Lars Myrvoll - The Island CD

Artist and musician Lars Myrvoll has been performing with a plethora of different projects, groups and musicians for more than a decade. He is maybe best known as an improviser who has collaborated with among others Ketil Møster, Axel Dörner, Ole Henrik Moe, Kari Rønnekleiv, Klaus Holm, Martin Taxt, Rafael Toral, David Stackenäs just to mention a few.

It makes sense to call ”The Island” a concept album. The music on the album sounds like it is cherry picked directly out of a dusty music archive, and that is partly also what it is. All tracks on the album was recorded in Lars Myrvolls bedroom between 2002 and 2008. ”The Island” is a collection of atmospheric, low key, and whispering instrumentals. A simmering sonic brew of old blues records, TV-music from the sixties and kithchen table experimentalism. Think Barton Smith or the calm minimalism of Morton Feldman mixed with Loren Connors´ melodic guitar trips.

Tracks:

01 Departure
02 Rain
03 As I Saw Her Then I See Her Now
04 Heartbeats (The Wait)
05 The Storm
06 The Picture
07 More Rain
08 September
09 Light Rain
10 The Silence
11 The Gleaming Water (Monaco)
12 The Dream

Personnel:

Lars Myrvoll - guitar and vocals
Klaus Ellerhusen Holm - flute
Martin Taxt - tuba
Solmund Nystabakk - ac. guitar
Ole-Henrik Moe - violin, viola
Kari Rønnekleiv - viola



Reviews:

Peter Margasak/CHIGAGO READER

Not long after I got my copy of The Island (Safe as Milk), the debut album by Norwegian guitarist Lars Myrvoll, I loaded it into a CD alarm clock--I can only wake up to Morning Edition for so long. I left it in there for a long time because it was such a nice, haunting thing to be awakened by. Months later I still don't know much about Myrvoll, except that he's mainly an improviser and that he's worked with, among others, David Stackenas, Axel Dörner, and Rafael Toral.

Myrvoll recorded the music on The Island mostly in his bedroom between 2002 and 2008, and there's a wonderful duskiness to it, rife with ambient noise--except for some of his overdubs, these 12 pieces are decidedly murky. A few superb Norwegian musicians--Klaus Ellerhausen Holm of Ballrogg on flute, Martin Taxt on tuba, Ole Henrik Moe on violin and viola--make subtle contributions to augment Myrvoll's haunting, minimal guitar playing, which somehow combines folk, Morton Feldman-style minimalism, and post-Derek Bailey tangles into a unified, gorgeous whole.

There's also no missing the influence of Loren Mazzacane Connors. Though Myrvoll's playing doesn't have any of Connors's note-bending bluesiness, his repetitive figures have a rich atmosphere, ringing with unusual harmonies, single-note runs, and leisurely arpeggios. Like Connors's best work, the pieces unfold slowly, but there's a greater structural focus; multitracking allows Myrvoll to fit together intricate, miniature little licks and note clusters in puzzlelike assemblages. Some of the pieces sound like they were recorded on tape that got wrinkled somewhere between the session and the final pressing, but the occasional dropouts and gnarled tones only cast the exquisite beauty into sharper relief. This is homemade music in the best possible sense.

Howard Martin/FOXY DIGITALIS

This collection of richly layered home recordings by Lars Myrvoll and the accompanying drawings won me over quickly. The opening wordless vocal melody pairs well with the classical guitar figures without mirroring them exactly. Each of the album's twelve tracks includes similar moments where one's expectations are slightly disrupted. None of the music here jars the listener, and yet dissonance along with unexpected timbres and rhythms keeps it from fading into the haze that surrounds the tracks. The closing moments of "Rain" foregrounds clatters that sound too dry to be droplets and ululations of a hard to place instrument, while the dissonant chords and arpeggios of the later "Light Rain" never settle or wholly resolve.

"Heartbeats (The Wait)" centers around the lowest piano notes, an unidentifiable thud, low strings, and a high guitar chord. The contrast with the more active preceding pieces lends vastness to its four minutes. Initially "The Storm" which follows seems to further the sense of brooding, but the classical guitar that dominated the opening tracks emerges from the string drones bringing palpable joy and relief. Although each piece shares the feel of the album and furthers the small-scale journey, the contrasts between them keep the pleasures of each distinct, like the almost achingly lovely melody of "September."

Only two songs extend a bit past the five minute mark. Brevity lends the album variety, and Myrvoll's pieces all seem a bit hushed but never stifled or stiff. In many ways, this collection is perfect apartment music. It fills a space larger than one's room, but there's still a closeness to it that suggests internal movement rather than outward expanses. 8/10

Tigernet.no

"A perfect soundtrack for the darkness of the world."

Textura.org

Sounding like it was recorded in some remote Scandinavian cabin using the lowest-tech gear possible, Lars Myrvoll's The Island nonetheless seduces with its mystical charm and pretty folk waltzes (in fact, all of the material was recorded in his bedroom between 2002 and 2008). His classical and steel stringed guitars are the natural focal point but guests flesh out the pieces with flute, tuba, classical guitar, violin, and viola too. The Norway-based musician comfortably adapts his style to the concept album's many moods, with some tracks mere interludes and others substantially arranged settings. Though track titles such as “Rain” and “The Silence” strongly telegraph their associative moods, and rapid strums certainly do suggest a torrential downfall in “More Rain,” other pieces move in surprising directions. “The Storm,” for example, is anything but the raging cacophony one might expect but rather an episodic setting for strings and guitars that finds the ship navigating through both tranquil and threatening waters. Likewise, one wouldn't necessarily expect “Heartbeats (The Wait)” to be the atmospheric, gloomy dirge that it is. Hypnotic flute arpeggios strengthen the already-dream-like feel of “The Picture” while a sinuous violin solo spotlight by Ole Henrik Moe Jr. significantly raises the temperature level during “The Gleaming Water (Monaco).” Also memorable are the transporting “Departure,” which wends a path from a slightly bluesy main theme to a startling descending figure, and “The Dream,” which brings the thirty-seven-minute album to a lilting close. Much of the material sounds like timeless whispers emanating from the deep recesses of the ancient forest. Tailor-made for lovers of Björn Olsson, Bo Hanson, and Popol Vuh, Myrvoll's music is just as “out-of-time”—in other words, always “in time” and never “out-of-date.”

Carl Kristian Johansen/Ballade.no

Lars Myrvoll har i noen år vært en aktør på ”downtown”-scenen i Oslo, en eksperimentvillig og åpen sirkel av kreative personer som dyrker frihet i måten å lage lyd og musikk på. Improvisasjon, støy, elektronika, samtidsmusikk, jazz, et uoversiktlig antall samarbeidsprosjekter, alt er lov, og entreprenørskap, er stikkord.

Myrvoll drev også nennsom kultivering av en liten plateetikett med navn Enligthenment, som blant annet ga ut CD-plater i 3”-format. Der har Andreas Meland én oppføring i katalogen, og det er Meland på selskapet Safe as Milk som slipper ”The Island”.

Aldous Huxley skrev i 1932 den klassiske og svært innflytelsesrike romanen ”Vidunderlige nye verden”, eller ”Brave New World” på originalspråket. Det er en slags dystopisk framstilling av en verden der menneskene forsøksvis er frarøvet vitale humane trekk, som har blitt erstattet av høyteknologi og lykkedopet soma. Dette dopet skal døyve ”uønskede” trekk i menneskenes psyke og hukommelse. Pushwagners Soft City kan ses på som en avart av Huxleys dystopi.

30 år senere skrev Huxley romanen ”The Island”. Den har jeg ingen førstehåndserfaring med selv, men denne historien omtales som et motstykke til ”Brave New World”. ”The Island” forteller om et idealsamfunn der menneskene lever i absolutt harmoni, en utopi, og handlingen i ”The Island” beskriver hvordan dette kan fungere i praksis. Dette samfunnet er også truet av naboer hvis levesett og målsetninger er basert på ganske andre verdier.

Stemningen i dette albumet strekkes mellom utopi og dystopi. Det kan være Myrvolls idé om å lage et lydteppe til Huxleys ”The Island”, og det kan være spennet mellom de to omtalte romanene som utforskes. Det er i hvert fall i en forestillingenes verden Myrvoll har landet i med dette albumet.

Via omslagskunsten gir musikken en følelse av lett surrealisme og fantasi, noe metafysisk og livsfjernt. Samtidig er låttitlene forankret i erfaringer som er vanlig for mennesket, som Rain, Heartbeat, The Storm, The Dream og Departure. Jeg har sansen for det semi-abstrakte, litt duse og ubestemmelige uttrykkslandskapet som kombinasjonen av det fjerne og det nære munner ut i med ”The Island”.

Det ligger også et alvor til grunn her. Det kan være et resultat av en refleksjon over det eksistensielle aspektet som ligger til grunn i Huxleys utopi/dystopi. Samtidig får jeg lyst til å sammenligne dette albumet med en Devendra Banhart som etter en plutselig og dyp innsikt har kollapset, stablet seg på beina, og funnet en ny retning i musikken som er enda mer melankolsk og sorgtung, enda mer nedstrippet, og enda mer lo-fi.

For til tross for mange elementer gjennom de forskjellige sporene framstår musikken på ”The Island” som enkel, bestanddelene er lette å skille fra hverandre og musikken er åpen. Som bidragsytere har Myrvoll med seg oppfinnsomme kolleger fra ”downtown”-scenen, som Ole Henrik Moe jr. Martin Taxt, Kari Rønnekleiv, Klaus Ellerhusen Holm og Solmund Nystabakk. Det er massevis av plass til å lese ”mellom linjene” her - musikken inviterer til det - og det er stemningene som står i fokus.

Det finnes også lettere kutt med spor av positivitet og optimisme, men hovedinntrykket er dyptloddende og tunge stemninger som kan sammenlignes med en drøm det tar flere døgn å bli ferdig med – en klump i magen man ikke vet hvorfor er der – et fenomen man bruker dager på å forstå.

Hvis man kan forsone seg med det tar det lang tid å gå lei av Myrvolls plate. Alt i alt vil jeg si at ”The Island” er et modig album som greier å mane fram sinnsstemninger som er forbundet med noe dypt humant. Det er ikke hver uke et slikt album slippes i Norge.

Lars Myrvoll on Myspace