Thanks to Chad, Brad & Pete from Dispatch for the interview and a great show last night. The interview and a video will be up in a few days.
Journalistic portfolio
Work for clients such as:
– The Copenhagen Post
– The Local Europe
– Yakondi
– Danish Architechture Centre
– Ted Talks
Year in Review: Best Danish music acts of 2012
1. Tako Lako
Tako Lako are a Danish band that make loud, chaotic Balkan beat with a gypsy twist. To pull off such a cocky concoction in a pop-obsessed nation is a bold move. The band remains allegiant to their roots in Balkan music despite their meteoric ascendency to fame this year, the catalyst of which was being signed to none other than Sony records. An assault on the kitsch wasteland of mainstream pop music is nigh.
2. Raske Penge
Humility and honesty are as rare as moon pearls on the local dancehall scene. Raske Penge’s anthems have added a soulful stroke of genius and quick wit to Denmark’s music scene, and unlike many performers on the dancehall stage, the Nordvest resident hasn’t gotten ahead of himself.
3. The Rumour Said Fire
Just when we were starting to forget the familiar, friendly folk sounds of their amazing 2009 hit ‘The Balcony,’ the indie-folk band burst back on the radar with a stunning new album, Dead Ends. As lively as the blue and lilac cover art on this album, The Rumour Said Fire are on course for a great 2013 if their achievements this year are anything to go by.
4. Lukas Graham
He may be a tad too sure of himself, but Christiania-bred Lukas Graham has had a big year in 2012. His sublime vocal talents alone are worth credit and for a debut album, his eponymous work is something he can be very proud of. Watch out for this kid.
5. When Saints Go Machine
The Saints haven’t been as active this year as they were in 2011. However, a well earned ‘P3 Guld’ award back in April accompanied by a modest performance at DR’s concert house just about does enough to squeeze them into the top five.
The best of the rest:
6. Vessel
7. Klumben
8. Spleen United
9. CTM
10. Efterklang
Year in Review: Best albums of 2012
1. Of Monsters and Men, My Head is An Animal
The epic rise of Iceland sextet Of Monsters and Men introduced the world the genre of chamber pop. Hailed as the new Arcade Fire by some, in truth they sound more like a witty mix between Indie-rock starlets Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros and popular folk rockers Mumford & Sons. Their debut album is a diamond in the rough and may be Iceland’s best export yet.
2. Beach House, Bloom
The aptly-named Bloom represents a coming of age for the captivating, soul-stroking music of this enigmatic duo from Baltimore. Their fourth album is a sheer listening experience; a journey through time and space rather than solely an amalgamation of songs.
3. Mumford & Sons, Babel
Outdoing a debut album like 2009’s Sigh No Moreseemed a daunting if not almost impossible hurdle for the now familiar Mumford & Sons,. Babel keeps the best of what we remember from its predecessor, which is rare for a second album. Little wonder that their 2013 show at Falconer Salen has sold out so quickly.
4. Grizzly Bear, Shields
Shields is as experimental and as contemplative an album as you’ll hear this year. Rock/electronica à la New Yorkers Ratatat meets alt-rock influences not too unlike those of Icelandic heavyweights Sigur Rós in a marriage woven in the clouds.
5. John Talabot, Fin
Barcelona’s John Talabot has somehow managed to weave a mix of house disco and indie together with the panache of a true innovator. Fin is Barcelona in an album; vehemently unique and ice cool albeit welcoming and accessible at the same time.
The best of the rest:
6. Hot Chip, In Our Heads
7. Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros, Here
8. Chromatics, Kill For Love
9. Grimes, Visions
10. Orbital, Wonky
Year In Review: The Best Concerts of 2012
1. The Roots
Roskilde Festival, July 7
The Roots are what hip-hop used to be way back when. The Philly natives shun the pathetic self-referential, revenge-tinged bollocks and swap it for purely eclectic, instrument-rich genius at its most refined. This is what the legendary crew managed to pull off at Roskilde’s massive Orange Stage.
2. Klumben & Raske Penge
Roskilde Festival, July 3
Roskilde’s bookers must have had their hearts in their mouths as the chaos unfolded at Klumben & Raske Penge’s show at Pavillion Junior. The stage is a breeding ground for some of Denmark’s soon-to-be-huge bands and rarely gets packed over capacity. This show was one of a kind however, crammed long before the dancehall dons even set foot on stage.
At his Lille Vega show in April, Kiwanuka showed that he was on his way to stardom (Photo: Søren Bo Basselbjerg / soerenbo@gmail.com)
3. Michael Kiwanuka
Lille Vega, April 27
BBC Sound of 2012 winner Michael Kiwanuka’s soulful music has drawn comparisons to legends such as Otis Reading. Genuinely talented and refreshingly humble, Kiwanuka delivered his best on his debut on Danish soil at Lille Vega. This show paved the way for a second Danish appearance a few weeks ago, this time at Store Vega. Read the full review.
4. Coldplay
Parken Stadium, August 28
Despite their latest album being something of a disappointment, Coldplay’s live shows repeatedly prove why they are one of the best bands around. Glow-in-the dark bracelets, giant balloons, four huge screens and an explosion of special light effects made optimal use of the stadium space, so a good show was always guaranteed.
5. The Vaccines
Pumpehuset, October 24
In a country where audiences are, in the words of Mike Skinner of The Streets, “almost impossible to please,” The Vaccines set Pumpehuset aflame with their dangerously contagious infusion of driven indie-rock. Props to the audience for dropping their usual poised appearances.
The best of the rest:
6. Of Monsters & Men, Store Vega, September 19.
7. Paul Kalkbrenner, Roskilde Festival, July 7.
8. Charles Bradley, Lille Vega, April 29.
9. Tinariwen, Lille Vega, April 23.
10. Joe Sample & Randy Crawford, Store Vega, March 22.
Spleen United, Store Vega (Dec 2012)
The last time I saw Spleen United perform, they were but a few metres from my tattered tent in the lakeside camping area at Roskilde Festival where they played a mammoth 24-hour set underneath a specially constructed rondavel. I’d heard plenty about the band and as such, anticipated a solid 24 hours of quality music, only to be disillusioned by a seemingly never ending stream of downtempo electronica that didn’t quite pack a punch.
It was a bold and dedicated act nonetheless, particularly considering that the electro rock quartet went on to perform at Roskilde’s Arena stage later in the festival where their downtempo affiliations were flung out of the window and replaced by rib-cracking rock with a vicious electronic twist.
The show at Vega Thursday night was a display of Spleen United at their best, on the edge and as driven as one could imagine. Slowolf did the opening honours with a heavy if not trippy excess of heavy percussive rock that, combined with a dazzling light show and a topless, impassioned drummer-slash lead singer, was a bit too much. The wind chimes were an impressive element of their show however, and in a different context they may well be a solid act.
Coming on in front of a static, eager-to be-pleased audience, Spleen United took to the stage looking slightly nervy and opened their set in the same manner. However, a dexterous performance of their 2008 single ’66’ got the audience in gear, before a thunderous, Depeche-Mode sounding thunderstorm that saw the Nørlund brothers showcase their vocal talents whilst Rune Wehner and Janus Ringsted did their bit on the synth and drums respectively.
Four songs in and the Spleen United quartet were huddled around their secondary synthesiser and studio gear, each twisting and pushing different buttons that created something of a frenzy that was amplified by a series of flashing strobe lights and a swarm of neon laser beams. Vocal samples of Opus III’s epic 1992 number ‘It’s a Fine Day’ interwoven with The Prodigy’s well known ‘No Good (Start the Dance)’ gem followed as Spleen United ventured deep into electronic territory.
A return to their rock base saw tunes such as ‘Days of Thunder’ and ‘Dominator’ played towards the end, accompanied by the acid-house influenced ‘Sunset to Sunset’, a track that set the pits alight as the front row audience scrambled onto each other’s shoulders. Spleen United veered more towards their electronic roots, playing with the usual passion and zest that one has come to expect from them and look set to end 2012 in style.
Jonas Alaska, Lille Vega (Nov 2012)
From time to time I must admit that I get bored of the heavy melancholic mood that hangs over most singer/songwriter gigs in the middle of the dark and downright depressing Danish winter. I approached Tuesday’s concert at Lille Vega expecting an evening of cheesy songs about lost loves and failed ambitions only to be pleasantly surprised by a dexterous assemblage of touching songs in the songwriter tradition fused with jolly spells of rich instrumental rock.
Faroese-Canadian songbird Lena Anderssen was on the warm-up duties for Jonas Alaska as part of her promotional tour for her latest albumLetters from The Faroes. Anderssen played a short, albeit entertaining, set that included tracks such as ‘Stones in My Pocket’ off her award-winning album, Let Your Scars Dance, exiting the stage as she’d come onto it, humbly and with a smile on her face.
The night’s main act, Jonas Alaska, stepped onto the scene armed with his guitar and sporting his recognisable gentlemanly hat and proceeded to break the ice with a short solo performance before his backing band swarmed around him and lifted the venue’s mood. Alaska’s backing, which included his brother on the drums, were the perfect merry antidote to some of the more melancholic solo tracks of the evening and the contrast between both moods made for pleasant listening.
At one moment, I found myself dancing and swaying to heavily instrumental Bluegrass boogies and at another, stood completely still in a contemplative mood, numbed by solos of songs such as ‘October’, a track about losing a friend at a young age. The evening peaked with Alaska’s performance of the up-tempo ‘In the Backseat’ – a tune off his eponymous 2012 album that sounds even better live.
It’s difficult to say whether Alaska is best as a solo performer or backed by a band, though in both capacities his vocal range, charisma and the ease with which he plays are very impressive. He also sounds strangely similar to Coner Oberst of the American indie band Bright Eyes, which can only be a good thing.
The audience at Vega were certainly spellbound by his musicianship on Tuesday evening, so much so that he re-appeared not once but twice after the curtain call, first with a cover of Neil Young and thereafter with a take on ‘Swine Flue Blues’, a spoof of Bob Dylan’s ‘Tombstone Blues’.
Orbital, Store Vega (Nov 2012)
Rewind the clock to the late 80s/early 90s in the UK. Practically every major news tabloid is crammed with one headline after another documenting the cultural phenomenon that has become known as ‘Acid house’. The rave scene is at its primordial best, propelled by a nation of discontented citizens who are changing England’s reputation as a nation of hooligans to that of one nation under a groove.
Bands like Tangerine Dream, 808 State and Orbital are at the forefront of the musical and cultural revolution, playing a blend of space-age electronic music that’s heavy on the use of short, often-looped samples and squelchy synthesiser inputs.
Now, fast forward a good few years to Wednesday night at Store Vega. Orbital are on stage performing to a venue that’s far from sold out. Phil and Paul Hartnoll, the two brothers who make up the band, seem as energetic as ever as they step onto the pitch black stage with their characteristic bright torches on either side of their heads.
A few white flashes later, and the brothers have tucked themselves behind a massive array of analogue instruments, flanked by an elaborate series of light devices and smoke canisters that form the colossal spacecraft-like stage on which they will perform.
‘Time Becomes,’ the opening track of their eponymous 1993 album is the first of many good tunes on the evening as the looped sample of a Michael Doorn line from Star Trek shatters the silence.
This is followed by a series of short tracks in quick succession during which samples from Belinda Carlisle’s ‘Heaven is a Place on Earth’ and Bon Jovi’s ‘You Give Love a Bad Name’ do their bit to woo the commercial-music appetite of the Danish crowd.
Midway through the show and Orbital are in fifth gear. The songs are longer and more driven and the light show that accompanying them is out of this world. The stage is aflame in a kaleidoscope of clashing colours and neon beams that criss-cross the fog-filled haze.
Down below, the crowd, most of whom are in their 30s and 40s are awestruck, much like this reviewer. The last time the floor reverberated as it did on Thursday night had to be back when dubstep mammoths Skream and Benga performed in 2010, so credit is due for the brilliant acoustics on the evening.
The show ends as it started, with the Hartnoll brothers exiting the pitch black stage after the curtain call, their faces alight with the content of two seasoned veterans of the electronic music scene. If Orbital are as good as they were in Vega on Wednesday, I can only wonder what they must have been like when they first burst onto the scene at the start of the 90s.
Choir Of Young Believers, Store Vega (Oct 2012)
Choir of Young Believers returned to Store Vega for their second concert of the year at the venue on Saturday. Led by frontman Jannis Noya Makrigiannis, the believers managed to brighten up the damp, dark evening with a solid show that featured some of the band’s revered hits along with a few songs off their latest album Rhine Gold. Ultimately though, the evening failed to truly take off despite the best efforts of the internationally-acclaimed Danish indie pop band.
Makrigiannis and company took the stage as the last act of the evening, following performances by 4 Guys from the Future and One Year from Home. A combination of technical glitches and sound problems resulted in poor opening sets, which weren’t made any shorter by a stiff audience in a venue that was far from its usual capacity.
It was clear from the start that this was going to be an uphill struggle for Choir of Young Believers, who went on almost a good half an hour later than they should have. This notwithstanding, the indie pop band were sharp, if not witty, during the entirety of their performance as they did their best to rescue what had been a disappointing couple of hours.
The musical career of Choir of Young Believers received a shot in the arm back in February when they dropped their highly revered second album Rhine Gold, an album that saw the band cultivate the heavily acoustic sound fused with dark, contemplative lyrics that they have become associated with. Saturday’s show featured several tracks off the album, but the live versions failed to match the band’s studio work.
The confident Makrigianni’s sharply inclined vocals plucked away at a rigid backdrop of emphatic synthesiser stabs and wistful guitar combinations that created a dreamy, progressive atmosphere in the concert hall right from the word go. As the show progressed, however, an overwhelming sense of repetitiveness descended on the venue, as many of the songs began to sound a lot like each other.
This, coupled with paltry crowd, dampened the otherwise dextrous musicianship by the Believers, and cemented the final brick in what was ultimately a lukewarm concert.
Of Monsters and Men, Store Vega (Sept 2012)
When I turned up at the Of Monsters and Men concert at Store Vega on Wednesday night, I must admit that my expectations were rather high. The chamber pop sextet have been hogging blog space lately, spurred by, among other things, their recently dropped albumMy Head is an Animal. If their performance is anything to go by, this is a band with huge potential, and an amazing live act at that.
We’re talking about a band that sounds strangely similar to Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros, fused with Mumford & Sons, and a tinge of Arcade Fire – just to complicate things.
Fellow Icelander Lay Low was at hand to provide a wonderful warm-up, playing a dexterous blend of powerful songs, intermeshed with snippets of witty humour. The performance was proof enough of why she’s had the honour of touring with the likes of Emiliana Torrini.
Of Monsters and Men then stepped onto the stage illuminated by a fiery red glow and proceeded to sweep Store Vega off its feet. Lead singer Nanna Bryndís Hilmarsdóttir seemed thrilled with the soaring number of Icelanders at Vega and engaged them in her native tongue before unleashing tracks such as the up-tempo, jovial ‘Mountain song’.
An unexpected cover of ‘Skeletons’ by trendy New York garage rockers Yeah Yeah Yeahs thereafter added a fresh wave of variation to the concert, while sing-along gems such as ‘From Finner’ got the crowd jumping.
Unsurprisingly, the highlight of the show came when the anthemic ‘Little Talks’ dropped towards the end. The song epitomises the chamber pop sound that the band has managed to cultivate over its short but sparkling career, and featured a brief, but perfectly timed trumpet solo that accentuated its jolly effect.
Led by the vocals of the subliminal Ragnar Pórhallsson and Hilarsdottir, Of Monsters and Men were sharp from the word go, playing with ear-to-ear grins and bonding with the crowd, despite the customary unresponsiveness of Danish audiences.
Nowhere was this bond more candid than at the very end of the show, as the Icelanders parted from the stage, with the dreamy, contemplative chimes and ticks of the final track ‘Yellow Light’ ringing in the audience’s ears, who by this point, were in merry spirits.
Bas Under Buen, Bispepuen motorway underpass ( July 2012)
Drum N Bass, something of a niche sub-genre within the spectrum of electronic music, more so in Denmark where it’s a rather small albeit rapidly-growing cultural movement.
The last few years have seen Drum N Bass grow from being a fringe music phenomenon celebrated in musky concrete basements and in the dens and alleyways of underground Copenhagen to a genre that has become renowned for providing some of the best parties for miles around.
Nowhere has this been more evident than at OHOI’s annual ‘Bas Under Buen’ party- an evening that attracts the creme de la creme of Denmark’s intimate Drum N Bass community for several hours of sheer bass and beats under the the Bispebuen motorway bridge on the outskirts of Nørrebro.
One could hardly imagine a more ideal setting; five thousand plus attendees under a concrete bridge, with the dipping summer sun flickering on the horizon.
This year’s event was a mammoth occasion that topped all previous ‘Bas Under Buen’ parties. I got to Bispuebuen rather late into the proceedings, and found myself surrounded by masses of smiling, dancing revelers who at the time were being steered through the heftier, more down-tempo sounds towards the dub-end of the electronic music genre.
As the sun set to the East of the motorway, the music got a tad commercial as the likes of Guns n Roses anthemic number ‘sweet child of mine’ and a tacky remix of Rae Jepsens overplayed and overrated ‘Call me maybe’ reverberated off the concrete roof of the motorway.
This didn’t really stir things up that much, though it did help accommodate the musical interests of some of the crowd. Personally I was a bit bemused about it all, and as such it was a relief when underground ragga/dancehall boys Maffi, Klumben, Top Gunn, Sukker Lyn and the revolutionary Mighty Mala came on to put on the best half an hour or so of the evening’s entertainment.
Well-rehearsed live versions of epic contra-mainstream culture tunes such as the emphatic, up-front “Du en lort” seemed to get the crowd raving and dancing, rattling through the warm evening air with a vengeance. The show ended at eleven o’clock sharp, finishing off with some of the wildest Drum N Bass tunes for miles around as the likes of Pendulum’s peerless track “Tarantula” caused quite a bit of pandemonium.
For many Roskilde festival attendees, Saturday’s shenanigans under the Bispebuen motorway were the perfect antidote to the post-Roskilde blues. Judging from the crowds reaction to it all, it would appear that Drum N Bass continues to cement its status in the landscape of the Danish clubland, proving itself as a genre to be reckoned with.
Kortbæk_Travels 