ceo – White Magic

ceo - White Magic

It’s become something of a cliché to talk about Sweden as a country that seems predisposed to producing good pop music, particularly over the past half decade. However, it’s worth taking a step back and reflecting on just how wonderfully odd the music that these very singular artists have been offering is – the haunted, pitch-shifting of The Knife’s Silent Shout, and Fever Ray’s warped domesticity last year; Robyn’s globe-trotting, cherry-picking pop songs continue to make her an unlikely star; The Tallest Man On Earth’s folk songs, seemingly removed from any specific time or place. There’s also The Tough Alliance – the duo of Henning Fürst and Eric Berglund whose Balaeric-infused pop music soundtracked lip-synched live shows where the pair threw themselves around the stage, wielded baseball bats and, occasionally, slow danced with each other. … Continue Reading

Bandjo – Bandjo

Bandjo - Bandjo

Bandjo, the largely instrumental debut album from the Swedish duo of the same name, is a spacious and understated collection of expansive epics to which the term ‘progressive’ is to be used as a compliment rather than a criticism. The length of the tracks generally allows Bandjo’s work the opportunity to breathe and build, often resembling a series of edited jams, rising and falling like the best electronic music. … Continue Reading

Love Is All – Two Thousand And Ten Injuries

Love Is All - Two Thousand And Ten Injuries

Love Is All have come up with a formula for a large percentage of Two Thousand and Ten Injuries: craft jittery, spiky melodies and smother them with the shrieks and vocal tics of lead singer Josephine Olausson. This isn’t necessarily a criticism – for the most part the album fizzes with unadulterated joy, but – as with most things in life – you can have too much of a good thing. … Continue Reading

Ikons – Ikons

Ikons - Ikons

Variety is a tricky term. I think I can pretty confidently state that our concentration and our patience has slowly eroded in the past decades. This means that apparently we cannot focus on one and the same thing anymore, as long as we once did. We expect, perhaps even subconsciously demand, that something will happen. A film like 1974’s The Conversation would probably bomb horribly today (even though arguably the subject matter is as nu as it was then). The same essentially goes for music, especially in a musical environment which has so changed in the 21st century. When I interviewed  Dayve Hawk of Memory Tapes he said that listeners tend to skim more (not you, obviously), resulting in the need to have a signature sound that people can immediately recognise in orrder to avoid being shooed away in favour of the next one that ticks that box. So in essence, if Bowie had done Station to Station in the current musical environment, people would’ve glanced at it, would say, “hey, this is not Ziggy Stardust and what I like”, and gone to the next artist who did resemble that kind of sound. From this standpoint the new Ikons album, a self-titled one, does raise some interesting questions. … Continue Reading

The Mary Onettes – Islands

The Mary Onettes

The Mary Onettes have made my job easy; I could do away with mentioning how their name reminds me of Earthbound (that SNES game from the 90’s) and just cut the whole review down to one sentence: Do you like The Cure? Yes? Then you’ll probably like The Mary Onettes.

Annoyingly that ‘probably’ means I have to elaborate and actually write a proper review, damn. Hailing from Sweden, The Mary Onettes are essentially an 80’s inspired pop band, taking their cues from gloomy acts such as Echo and The Bunnymen, and of course, The Cure.

However, where The Cure were known to produce the occasional upbeat tune, such as ‘Lovecats’ and ‘Friday I’m In Love’, this band maintain a steady level of mediocre melancholy in their sound, making them great for sad funeral moments in low budget films and sitting rocking gently in the dark, but not good for much else.

While Islands is without doubt a well performed and polished album, it just lacks energy, with each track agonisingly dragging into the next, like the horror that was the Freddie Krueger TV series (although The Mary Onettes could probably benefit from the excitement of having razor sharp fingers).

… Continue Reading

Lykke Li covers The Shirelles

Lykke Li

A video of Muso’s Guide favourite Lykke Li covering The Shirelles’ ‘Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow’ has been made available here.

It’s a sombre take on the song as doleful as Swedish LI can be – in spite of her perform-to-impress live appearance. Watch it, why don’t you. … Continue Reading

First Aid Kit – Hard Believer/Waltz For Richard

First Aid Kit

If you didn’t already know that First Aid Kit’s Klara and Johanna Söderberg were Swedish sisters it’s likely that you wouldn’t guess their nationality from their music. They could quite easily come from the North West of the USA, home of Fleet Foxes who gave them a leg up by showcasing their heartbreaking cover of their ‘Mountain Tiger Peasant Song’ on their MySpace page. Now signed to Wichita, they have a debut album out next year and this lead-off single is a perfect showcase for them.

… Continue Reading

Lake Heartbeat – Trust In Numbers

Lake Heartbeat - Trust In Numbers

Confession time; I have a massive crush on Sweden. Literally, every aspect of that country makes me sigh a little, hell, it even makes me cry a little. But tears of pure joy. The people are beautiful, the food is amazing and they’re also pretty good at creating music that makes you feel simultaneously happy and wistful. By combining delicious pop melodies with lyrics about falling out of love, Sweden has made its name at the forefront of what no-one is calling “misery pop”.

The mysterious Lake Heartbeat are Swedish and though their songs aren’t as immediate as, say, Jens Lekman or Kleerup (both are label mates), they’ve clearly been given the “misery pop” gene. Over lashings of dreamy keyboard washes, polite beats and softly strummed guitar, their sound wouldn’t scare a small kitten, with much of Trust In Numbers shying away from full blown passion in favour of a detached cool. There are times when the politeness leads to you almost forgetting that the album’s on, as if the songs start to melt into the wallpaper.

But this is the Swedish way. There’s no need to bash anyone about the head when you can quietly waft into view, leave your mark and slink out again before anyone’s noticed. Hopefully people will notice though, given the fact that much of the album is achingly current. ‘Pipedreams’ sounds like Empire of the Sun, all sun-kissed melodies and catchy hooks, only this time the chorus runs, “I’m killing off a pipedream/I need a witness”. It makes you want to do that Auntie-at-a-wedding dance whilst crying into your vodka. There’s also the constant wreak of the 1980s, with an obvious homage to Steve McQueen-era Prefab Sprout and dashes of what was once called Balearic beat.

Elsewhere, ‘Southbound’ brings in some lush strings to augment Janne Kask’s hushed, heavily accented, almost emotionless vocals. It’s a style of singing that can sound bored at times (as on the dreary ‘Let It Die’), but works well when there’s more going on in the background. Highlight ‘Blue Planet’ starts with a bouncing drum beat before settling down into a gorgeous, ridiculously dreamy concoction of pattered drums and sweet falsetto.

Much credit should also go to producer Dan Lissvik (one half of Studio), whose crisp, clear production allows the songs to unfurl in their own time. There are melodies upon melodies of course, but they can take some time to make themselves known, as if they’re still climbing out of bed on a bright Sunday morning. Trust In Numbers is a strong debut from a band that seems to shun anything close to promotion (there are no photos of them on their myspace page). Fingers crossed that despite their reluctance, they get the attention they deserve. That way I’ll have something else to add to my list of why Sweden is the best thing, ever!

Kleerup – Longing For Lullabies

Kleerup

Swedish super-producer Kleerup was last heard sprinkling sombre strings and bubbling analogue synths on fellow Swede Robyn’s bittersweet indiepop hit of summer ‘07, ‘With Every Heartbeat’.

… Continue Reading

The Mary Onettes – Dare EP

The Mary Onettes

Quite an Eighties-inspired sound on offer here from the Swedish trio The Mary Onettes, and not just through the name of the disc.

… Continue Reading