Arkiv för mars 2010

This is a review we got on the big Norwegian music site Groove.no. Since the text is so long we havent had the time to translate it all – we used the google translation tool instead, and this isnt always that accurate. We also left out a part in the beginning that google couldnt translate – we’ll see if we, when we get some spare time, can translate that part.

Primeval forest
Paganus, Kalla

Rated 6/7, ”Groovissimo of the week”

By Dag Erik Asbjørnsen

[…]
Paganus’ chieftain ideologist Johannes Söderqvist  is a energetic supporter of the stand point that suggests that we should once again array ourselves in  forest fur and not break a continuity that has lasted thousands of years. Real werewolves abruptly entered history during the migration period in the Iron Age. These where the tribes that cultivated Fenrir, violence, pain, evil[-ness] and a caricature of the warrior ideal to the, and defied the forces in the world that keeps us all together in a kind of balance. They created an eternal balance of terror [collateral damage?], in which no man can say what is good or bad, but at best, learn about the strong and weak forces and which are opposites to each other. Lack of respect for “the whole” makes man blind and may cause whole civilizations to go crashing down the abyss – though Ragnarok becomes the midwife of a new world where there is no evil, suffering or toil. Until the new people again brings these elements into the world, of course!

Dual libertarianitys’ two ditches leading man into the blind worship (the total dissolution of the ego) or blind evil (total selfishness), fanaticism is as strong on both sides and they attract each other relentlessly in the same way as opposite-charged elementary particles. These people follow only their fate and can not be resolved from their monotheistic, mental slavery before the moment where matter meets anti-matter and energy delivered. The big religions of the world is however not without a glance at “the whole”. I am thinking particularly of the dialectic expressed through Zen-buddhism’ countless koan’s (dialogues or questions between master and student), for example: Two hands are clapping, and it will sound. How is the sound of one hand? Or: Without thinking of good or evil, tell me how was your original face before your mother and father were born.

So it is that it is our conscious choice that counts, we are free to make our clumsy attempts to understand the world around us – and every action we choose to do, get their consequence, perhaps hundreds of years into the future a whole elsewhere in the world or the universe. We have ground to loan a few decades before we go somewhere else some call ”nowhere”, the second ”heaven”, with as little material wealth that we took with us into life. We are as cells in a larger organism, where the intention is to build larger network through our daily work, through communication with others. We exude an energy of signals and codes to the environment and trained senses will feel the reflection back and the impact on ourselves. We are all one.

In today’s world dominated by digital shorts and urban superstition, many people become lost in the conspiracy theory’s most twisted mazes. Lies and truth be confused more and more often, because people forget that the search for truth requires something other than ”cut and paste”, what is required is the interaction and respectful interaction with the myriad of forces and opinions around us. Even in Norse times, it was a goal to behave the most moral and courtly (recorded in Snorri Håvamål). We search the day after to do anything about the digital black and white in the form of zeros and one in an organic, living universe in which the study of plasma physics and electromagnetic forces are better able to keep us in place in elliptical orbits, circling around the existence unsolvable, existential, paradoxical and eternal questions.

, That is, this is my own observations and interpretations in light of the music of Paganus. Surely there is at least that group are united in the desire for a better time, a better world and a message that the Earth is sacred, in a certain sense of the word. The name ”paganus” have no rest with so-called pagan religions, but is the Latin word for an inhabitant of the countryside. Kalla is the sequel to Rock Forest, which won in 2007 and expresses an idea of listening for the call from the wilderness, and later recall.

The music is as before, down to earth, honest and straightforward, without pompous ornament in the direction of Wagner’s ghosts and unnecessary tidsforvrengninger in the rhythm department. And honesty is so visible in an industry, or indeed a world, full of promise lies and assumed intentions. It is like Black Sabbath stripped of artificial black color, Lindisfarne on rehab with svagdricka and Nordic gloom or Jethro Tull in the forest to dig for Nordic forkultur. Here is the heavy riffs in everyday clothes with guitars, fiddle and mando liner in compositions that give honor to a long and rich tradition of Swedish folk rock.

This is an album that holds angst and frustration, where the first message is simply ”I am angry. I’m so fucking angry”, as opposed to extremist black-metal-iacs who read Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount backwards with stone crushing voice, while the six feet tall, inverted crosses forged in Mount Doom’ flames shakes loose from their mounts on the walls and smashed over the audience as the blood flows, whilst the ecstasy among the survivors reaches new heights. It is possible to get the message  that the world is on the beaten track through without burning churches, schools and synagogues in a storm of hatred. Paganus keeps it all on a more allegorical level with stories like “The Wild Laughter” and “The Man in the Stream”. And “The Forest Remembers” new ages …

Kalla is simply a brilliant record with dynamic width in the sound, yet with distinctive musical expressions and a – when it comes to references within the rock community – unique philosophical conviction behind it all.

This comes from a heart that beats for the black-green virgin forests, and an exploitation of nature in harmony with its tolerance limits.

(Before u read this one u might like to know that ‘Brunskog’ is the name of the area where Johannes live and that ‘Stureplan’ is a very hip -brats- area in Swedens capital Stockholm).

DALADEMOKRATEN (Newspaper)

Forest Rock from Brunskog.

Forest Rock, a new concept in Swedish music. It was actually Paganus that created this concept when their first album, which was named ForestRock, came out. Forest Rock should not be confused with Hillbilly rock, which is something completely different. Forest Rock should also be the sub genre used to describe this new album. Though Kalla is more, a cry from the wilderness (-ish), or at least the countryside.
Paganus has been compared to Jethro Tull and it is not entirely wrong, but there is something more Swedish to the mix of folk music and rock. And somewhere behind all that Brunskog is almost visible.
This is political music, not party political but more Mother Earth-type of politics. The texts are accompanied by the grooviest music you can imgaine.
Johannes Söderqvist is the singer, rhythm guitarist and the one who write the songs. Naturally he lives in the middle of the woods, outside Brunskog, and is a bit of a self-sufficiency guy. It is left-wing, it is green party, but still not attached to a party… rather a bit of green wave…. no not that either… it is a call to take care of the planet we share. A call that is above the governmental and political bickering.
It should be added that the members of Paganus can play. You’ll meet a drummer who’ve played with the Sinfonic Orchestra of Wermland and a violinist who is an award winning folk music fiddler. And yes, they are both girls – if that is specially interesting. Paganus have something to say, but also is entertaining.
Regarding Paganus first CD it has been said to be the “first organic rock album” and that the band is on “a crusade for the countryside”. With Kalla the band walks a new path, but leading in the same direction, and it is clear that Brunskog provides with a totally different input than Stureplan.

- Lennart Götesson