By
Sammy Stein
Norway is sending a lot of good things to the world. Naaljos Ljom comprises
Anders Sundsteigen Hana on jaw harp, langeleik (Norwegian stringed
instrument), fiddle, and guitar, and Morten Johan Olsen Joh on analogue
synths, drum machines, and SuperCollider. The duo has played at a number of
festivals including the Rewire Festival in The Hague, Unsound Festival in
Krakow, Fri Resonans in Trondheim, Elevate Festival in Graz, Sonic Protest
in Paris, UH party in Budapest, Motvindfestivalen in Oslo, Tuvas Blodklubb
at Riksscena, Wonderful World in Stavanger, Fanø Free Folk Festival, and
more. They release Naaljos Ljom 2 on 1 st December on Motvind
Records.
The music is a fusion of microtonal folk music and electronic sounds and
noise. The musicians used materials they found at recycling stations and
antique centres and united the sounds created by these old, discarded,
misshapen objects, with tonally asymmetrical and rhythmically straight
angles. Well, this is what the PR notes say anyhow. What Naaljos Ljom has
actually done, and which comes across in the music, is to create layered,
textural, and multi-dimensional layers of sound that form a collective mix
that feels as if it draws elements of ancient Nordic culture and modern
musical nuances together.
They have dived deep into the meaningful side of objects and sounds and
merged them. They have taken phrases of folk music, elements, and textures
from a variety of sources, and from the eclectic nature of their findings –
both sonic and physical, they have developed music that makes sense, yet
contains surprises and unexpected textures and shapes.
Throughout the music, a connection to their origins and the origins of the
music that influences this release is prevalent. There is a sense of
desolate, windswept mountains, boulders rolling, deep, grass-layered
valleys, and sheer cliffs where a turn in the wrong direction may see you
plummeting hundreds of feet toward a rock-strewn floor. It is difficult to
put into words, but the music seems to create its own environment and
landscape – rather as if the elements have come to life – these dark, cold,
imperfect, tossed-away objects, somehow have united with sonic ideas from
the past and present and found new lives, and purpose. Using folk music
means the musicians seek atonal nuances usually only present in vocal
numbers because of the imitations of instruments (and players) but here,
they find those microtones using a variance of electronic and physical
means.
The album opens with music under a statement from Eivend Groven, a
Norwegian music theorist and composer with a background steep in folk
music. The statement is from a radio program broadcast in 1966 with the
title "False or pure in our folk music? Lecture by Eivind Groven with
musical examples". He explains (approximately translated as it is in
Norwegian). "Today we are going to hear music, not performed on an ordinary
organ or piano. These are folk tones, containing pitches or intervals lying
outside the usual tonal system." He is honoured later in the release on the
tracks, Tolvtalsvisa" and "To visetoner etter Eivind Groven og Ola Brenno
(Two songs after Eivind Groven and Ola Brenno).”
They use different rhythms, repeated often as in ‘Fiskaren’ and over these,
the electronic music adds textural levels and percussive variations. Or
they use a mix of rhythms and patterns, most taken directly from folk
songs, and create a new way of hearing the music.
Traditional tunes from different villages, inspired by musicians such as
Andres K. Rysstad, Torleiv H. Bjørgum, Ivar Fuglestad, Gunnar Austegard,
Sigurd Brokke, Daniel Sandén-Warg, Anders E. Røine, Thov Wetterhus, and
Kenneth Lien, follow with twists using electronic and sounds created on
different surfaces. They even include their take on a folk dance – or
Halling - inspired by Trygve K. Vågen. They copy the melodic material from
unique 1930s recordings by Groven and Brenno, (more of which the label
(Motvind Records) promises next year.
The release is neither folk, jazz, or classical Norwegian music but free,
improvised in many places, and wholly inspired by the unique culture of
Norway and its historical music.
From the weirdly ethereal ‘Foss Fugelstad’ (Fugelstad waterfall) to the
folk imbued ‘Rammeslatt,’ the album is original, different, and a journey
that links modern music perception to the historical music of the past.
