I had my headphones in as I got into bed, listening to the closing moments of Gotye's Coming Back. Song ends. Silence as I switch the light off and lay my head down on the pillow. Then alarms. A cacophony of them all screeching in my ears. I knew it wasn't my iPod. Even with the 2000 or so songs on there, I was 100 percent certain that I didn't own any music from bands in the alarm bell genre.
But then it hit me, like taunts to a fat kid. Several hours earlier I'd 'synced' three albums, that I'd plucked out of the 'freebies' bin at Fbi Radio, to my iPod and was planning to actually listen to at some point.
It had to be one of those albums!
At this point, it occurred to me that perhaps I could obtain all the information I desired by simply checking the details on the little screen in my hand.
Sure enough the details were there, and I was right. It most definitely was an album I'd pulled out of freebies and I'm sorry to say, well actually, I'm not really sorry at all. I mean who gets all of life's most annoying sounds, like whistles, bells and piercing fax-like noises, mashes them together and calls it music? Klive, that's who. And I'm figuratively sorry to say that 'Klive' was quickly removed from the iPod.
I did play most of the tracks from the album Sweaty Psalms, though not all in their entirety. It was far too 'abstract' and 'surreal' for me. I'm a big fan of free form jazz, but this is just ridiculous. The tracks generally start with some kind of harsh irritating noise that's on a loop and layered with other irritating noises on loops, to form a kind of repetitive 'melody' (I use that word very loosely). Then the drums join the mix, in some vain hope that this monstrous mess of noise will gain some resemblance of a song simply by having a beat put too it.
Suddenly half way through, there's a moment of clarity as some, dare I say, soulful, ambient and even delicate sounds drift from the speakers, in the Deep Forest vein. This is not to last though as we dive back into obscurity and irritability. And that, to me, can only mean one thing. This guy loves his acid.
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| No one in their 'right mind' would wear that jumper in public! |
It's the perfect music for any tripper to be totally blown away by. I only know this because it's otherwise annoying as all hell, and seems to follow the journey from chaos to moments of extreme clarity, that only a person tripping balls would really understand.
I thought I better do a bit of research on Klive (by research I mean checked Wiki. But it's alright cause I'm Gen Y) and I discovered he's an Northern European musician, so he's most definitely on acid.
The Icelandic album called Sweaty Psalms received rave reviews in Europe and took two years to make. Two years! To record a bunch of faxes, telephones and some alarm clocks. This is why drugs are bad mkay.
It actually reminds me of a slightly happier version of the ultra depressing Norwegian band, Ulver. Also tripped out. Also terrible.
So if you like being depressed or are considering taking acid sometime in the near future and want to have a really bad experience, I recommend you get Klive's album Sweaty Psalms.
Who knows, maybe I just didn't get into the 'groove' enough or his live performances are actually really awesome. But something, I'm not sure what exactly - maybe the slightly deflated enthusiasm for living I now have or the ringing in my ear from shrill noises - makes me believe that, like Old Yella, he's done his best but someone just needs to put him down.
Here's one of his softer ones. It's all I could really find on Youtube. Enjoy. I guess.
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