noisedfisk

The Concretes (and some others)

2006.04.11

— Music

Yet another update inspired by the ever-inspiring Alistair Fitchett, whose Tangents website remains one of my main sources of… inspiration. As I said already, he’s one of those aware of the excellence of Swedish pop and he regularly posts some interesting thoughts about it… A couple of days ago, one of his reviews was about The Concretes (who are, in my humble opinion, one of the greatest pop bands of the moment, swedish or not): “Kicking off an album with a piano riff right outta ‘Daydream Believer’, as The Concretes do with this opener from In Colour, should tell you a lot about a band. It should tell you that they are knowingly in thrall to the magic of Pop…” That’s how the review starts, and that should be enough for you to go and read the rest. In spite of what I said before, In Colour is a pop gem, but I won’t get in any detail, read Tangents instead, have a look at one of their new videos and buy this fantastic album. The Concretes have just started a worldwide tour, go and see them live, they rock!

In the same post, Alistair suggets that we discover two other scandinavian bands. The first is Boy Omega: “Christ, what is it with Gothenburg these days? Why does everything that comes out of that city of angels kiss my ears and slips tendrils of infatuation into my heart? And here to the clamour is Boy Omega and the Black Tango set (on Stereo Test Kit in the UK). Recorded at home by one Martin Henrik Gustafsson with the help of friends who provide backing vocals, sax, violin and cello accompaniement and “breathing”, amongst others, it all adds up to a richly dark musical miasma of loss and longing, just like all great Pop ought. At times recalling the soft and gentle despair of early Elliott Smith, at others the quirky Pop experimentalism of Beck or Ariel Pink, Black Tango is a tempered ramshackle record of 21st Century folk music that understands the value of brief meanders and intermissions (half it’s twenty songs are under two minutes, and almost half of those are under a minute) and the importance of simply great songs (this track, and the wonderful, oddly Cure-esque ‘By Midnight We’ll Give It A Go’ are classy moments you could easily find yourself addicted to). Gothenburg, my heart belongs to you.” You won’t find much on the Boy Omega website, you’d rather visit Stereo Test Kit Records and download a free single (and if you insist, you can still read this interview with the label guys).

Then you have the Goodnight Monsters, hailing from Turku, Finland, “softpop inspired no-fi Indiepop with a lounge psych undertow that is both peppered with reference points moored in Pop’s past and utterly contemporary all at once.” 20 Fingers 20 Toes is a free download from their website. You can stream a couple of songs from their myspace page.

And a bit earlier, Tangents wrote a few lines about Swissair who are (hum) from Sweden. Worth a download and a listen as well from here: they have three free songs to download and my iPod loves them.

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