Fysisk Format Indierock | Alternative 8 Items

As one of the most sonically challenging and visually unique bands of their generation, Daufødt swept the floor of the underground with their debut “1000 Island” and won a Norwegian Grammy in the Rock category. They could easily become the Next BIG Name IN Rock, but – no thanks! got other things to do. Instead, the Daufødt-gang circled back to the underground, hooked up with Lasse Marhaug, associated Sunn0)))-member and recent producer of Jenny Hval and Thurston Moore.

On their upcoming sophmore album “Aromaterapi”, Marhaug has challenged the band on all levels and pumped them into Absolute Sonic MAYHEM-mode, giving associations to similar noise-rock-mongers as Napalm Death, Swans, The Body and Årabrot. Likewise, the scorning lyrics of the debut that made local billionaires spam singer Annika with self-righteous messages have been sharpened into something even more destructive and dangerous.

When we now can announce the first single from the album, one thing is for sure: Daufødt has big amps, but even bigger ambitions. “Knekken” (translated: “the crack, like in cracking you teeth..)

The dictionary describes to crack like this: “to break something so that it does not separate, but very thin lines appear on its surface”.Daufødt, on the other hand, shows us that the crack, Knekken, is the musical equivalent of being hit by a freight train full of decibels. The crack is about getting your snout crushed, regardless of the direction of the sky, and with an unknown sender.

Daufødt consists of bassist Eskild Myrvoll (Mall Girl, Kanaan, Blodkvalt), vocalist, visual artist and designer Annika Linn Verdal Homme, guitarist Eirik Albrethsen Reithaug and drummer Mads Antonsen Gerzić.

The band says: “This album is clearly something else than the first album. It’s harder, faster and more violent – and made to better fit the times we live in. The first album was written in 2019, while Aromatherapi was written in 2021, when the world looked quite different. The bold creative choices we have made with Lasse are made not to be naive, but to actually be honest with ourselves and the audience about how things really are.”

Thea & The Wild with the follow up for the album praised by NME and Rolling Stone moves from the city to the rural of Norway with catchy, lingering songs dominated by a soundscape with softer edges, characterized by rock, country gaze and nature-indie.

With the self-taught musician’s intuitive feeling for melody, Thea Glenton Raknes creates songs which linger and keep returning to one’s mind. With her debut as Thea & The Wild in 2014, she received brilliant response and acclaim, and was nominated to a Norwegian Grammy in the Indie category. When her second album “Ikaros“ was released in 2018, Rolling Stone Magazine highlighted it as one of 10 albums to stream, and NME wrote:

"Having quietly released one of 2018’s most impressive debuts with ‘Ikaros’, Thea & The Wild offer the kind of fist-clenching, abandon-free arena power-pop that Florence + The Machine‘s latest effort was lacking in. Imagine the open-road arena anthemics of Fleetwood Mac with the slick R&B edge of early Haim, and throw in the synthy showboating of Chvrches and you’ve got a rough sense of what this dark horse has to offer."

After moving to a rural environment in the Hurum peninsula, the urban, Nordic pop synth focused sound on her previous album, a new sound emerges, where Thea embraces her guitar and the ambience of rural Norway in her new single.

"Deadheading" is the gardener’s word for removing withered or dead flowers from plants, so the plant can use its energy to produce new, fresh flowers. Perhaps this is precisely what Thea did when she cut the cord to her hometown of Oslo and moved to the countryside. She recorded the album in the garden annex with her partner Cato Salsa Thomassen (Madrugada), in between deadheading her plants.

On Deadheading, we get a soundscape with softer edges, characterized by rock, country gaze and nature-indie, and with her distinctive voice, songwriting and melodic flair, she still has her clear Thea & The Wild signature.

"What happens when a band decide to fly? They become the primordial bird from Tor Ulven’s poem. The sensation of flying is striking. The musicians seem to levitate, so too their audience." – Susanne Christensen

On his sophomore album, Urfuglen, Christian Winther draw lines back to the post-punk era’s way of combining contemporary impulses with artistic sensibility. And following up on his debut album from last year, «The Clearing» (Fysisk Format), noise and experimentation is part of the picture also here, but with a genuine desire to find the beautiful moment, the shimmering harmony.

«It becomes the evocative sound of joy, immensely uplifting and markedly anti-depressive.», writes the danish art critic and writer Susanne Christensen on the album’s liner notes.

Behind the title and the Norwegian lyrics, Tor Ulvens surreal debut «The shadow of the primordial bird» from 1977 shines through. In Winther’s, like in Ulven’s, fabulating universe, surrealism’s instinctive, inward-looking and dreamy pictures are used as a way of processing the often cold and ruthless ravaging happening out there. But most importantly; to remind us of the connections we have with each other.

The «flying» band consist of some of the country’s most open minded, or post-punk-thinking, musicians from bands like Broen, Valkyrien, Monkey Plot and Mall Girl. Anja Lauvdal on synths/piano, Tuva Syvertsen on fiddles/vocals, Ina Sagstuen on vocals/electronics, Magnus Nergaard on bass and Veslemøy Narvesen on drums, in addition to Winther on guitars and voice. They each have strong signature expressions and contribute to an open soundscape full of spice, surprises and spontaneity. The intuitive is striking, and the record is mainly recorded live in the studio.

Urfuglen was born as a commissioned work for the edgy Oslo-festival Motvind’s 5 year anniversary, a perfect arena to present forward thinking music that can stand on its own completely free from the established genres. Within the open festival umbrella rock, free jazz, poetry, protest and spontaneity naturally coexist, and Urfuglen is exactly that. Last year’s lockdown turned the live premiere into a studio premiere, the musicians exhibiting a strong improvised attitude on top of Winther’s alternative rock compositions.

Although noise and experimentation is part of the picture, the influence from Brazilian music, or the way the guitar somehow found a new melodic balance in the 90s Chicago scene, seems just as strong. Contrasts find a harmony here, listen to Valkyrien’s Tuva Syvertsen singing harmonies with Winther on «Urfuglen, Pt. 2», or the acoustic guitars on «Marmor» intertwining like something Jim O'Rourke and Gastr Del Sol companion David Grubbs would come up with in the 90s. The musical relations are many; in addition to the post-punk-mood, threads go out to Brazilian Tropicalia, Japanese psychedelia and Oslo’s improv scene, who most of the musicians on the record are a part of.

2021 saw The Good The Bad and The Zugly return to the formula that birthed their now fading credibility almost a decade ago. This is the third release in a series of 7" split singles with exclusive new tracks only available on vinyl with artwork by Flu Hartberg. This time around we get a split between Tgtbtz, and... Tgtbtz.

After the promising, Norwegian Grammy-nominated debut Puzzler (2016), and the more ambitious follow-up Mjusic (2018), it would've been easy for Hilma Nikolaisen (formerly of Serena Maneesh) to continue in the same vein. After all she's perfected her own kind of groovy guitar rock built on catchy riffs and jammy psychedelic excursions. Instead, Heritage represents a surprising step to the side.

From Tromsø to Øyafestivalen, to Roskilde Festival, moving to Oslo and now with new label Fysisk Format onboard, Heave Blood & Die is ready to follow up their 2018 effort “Vol. II”, with “Post People”. A mournful panoramic rock piece that brings to mind the inward explosions of The Cure, Smashing Pumpkins and Killing Joke. Given life through the mix by Graham Walsh (Holy Fuck, Metz, Viet Cong) and master by Paul Gold (Angel Olsen, Preoccupations, Beach House).