Gösta Berlings Saga

Photo: Johan Kindbom

Last Saturday was a pretty interesting one for us. Having played more or less the same basic set of songs for the past two years, things tend to be done on routine and due to that we have always tried to squeeze in some minor changes to the songs to keep them interesting to play. In this aspect, Saturday was really different.

Our original intention when we were asked to play at Teater Scenario (a really cool place btw! It used to be a movie theater and now they have all sorts of things going on there, including music, poetry, theater plays etc.) was to play the songs we still like to play from Tid är ljud and a few new ones. Like Tog du med dig naturen? , Ljud från stan, Helgamarktz and a few more. However, as we got closer and closer to the date of the initial recording session (which is next Friday) we thought that we could as well give all of the new songs a go since we had to practice them anyway. Which for the first time in quite a while made us all both excited and nervous about the whole thing. A well needed injection to say the least.

Luckily, we were free to choose an opening act ourselves, which we did by inviting Trummor & Orgel to play their great psychedelic Hammond and drum driven stuff. These two brothers are really good at what they do and they gave the audience a perfect starter mind set for the evening. We also got to pick our own DJs for the night which first of all was Emma from the club Groddar & Gräsrötter and a friend of hers who played some great progressive and folky tunes. They were followed by Jon Person aka Levande död aka Black Hitler aka DJ CDr who played a slightly darker and more kraut focused set. A perfect match!

Well, what about our show then? Things went just fine; a few minor, hopefully inaudible, mistakes at some places but still something to be really proud of. The hall looked pretty much full and for the second time we had a sitting audience which suited us very well that night. We played a total of seven songs for about one hour and one of the highlights was when Trummor & Orgel joined us during the last song for a lengthy and psychedelic jam based on one of the more folk sounding songs from the upcoming album. The whole thing was filmed with two cameras so hopefully we’ll get something up on youtube or something.

If any of you who attended the show took any nice pictures, please send them to us! It would be really interesting to see what the whole spectacle looked like and of course we’ll give you credit for it if we put it on our website.

That’s all for now, take care.

/Alex

Next Saturday we will play a live set at Teater Scenario in Stockholm with Trummor & Orgel opening for us and some dear friends playing their favourite albums between the sets. We are planning on playing all new songs live for the first time ever and with only one rehearsal left, this idea is totally depending on our concentration capabilities.

Entrance is only 60 SEK and we hope that the night turns out to more of a party than just a regular show, so please bring a friend or five!

Hope to see you there!

So what about the the names of the songs and the album then? Nah, we wouldnt want to spread some of the quite uneasy working titles around, but stay tuned. Everything will be announced right here later on.

With only 5 weeks left before the first recording session we have managed to narrow down the track list pretty much but we’ll write another post about that later. However, apart from these 7-9 songs we will also record a cover version of Arbete & Fritid’s “Esso Motor Hotel”, originally released in 1970, for a tribute album named Rökstenen. This album, which is a tribute to Swedish 70′s progressive,  is to be released by the Finnish Progressive Music Association Colossus during spring 2009.

The current, and yet diverse, line-up of the album is at the bottom of this post. More info might be found here: Rökstenen’s Myspace page

Click here to stream the original recording of “Esso Motor Hotel” with Spotify

LINE-UP:

THE SAMURAI OF PROG (Ita)
Blåkulla “Drottningholmsmusiken, Sats 1″

SIMON SAYS (Swe)
Kaipa “Tajgan”

REVELATION (Ita)
Atlas “Björnstorp”

BLACK BONZO (Swe)
Pugh Rogefeldt “Här kommer natten”

VILLEBRÅD (Swe)
Trettioåriga Kriget “Rockgift”

KEYBRIDGE (Ita)
Kaipa “Den skrattande grevinnan”

RICHARD MARICHAL (Ven)
Kaipa “Fran Det Ena Till Det Andra”

ECHOES (Ven)
Trettioåriga Kriget “Andra Sidan”

WILLOWGLASS (Uk)
Kaipa “Oceaner Foder Liv”

ANJA (Swe)
November “Mount Everest”

DARXTAR (Swe)
Ralph Lundsten “Cosmic Love”

WASA EXPRESS (Swe)
Egba “Apkalops”

PENSIERO NOMADE (Ita)
Flasket Brinner “Jatten Feeling”

MIST SEASON (Fin)
Ragnarök “Promenader”

IN THE LABYRINTH (Swe)
Handgjort “Worlds on Fire”

SONIQ CIRCUS (Swe)
Pugh Rogefeldt “Stockholm”

THE MOOR (Swe)
Pugh Rogefeldt “Grävmaskinen”

JINETES NEGROS (Arg)
Blåkulla “Mars”

THE GRAND TRICK (Swe)
Bo Hansson “The Black Riders”

PSEUDO SUN (Swe)
Life “En Av Oss”

MATTIJS HERDER (Hol)
Älgarnas Trädgård “Two Hours Over Two Blue Mountains…”

THE CHAIR (Swe)
Rag I Ryggen “Naked Man”

GOSTA BERLINGS SAGA (Swe)
Arbete & Fritid “Esso Motor Hotel”

MOOSEQUARTET (Swe)
Fickteatern “Vi Valde Inte Våldet”

MAGNOLIA (Swe)
November “Ganska långt från Sergel”

DAAL (Ita)
Ragnarock “Var Glad Var Dag”

TKINGDKEYS (Fin)
Samla Mammas “Ingenting”

ANIMA MORTE (Swe)
Bo Hansson “The Old Forest”

KATE (Fin)
Dice “Disease”

SINKADUS (Swe)
Dice “Death”

VANILLA PROJECT (Ita)
Atlas “Gånglåt”

CONTRARIAN (Usa)
Blåkulla “Sirenernas Sang”

SURVIVAL (Hol)
Atlas “Sebastian”

BEARDFISH (Swe)
Made In Sweden “Pop Poem”

KARMIC JAGGERNAUT (Usa)
Dice “Greed”

TRION (Hol)
Atlas “På Gata”

PAX ROMANA (Fin)
Blåkulla “Solnedgången”

LA BOCCA DELLA VERITÀ (Ita)
Dice “War”

Bonus Track:
JERRY JOHANSSON & DAN FRÖBERG (Swe)
“Kontinuerlig Drift”

This Tuesday Spotify was launched and since then we have gotten more or less addicted by the simplicity of the application and the pretty vast catalogue. You will not find the most rare albums here, but for as little as €10/month there is a lot left to discover.

For instance, you can listen to the complete Tid Är Ljud album if you like! Suddenly getting exposed to the world like this certainly hasn’t made us feel less obliged to release the new album…

Listen to TID ÄR LJUD