his recollections of his time helping to run The Haçienda club, a potent symbol of Manchester musical culture. The Haçienda: How Not To Run A Club is an unflinching and often hilarious memoir that details the chaotic organisation and financial mismanagement of this legendary venue. Kevin Cummins, meanwhile, has just released a collection, Looking for the Light Through the Pouring Rain, which contains a selection of over 300 of his photographs documenting Manchester music over the last 30 years. Both men will be presenting talks based around their books as well as answering questions about their work and Manchester itself. These two talks will provide an unmissable opportunity to find out if it’s really true that, as The Stone Roses’ Ian Brown put it, "Manchester's got everything except a beach".
(Photo of "the author" interviewing Kevin Cummins for his by:Larm seminar taken by Maria Jefferis)
Live Review: by:Larm Opening Night 2010 (by:Larm News)
RIGHT ON TIME?
He’s a 21st Century Boy, but at by:Larm’s opening night Wyndham Wallace tumbles back in time…
So it’s true that outside the main by:Larm tent there was a giant screen ticking off the seconds until the start of 2010’s official music programme like some Cape Canaveral countdown, but I swear I walked in on foot. And yet, within minutes of The Megaphonic Thrift taking the stage, I’m looking for my silver De Lorean time machine. I feel like Marty McFly, blasted back in time to emerge in a familiar landscape that is still somehow alien. There are no fiery tyre trails behind me, and no madcap scientists played by Christopher Lloyd anywhere in sight, but this has to be the late 1980s, surely? Isn’t it?
ARSEQUAKE EXPLOSION
The Megaphonic Thrift trade in the kind of alternative indie rock that, back in the day, was comically known as “arsequake”. They arrive on stage carrying a metaphorical crate of records under their arm: Sonic Youth’s ‘Daydream Nation’, Dinosaur Jr.’s ‘Freakscene’ on coloured vinyl, My Bloody Valentine’s ‘Loveless’ turned up to 11. Like fellow by:Larm hopefuls Serena Maneesh, they’ve immersed themselves in what some would call the last gasp of genuine independent music, a time when experimentation didn’t stand in the way of marketing, a time when noise was medication for the mind. They’ve got a singer who’s perfected that trademark Thurston Moore “I’m-so-excited-that-I-just-can’t-hide-it-and-yet-I’ll-try” yelp, occasional female vocals from a Kim Gordon mimic, blurrily distorted guitars gliding over thunderous drums, and a finale which involves swinging their guitars round their heads before leaving the stage bathed in two minutes of howling feedback. It’s tremendous stuff, a suitably impressive beginning to three days of music, but it’s the end of the first decade of the 21st Century. Isn’t it?
Apparently not. Bergen’s The New Wine may not have been souping up their guitar pedals like Kevin Shields’ life depended upon it, but they too seem trapped in the 80’s, their tunes bringing to mind the likes of both China Crisis and Hall & Oates. There’s nothing wrong with that, some might argue, but the Erlend Øye endorsed four piece lack a little of the prerequisite soul necessary to carry it off. Their beats are funky and yet they drag their heels, as though they’ve worked out the formula but not how to put it into practise. The crowd are dancing, but somehow The New Wine make The Whitest Boy Alive seem rather tanned in comparison.
THE DATA TODAY
Datarock, on the other hand, seem to know exactly what they’re doing. Mere minutes into their set – minutes almost drowned out by the frantic screams of the fans packing out the front rows – they’ve hauled out a saxophone, and yet this terrifying indication that the 80s revival is picking up speed is in fact inspired. They draw on the same influences that James Murphy’s DFA Records have so radically overhauled, and like LCD Soundsystem’s simian cousins they know exactly how to throw down a party: rolling basslines, four to the floor beats, and a bare-chested tambourine player concluding their set by crowd surfing through the tent. (You didn’t get that with Spandau Ballet!) Like council estate superheroes, they’re still wearing the same tracksuits that they paraded at by:Larm in Trondheim three years ago – it’s a wonder we can’t smell them from the back, to be honest – but their schtick seems in little danger of getting tired, and it’s a mystery why they’ve not achieved greater international success. Someone, somewhere, has a duty to put that right.
WATCH ME
Casiokids give away their 80s inclinations before they’ve even taken the stage. Their name speaks of digital watches and cheesy keyboards, and their music lifts from early house and techno with the minimum of fuss. But they make it their own, adding vocals whose ghostly falsetto recalls Sigur Ros’ Jonsi, a sprinkling of Afrobeat, and – obviously – four dancing bears whose hallucinogenic presence suggests that there’s acid in the beer as well as on the stage. One song, I’m reliably informed, is a love song sung in Bergen dialect to a pet dog. It makes perfect sense in any language.
CUM ON FEEL THE BOYZ
If you lived through the 1980s the first time it’s often hard to take this revivification of that era terribly seriously, but tonight’s final act are far from a joke. This is important because the messily named Cumshots are fronted by Kristopher Schau, comedian and TV host, and it’s initially hard to know whether this is one of his jokes. But five albums in it would be a joke that’s wearing thin, and no one finds this funny. That’s because The Cumshots take themselves very seriously indeed, and rightly so. Schau has perfected that death metal roar pioneered by the likes of Napalm Death, and his band tear the tent at least a dozen new arseholes. They’ve got manically nihilist lyrics – “Fuck you all” appears to be the chorus to an early tune, while they finish with the entire audience singing along to “Why Drink Alone?” – and they rock so heavily that the tent sinks at least three feet into Youngstorget. Schau launches himself around the stage between cowboy-hatted musicians, pouring bottles of water over his head, eating his microphone, stripping down to reveal the massive “Guilty” tattoo that straddles his back, roaring into the audience’s faces from the photographer’s pit. It’s hardly original, but it’s breathtaking in its intensity, and after a night of 80s inspired nostalgia it feels good to be brought kicking, screaming and bleeding back into the 21st Century. It’s hard to know whether the gradual thinning of the audience is due to the need to work in the morning or simple, instinctive fear, but no one’s going to forget the night The Cumshots got in their face. Back to the future at last…
Saturday, 21 February 2009
Live Review: Hanne Hukkelberg (by:Larm News)
HOOKED ON A FEELING
Three albums in, and Hanne Hukkelberg just keeps getting darker…
TYPE CASTING: In Trondheim two years ago, the last By:Larm to take place outside of Oslo, Hanne Hukkelberg bewitched an audience with a performance of exquisite fragility that gathered together strands of smoky late night jazz, sweet Scandinavian pop and the avant-garde. Her schtick was not only a magical voice but the presence on stage of both a bicycle and a typewriter, employed gainfully as sources of percussion during the show. She’d just completed her second album, Rykestrasse 68, and the fact that it was recorded in Berlin perhaps inspired this Einsturzende Neubauten Lite behaviour.
She’s back now with her third record, Blood From a Stone, written over seven months in a village on an island in the Arctic. You’d think that this solitude and peace would have inspired a music of similar incline, but in fact it seems to have provoked in her a need to do exactly the opposite. Instead of dropping the Einsturzende Neubauten references in favour of the twittering of birds - hell, Kate Bush managed to build a record around such things so it’s not impossible – Hukkelberg has upped the ante. She’s dropped the bicycle and the typewriter, but in its place she has a band which at times – and deliberately, it must be added – make a noise that feels like the sinews of one’s arms are slowly being shredded.
VOICING HER OPINION: Hukkelberg has one hell of a voice, that’s for sure. It swoops and glides gracefully, evocative and full of yearning. But it’s as though she’s so scared of being pigeonholed as another cutesy Scandinavian female in the mould of Stina Nordenstam, Anja Garbarek and Bjork that she’s gone running and screaming like a banshee in the opposite direction. And what she’s found at the other end of the line are her old PJ Harvey and Sonic Youth records.
For this reason, despite the fact that at times tonight there are curious reminders of last year’s By:Larm sensation Lykke Li, most of the kookiness that she might be in danger of exhibiting is buried beneath the clatter of dustbin lid percussion and the clang of detuned guitars. There’s a depth and complexity wholly absent from the synthetic pop of Li, and within this context Hukkelberg sounds more and more like Siouxsie Sioux or perhaps Polly Harvey, the strum of her guitar imbued with a threatening menace, the shadowy figures behind her lending her music an almost gothic mysticism.
SKIN & BONES: Hidden in the cracks of these gnarly, skeletal arrangements are unexpected hints of melody, and this stripped down but oddly metallic approach has brought out a new confidence in Hukkelberg’s delivery. The catch is, however, that while it’s enormously easy to admire the aesthetic it’s not so easy to enjoy the reality. This is less music, more intricately plotted art: determined and uncompromising, quietly but indefinably charismatic. It’s a puzzle that needs to be pieced together and, as the show progresses, it clearly baffles members of an audience that half way through begins to thin out. Those left behind, however, display a reverent devotion for Hukkelberg’s performance, and while she’s unlikely to be the name on everyone’s lips when they retire from By:Larm at the end of the week, she’s considerably more likely to keep on coming back with fresh and challenging music than most of the acts in attendance this week. It won’t be easy to listen to, one suspects, but it will always be hard to ignore.
Live Review: Simon Says No (by:Larm News)
Songs beginning with droning one note guitars: check. Obligatory smoke machine rendering band mere silhouettes on stage: you bet. Vocalist singing with Sonic Boom’s ‘can’t really give a fuck” tuning skills while leaning over his microphone so he can see his boots better: uh-huh. Welcome to the world of shoegazing, 21st century style. Hold on. Doesn’t that song start just like a Chapterhouse song? I think it does. Isn’t that the same ‘glide guitar’ sound that Kevin Shields made his own? It just might be. Could that be the sound of an early Ride single? Hell, don’t ask me, but it certainly sounds familiar. (Could it be the janitor? Could be. Oh, shit. That was Hong Kong Fooey.) Simon Says No have clearly studied their homework very, very carefully indeed, so carefully that they even raise the ghost of shoegazing outsiders, Loop, but therein lies the rub: this is shoegazing 20th century style. All the right musical themes are in place but there’s little new here, little that isn’t instantly identifiable. When they pick up the pace on “Give Me Good Vibrations” they threaten to take off, as they do again at the show’s close, but they need to find a way of doing more than replicating – albeit very well indeed – their heroes. Perhaps they should spend a little more time gazing at the stars rather than their feet.
(Reviewed at Sub Scene)
Friday, 20 February 2009
Live Review: Ólafur Arnalds (by:Larm News)
A CLASSIC ICELANDER
Ólafur Arnalds turns in the most unexpected but undeniably beautiful performance By:Larm will see this year…
They say you shouldn’t use the first person when you work as a critic, but how can you not when faced by music this intimate and personal? In the interests of professionalism I will endeavour to maintain the high journalistic standards set by other writers on the By:Larm News, but trust me: it’s going to be hard. Tonight Ólafur Arnalds could have played until the polar caps melted and it wouldn’t have been long enough. Save the planet, kids! Don’t let him stop! ‘Cos when the shit goes down the only refuge is going to be in the music of people like this.
PACKING THEM IN: Only 21 years old, Arnalds has already cut his teeth opening for Sigur Ros and sold out London’s Barbican Hall. With two albums to his name, but both on obscure UK label Erased Tapes, it’s an extraordinary achievement, but this near faultless performance provided more than ample evidence of how he’s succeeded in capturing the imaginations of those who seek music of sentiment and subtlety missing from almost every other act not only here in Oslo but throughout the world.
It’s impossible to write about music of such exquisite refinement without the use of clichés, so brace yourself. Arnalds’ work is as soft as pillows, as soft as pillow talk. Seated behind a grand piano, a Mac by his side and an effects rack discreetly hidden nearby, he summons gentle melodies from the keys like a magician, allowing them to float like summer mist over the stage. Accompanied only by a four piece string section whose embellishments were elegantly poised and never obtrusive, this modest Icelander ensorcelled a packed and fortunately seated audience with the thirty most peaceful, meditative minutes of the week. At times the auditorium was so silent that the bass thudding from the room next door threatened to overwhelm him, but it remained impossible to tear one’s ears away from the majesty of this understated but unforgettable performance.
PAY ATTENTION: He is of course completely out of place amidst the clamour of By:Larm, where the standard approach of new artists is to make as much noise in as sensational fashion as possible. But such is the contrast from the madness around the city this weekend that he stood out from his peers by virtue of his utter refusal to concede to such attention-seeking behaviour. Drawing upon a wide range of influences – from the glacial soundscapes of Harold Budd to the classical minimalism of Arvo Pärt and on to the simple charms of Erik Satie – he allows his ‘songs’ to swell gently until they blossom magnificently, gentle percussive twitches like ice melting in the background.
EVERYTHING ELSE IS JUST TALK: When he rolls the beats out with more force – and force is a relative term here – a colleague whispers that there’s a danger he may slip into Enigma territory, but for the most part he avoids the pitfalls of mixing electronica and classical tendencies with grace and panache, largely due to the muted quality of his programming. William Orbit this is not. Instead it is perhaps closer to the far-reaching ambitions of Talk Talk’s Spirit of Eden, stripped of its fundamental rock and pop traditions until only the fragile details of that masterpiece remain. Much like fellow Icelander Johann Johansson – from whom he has perhaps borrowed a couple of tricks, such as the computerised voice behind his closing piece – Arnalds creates an inexplicable emotional resonance that ensures that his Oslo debut will remain one of the most enduring memories of 2009. Believe me.
Live Review: El Cuero (by:Larm News)
LEATHER BE ROCK!
Their name means ‘the leather’, and these monumental rockers could tear the skin from your back…
Beer Here Now: The problem with events like By:Larm – if there is a problem, and it’s perhaps unfair to suggest there might be – is that they put more emphasis on the provenance of a band and its music than is arguably strictly necessary. If one stumbled upon El Cuero in a dingy neon-lit roadhouse in the southern states of the US, its pool table stained with cigarette ash and sticky cheap beer, one might be forgiven for believing that one had located the very heart of America. The conviction with which they perform is such that they could be mistaken for any number of legitimately American classic rock bands.
But somehow, for a short while, a question mark lingers in the air above the stage as to whether a band from Oslo and Kristiansund have the right to pull these moves. Fortunately, and with relative ease, El Cuero make their point with such ferocity that by the end of their thirty minute showcase that question mark lies at the back of the stage, the shit kicked out of it relentlessly and unforgivingly.
For Those Ready To Rock, We Salute You: They start with a wall of noise, a deafening roar that drags their audience forcefully to the front of the stage. Guitarist Øyvind Blomstrøm wields a Flying V guitar like a battle trophy, singer and guitarist Brynjar Takle Ohr puffs out his chest beneath his T-shirt, bearded face hidden beneath a standard issue baseball cap. And then they rock. They rock like bastards.
The words Crazy Horse get thrown around a great deal when talking about El Cuero, and with good reason, but to begin with they crank out riffs as though they took lessons from AC/DC during their Oslo show earlier this week. It’s only when they break off into a frenzy of soloing that the crunching of guitar chords recedes, replaced instead by the kind of hurricane squalls that Crazy Horse have made their own. And though, from this point on, Neil Young’s legendary backing band remain a constant point of reference it’s nothing that detracts from the power of El Cuero’s performance. As they stagger through a second slower but still monstrous tune the ghost of The Jayhawks – albeit on a diet of Budweiser, nachos and beer nuts – is brought into focus by immaculate harmonies, but by the song’s climax they’re not so much dragging their heels as booting the face of the front row with size 12 Timberlands.
I Cuero Because You Cuero: Blomstrøm, Ohr and bassist Tommy Reite – pudding bowl haircut hanging down to his mouth – repeatedly face off with one another for a series of guitar duels, while drummer Håvard Takle Ohr beats his kit with the power of Mike Tyson. They strike Guitar Hero poses, wheel out a pedal steel to prove they’re still in touch with their ‘sensitive side’, but through it all they churn out the kind of anthemic rock whose lineage can be traced from Lynard Synard all the way to the jam band antics of My Morning Jacket. Little Steven, one can be sure, would approve.
They finish with another wall of terrifying noise, amps turned up to 12, so loud that it would scare the baby fluff from the Kings Of Leon’s chins. They may not come from Tennessee, but at this volume you could almost certainly hear them in Nashville...
Live Review: by:Larm Opening Night (by:Larm News)
AND THEY'RE OFF
By:Larm 2009 kicked off in a suitably controversial style in the Dagbladet Tent on Wednesday night with Ida Maria inexplicably storming off stage after only 16 minutes of the convention’s first show. A year ago, on the same stage, the band were announced winners of the inaugural StatoilHydro Grant, an 800,000 Norwegian Krone prize designed to further the international career of one Norwegian act each year. In the subsequent 12 months since their by:Larm breakthrough the band have toured relentlessly, making significant inroads into the UK market in particular, and this free show could have been their moment of homecoming glory.
Of course it was also designed to launch proceedings for By:Larm and highlight the benefits of the exposure that the event can offer, but inadvertently this brief appearance perhaps also spotlighted the pressures that bands face on the road to success. Whether the band’s premature departure from the stage was due to their rumoured exhaustion, the subdued response of an early evening crowd or an out of tune guitar – “that’s not a reason to leave the stage,” Oslo’s current Number 1 celebrity Little Steven was overheard to say, “it’s a reason not to go on stage” – is hard to say. It certainly ensured, however, that the band continue to provoke, confuse and excite in equal measures and confirms that acceptance of money from the petroleum industry does not have to mean the loss of one’s rock ‘n’ roll attitude.
It was left to Cocktail Slippers to get the party started, but they had the added benefit of an introduction from the boss of their label, the afore-mentioned Little Steven Van Zandt, who one suspects is going to be seen a lot in the coming days. Slouching on stage in an unusual fur print jacket and his trademark bandana, the round-shouldered Springsteen comrade and star of The Sopranos welcomed us to “the first By:Larm of the rest of your life” before his latest signings charmed a crowd, by now beginning to flesh out, with their rock ‘n’ roll revivalism and carefully cultivated polka-dot wardrobe.
As local musical luminaries and hopefuls circulated side by side through the tent Lukestar tore through a storming set, followed by one of the acts shortlisted for this year’s Statoil Hydro Grant, Harry’s Gym. They provided a more sombre but intense half hour of electronic indie rock, the ghosts of New Order and PJ Harvey just about visible amidst the dry ice.
There was no doubt that, after this, the instantly palatable sounds of one of Norway’s top dance producers and yet another emerging international success story, Lindstrom, were a welcome excuse for the crowd to cut loose. From behind his Macbook he took advantage of a room of well-oiled individuals by cranking up the beats and giving them a soulful twist.
Events were then brought to a rousing close with one of Annie’s eclectic DJ sets, a welcome reminder of the breadth and depth of a Scandinavian music scene that this opening night sought to celebrate. If this is how things get started one can’t help but be excited about how on earth they’re going to end this Saturday…
Thursday, 19 February 2009
Feature: It's by:Larm Again! (by:Larm News)
IT'S BY:LARM AGAIN!
By:Larm is back in Oslo for the second year running. Whose idea was that?
For over a decade ByLarm has left a trail of destruction in its wake across Norway. For those ten years Scandinavia’s leading musical showcase has trampled city after city in its search for the finest in local music: Stavanger, Bergen, Tromsø, Trondheim and Kristiansand all hosted what people – well, me, anyway – referred to as ‘South By South West in the Snow’. Artists and execs flew in from miles around – it would be a bit stupid to fly in from less, after all, though perhaps not beyond the bounds of the music industry when you think about the mess it’s in right now – and found themselves seduced by Norway’s grand beauty, its people’s generosity and its hedonist culture.
But the news that ByLarm was no longer going to travel around Norway like a carnival – complete with attendant freaks and sideshows – came at me like a truck with headlights on full beam and snowplough sharpened. How would people like me ever be able to experience Norway if the existence of a music convention in the furthest reaches of the Arctic wasn’t there to justify the expense? What else was I going to look forward to in the grey month of February that could drag me from the grubby pile of CDs on my desk – most of which sounded like they’d been recorded in the sewers beneath Camden – and instead deposit me in a pale moonlit landscape filled with warped electronica, physically threatening mutant-metal, the sallow caresses of whispering voices and hip-hop in which references to snow had nothing to do with cocaine? Though I could hardly call myself a veteran of this fine event I felt slighted that they hadn’t at least discussed the decision with me.
As A&R for a now deceased (or barely breathing) little label with big ambitions I exercised a fascination with Scandinavian music, in which I recognised the kind of inventiveness that can turn rotten fish into an edible delicacy. I considered myself lucky when this growing obsession led to my first ByLarm after I stumbled on a band that insisted I travel to the event’s 2006 manifestation in Tromsø to see them play. But nothing had prepared me for the adventures that would follow when I stepped off the plane upon arrival in that northern city. No one had informed me that the streets are so icy that I wouldn’t even make it from the bus to the hotel lobby without falling flat on my arse. Nobody thought to tell me that the sight of grown men engaged in a bollocks-kicking wrestling match at 3am is a cause for celebration rather than pant-wetting fear. And the water bottle that was passed to me after I’d soaked in a hot tub in the snowy hills outside the city limits definitely offered no warning that it contained 95% proof moonshine. That weekend was a one of endless surprises, and ByLarm was etched into my diary for life. Oh, and I signed the band.
I travelled to Trondheim the next year, another city smothered in snowdrifts where I ate reindeer steaks and enjoyed the riches of the Scandinavian music scene in the confines of a former Nazi U-Boat factory, one whose foundations were so strong that the explosives necessary to destroy it would demolish the city itself before they even took out the building’s supporting walls. I can barely remember where I stayed that year: possibly I didn’t go to bed the whole weekend. Loney Dear were astonishing, though.
And yet, when the ByLarm authorities told me that I’d be travelling to Oslo for 2008, I wasn’t sure I wanted to bother. Oslo’s got its strengths, don’t get me wrong. The crayfish sandwiches in the Bristol Hotel justify its existence alone. Then there’s the existence of a 7 Eleven on every corner, the music policy of Mono, and the most beautiful specimens of humanity everywhere you look. But it wasn’t like I was going to end up huskie-sledging by night, or skating from one venue to the next in my rush to discover another absurdly named ska-country combo. I was going to have to focus on the music, and as any fool in this business knows, no one cares about music anymore. Not unless you’re listening to it somewhere like a wooden tee-pee with snow falling through a chimney out of which smoke curls from a log fire on which coffee is brewing.
Those same ByLarm authorities admitted soon afterwards that their plan for the future was to make Oslo ByLarm’s home. I tapped my head to indicate that they were lunatics, though their English is so perfect I suspect that was unnecessary. I begged them to send us to Kautokeino instead: I’d never been to Finnmark and wanted to drive snowmobiles. What about Bodø? We could take a boat ride out to the Lofoten Islands and catch cod in their breeding grounds. Or wouldn’t Bergen be nice, with its wooden houses, fish market, and the promise of trips into the fjords? But Oslo? Where was the adventure in that?
SEEING THE WOOD FOR THE TREES
It didn’t take long to forgive them. That first night in Oslo I watched Truls & The Trees, a ramshackle nine piece fronted by a peculiarly angel-voiced overgrown boy scout. I’d already spent the afternoon being charmed by the sweetly French sounds of Maria Due and the minimal Kate Bush-isms of Maose, before stopping off at Rockefeller, where All That And A Bag of Chips had at least proven that a terrible name didn’t mean terrible music (though they were pushing their luck none the less). From the other side of the city I received an excitable text message from a friend who’d just witnessed a band who’d blown his mind: he thought they were called Kaka Motherfucker, though they later turned out to sport an only slightly more commercially friendly name, Kakkmaddafakka. But Truls & The Trees awoke in me a fresh excitement that normally I could only have expected from an oily massage in the Arctic snow. They also reminded me of the most important thing I learned that weekend: that there’s more to ByLarm than illegal moonshine, top quality fish and twenty hours of darkness a day. By Gum, ByLarm, there’s the music!
I realised, as Truls’ falstetto cuckooed through what I soon learned was an album highlight called Upside Journey, that amidst the madness of the North and beneath the midday moon I’d forgotten what first took me to Tromsø for ByLarm: music by one of the most inspirational and unusual bands I had ever heard. I’d only come across them after falling for another Norwegian act, whose shoegazing revivalism was scuffed up magically by an obsession with avant-garde noise. They in turn had only been brought to my attention after a colleague introduced me to a swathe of exciting bands that had all emerged from her home town of Bergen, forcing me to concede that Abba, Aha and Aqua were not the be-all and end-all of Scandinavian music. Truls, I recognised, brought on that rush that only flourishes when you discover something truly special. He took me back to Tromsø, to seeing the band I later signed perform for the first time, and maybe even further, to the day I first experienced the magic of their album. From there he helped me trace a line back to the reason I first looked to Scandinavia: it’s a source of music as pure as a bottle of Voss. Scandinavia pumps out great acts like America pumps out ozone depleting toxins.
HAT’S ENERTAINMENT
Luckily for us, wherever ByLarm lays its woollen hat, that’s its home. Because that’s what ByLarm is about: the music. And only a fool forgets about the music, right? While none of us here really know how we’re going to keep our jobs much longer than the end of next month, and many of us wonder what we’ll do if we can no longer work with the one thing that’s filled our every waking hour since we first turned on a radio, we all know that music is going to be around for ever, and as fans, first and foremost, we’re driven to find that music. It doesn’t matter where we see it. It simply matters that it’s good.
As it happens, ByLarm in Oslo was as memorable as every ByLarm I’ve so far attended, and I expect this to be the same in 2009. I’ve already taken those shadowy ByLarm authorities to one side and apologised that I could ever have doubted them. (As punishment they’ve banished me to a remote Arctic island during the summer, but since it turns out to be the home of the Træna Festival I think I’m quids in.) In 2008 I might not have rolled naked down a frozen hillside or sucked the marrow from reindeer bones, but I did see Lykke Li on the top floor of a tower block overlooking the city centre, and I surprised everyone by discovering a hitherto-undetected love of Faroese garage rock. That’s why I’m confident that this weekend promises more surprises than Britney’s friend Amy, because within the borders of the Nordic countries there are whole packs of satan-worshipping metalheads, pitifully-shaven country revivalists, mad-eyed electronic scientists and doe-eyed bed-headed blonde guitarists looking to expand our musical minds until they burst.
So call me a ByLarm bore, if you like, as I regale you with stories of the good old days, and you can even question why the apparently wonderful artists I’ve championed haven’t sailed into international waters with their flags flapping proudly in the breeze – you’ve only got yourselves to blame, if you ask me. But don’t expect me to claim that ByLarm isn’t like it used to be. Because it is. It’s a little bit warmer here in Oslo, perhaps, and it’s definitely a little bit bigger, but it’s always been the home of everything that’s great about Scandinavian music. It proves that it’s not about where you’re at, and only a little about where you’re from. What it’s really about is where you’re coming from, and where you’re going. Frankly, I don’t care where I am as long as what I’m hearing has the ability take me away from it. After all, as the old saying goes back in what was once known as Great Britain: why look at the mantelpiece when you’re poking the fire?
Wyndham Wallace is a debonair freelance journalist who is also available for naked hot-tubbing, karsk-fuelled pagan rituals and sledge-racing down the Svartisen Glacier. He is currently single and quite likes music, food and travel.
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