Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Paavoharju - Yhä Hämärää (2005)


Take two brothers (Lauri & Olli Ainala); insert them into a born-again Christian commune in the Finnish town of Savonlinna with a bunch of instruments and recording equipment, add generous portions of lo-fi ambient psych-folk and dream pop and that's basically Paavoharju in the most reductive of ways. They're so much more than all of that, they defy any genre pigeonholing by employing an extensive use of electronics (to add a perfect balance between acoustic guitars and ethereal-sounding vocals) it's much easier to just call it "experimental".

Yhä Hämärää loosely translated means "still murky"; as all the song titles revolve around a similar theme (or a poem of sorts): "forever to the world / light oozing through everything / moon consoles concern / depth / gust / air flows / morning sun feels / pure white / I traveled far / it is still murky / black street..."

Yes, I ran all the song titles through Google Translate.

Anyway, this is one of my favorite releases of the last ten years; a real hidden gem full of murky, dense, layered atmospheric folktronica jams from the land of reindeer and cheesy symphonic death metal. Enjoy!


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