Session 4 - Alamaailman Vasarat
Reminder -
ProgRockVideoNight will showcase a unique power cello-klezmer band from Finland
tonight - starting at 7:30.
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Our ProgRock
video series will resume this Tuesday night, when we'll feature a unique band
from Finland - Alamaailman Vasarat. As you can see from the description
below, these guys live between genres - they are probably one of the most
unusual groups we'll be featuring this term. Note that, because of
scheduling issues, we're running this program on Tuesday night this week - NOT
Wednesday - but still starting at 7:30 PM on the third floor video wall of E14.
Ah Finland - a
fascinating and wonderful country in many ways. Everybody associates
Finland with reindeer, forests, sauna, cellphones, and high technology - but
those of us in the know prize this place also for some of the most most
innovative and out-of-left-field music that's now being made. There's
certainly something of a legacy here. Going back to the early 70's,
proggish bands like Tasavallan Presidentti (and their great guitarist Jukka
Tolonen) were already known to a few of us in the US, as was the beautifully
intricate prog/jazz music composed by Pekka Pohjola. If you dug a
bit deeper back then though, there was also, for example, Haikara - an amazing
group of "rock" musicians who were already comfortable escaping genre
in intense, fascinating and strange ways. This is a characteristic that
defines much underground Finnish music now. Somewhere deep in the woods
there (or perhaps in Helsinki basements during the long winter darkness)
musicians are putting sonic influences into a boiling still, then adding a
pinch of their famous dry humor to produce a fearless musical beverage that
tastes like Earth's culture interpreted by a hyperadvanced civilization in
another corner of the galaxy who just don't get it. A few hits of this
brew will open the ears of anybody with musical curiosity (heaven help the
others). And what a diverse scene it is... Off the top of my head
come Circle (they deserve their own category, blending Krautrock, metal, new
age, and weird cultist styles into their own melange), spacerock (e.g., Hidria
Spacefolk and Taipuva Luotisuora), folky noise music (there's a ton of
this, like Kemialliset YstŠvŠt or Avarus), dark quirky subpop with
electronics (Keuhkot, The Cleaning Women), extreme stoner (Tivol, Pharaoh
Overlord), dramatic postrock (Magar Posse), utopic poppy eurosynth (Aavikko)...
It's a broad musical landscape, full of left turns and strangely familiar
landmarks often eroded beyond recognition.
Alamaailman
Vasarat (their name translates as "The Hammers of Hell)) are prime among
these Finnish genre-benders. I'd say that they play something of a
heavy-metal klezmer music. They call their style
"kebab-kosher-jazz-film-traffic-punk-music with a unique Scandinavian
acoustic touch". I'd broadly agree with this. The band sports
a keyboard player (mainly pump organ and melodica), a reed player, a
trombonist, two cellists (frequently playing with distortion), and a drummer.
One piece of their music can bring you from Alban Berg to a Jewish wedding,
perhaps stopping enroute at a New Orleans funeral, but never quite escaping the
effluence of Black Sabbath's garage . As expected, the playing is great,
the music is intense, and these guys keep you guessing. The band has some
elements (if not members) in common with Apocalyptica (3 cellists and a
drummer known for their Metallica covers) and Hšyry-kone (an amazing
cello-dominated avant-prog band). Despite the levels of doom these guys
can reach, they maintain a sense of humor throughout - yes, very Finnish indeed.
We'll be playing
bits of their recent "Haudasta Lomilla" DVD on Tuesday - they term it
a "4-hour hammerfest" that spans 7 gigs, but we won't make it nearly
that far - I'll subsample a couple of hours or so of material that should keep
us all from aliasing.
I look forward to
sharing this acoustic elixir with some brave musical souls on Tuesday....
You can find out more about these guys at their website:
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Joe Paradiso (Spring 2011)