The combination of substance and subtlety that Norwegian singer-songwriter Thomas Dybdahl evinces on Science marks him as an artist worth watching. Originally issued in Norway in 2006, Dybdahl’s fourth album finds him continuing to find original ways to incorporate dark, elegant and often quirky atmospherics into his stark acoustic style. While the soul pulse, harmonies and abbreviated title mark “U” as Dybdahl’s homage to Prince, it’s the slowed-vocal trickery and off-kilter arrangement of “Always” that sounds more like late ’80s Purple One. Dybdahl’s lyrics are also surprisingly unorthodox; the downcast tone of the lone piano and mournful violins accompanying his plaintive vocals on “Still My Body Aches” immediately mark it as an introspective meditation. A closer listen reveals references to how much it hurts the guy to do sit-ups. That sort of unexpected turn is something Dybdahl excels in, and Science is full of them, making it the elegiac, moody acoustic record that manages to make you smile.
First appeared in the December 2007 issue of Harp magazine.
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Categories: CD reviews · Music
Tagged: acoustic, cd review, dreampop, harp, norway, prince, thomas dybdahl
English musician Rick Tomlinson is not on a mission to secure global popularity. Though he’s been performing and recording for nearly four years as Voice of the Seven Woods, this self-titled album is his first widely distributed full-length, as he’s preferred to release his work as singles, cassettes and ridiculously limited-edition CD-Rs. (How ridiculous? Try a run of 47.) While his mercantile methods resemble the approach utilized by noise artists and precious indie bands, Tomlinson isn’t peddling unlistenable, underdeveloped claptrap. VOTSW indulges in warm, expansive and smartly arranged psychedelia. Rooted in simple acoustic structures, but often exploding into massively mindbending numbers, Tomlinson’s songs are both gently affecting and relentlessly engaging. The middle eastern psych-rock of “Fire in My Head” and the dizzying swirl of “Second Transition” wouldn’t be out of place on a collection of unearthed acid-rock, while the rich-if-unadorned sounds of “The Smoking Furnace” and “Sand and Flames” demonstrate his facility as a top-notch acoustic player in their easy evocation of John Fahey’s “cosmic sentimentalism.”
Originally appeared in the Dec. 2007 issue of Harp magazine.
Buy this CD at Amazon.com.
Categories: CD reviews · Music
Tagged: cd review, folk, freak-folk, harp, psychedelia, rick tomlinson, voice of the seven woods
