Review & Video Premiere: Edena Gardens, Agar
Edena Gardens, “Veil” video premiere
[Click play above to stream the premiere of Edena Gardens’ video for “Veil.” Their new album, Agar, is out April 7 on El Paraiso Records.]
Two albums in a year’s time is a pretty quick turnaround anyhow, but Edena Gardens released their self-titled debut (review here) in late October, and Agar — the instrumental trio’s follow-up, released like its predecessor on El Paraiso — will be out less than six months later. Without knowing the recording circumstances of one and the other, it’s hard to gauge whether the returning three-piece of baritone/bass guitarist Martin Rude, drummer Jakob Skøtt and guitarist Nicklas Sørensen are actually creating that fast or if one or the other record was in the can, either the debut’s release delayed and the second album written in the interim, or the two recorded at the same time and edited into multiple sessions à la Big Scenic Nowhere, but one way or the other, Agar‘s arrival-on-heels delivers plainly the message that despite the fact that Rude and Skøtt are members of Causa Sui and related projects like London Odense Ensemble and Sørensen is accounted for in fellow Danish explorationists Papir, Edena Gardens is going to be a real band.
It was the biggest question coming out of Edena Gardens, and the answer feels all the more declarative for the short break between that and the eight songs and 46 minutes (the first was seven/41) offered in Agar, even as the material itself seems to move forward and ponder who and what Edena Gardens are going to be as a band. The answer this time is complex, whether it’s the seven-minute opener “Forst” (in English: ‘first’), which mindfully stumbles in on a drum fill and in medias res-feeling strums, taking all of six seconds — no less crucial for their brevity in setting an atmosphere of improvisation-in-the-room; a subliminally functioning ambience that reminds of communication studies in how it tells the audience where they are — to get its footing before jamming out like the day in 1994 when all the kids who had been playing grunge unanimously voted to invite Neil Young to the party, or side B counterpart “Halcyon Days,” which runs just 1:31 and is hardly more than a snippet but expressive and memorable in its floating guitar lead over Rude‘s baritone rhythm, an escapist drone filling out behind, cymbals maybe there but so gentle they’re practically static I can’t be sure if I’m imagining them or not. And I don’t just mean it’s a complex answer; ‘complex’ is who they’re going to be.
Fair enough as they shift from the lightly jazz-improv vibe that caps “Forst” into the shorter “Sombra Del Mar” with its wistful swells of floating guitar and deceptively lighthearted bounce, a contemplative meander out for one walk rhythmically and another melodically and meeting up in the echoing resonance, smoothing out for a time and then splitting off again as the drums crash with time-to-go finality at 3:42 only to keep going for a while longer behind the serene drone guitar, complementing in a way that feels organically off the cuff. Closing side A is Agar‘s longest track, the 12:31 “Veil” (premiering above), which starts with foreboding drums and near-Western swagger of strum in its first minute-plus, Rude and Skøtt reminding a bit of Earth (plus keys) before Sørensen‘s forward higher frequencies stretch out over top.
“Veil” wants to roll, and so it does as it cycles through, Sørensen diving into a more decisive ‘lead’ around three and half minutes in as they build subtly amid hypnotic repetition, the part gradually changing in the midsection — I’m not sure if that’s bass or baritone guitar, but if you’ve got headphones you can hear the strings vibrate — to emerge circa the seven-minute mark in a place adjacent to but different from where it started, still riding that initial groove. At 8:38, Skøtt turns to the ride cymbal and that seems to signal a pickup in energy for all three as “Veil” winds toward a crescendo of reshaping, finding a way toward heavy rock solo-topped nod without giving up the peaceful vibe in service to volume without reason, with a crash and burst of amp noise as if to say, “sorry this jam has exploded, please try another.” So it goes with a band brave enough to be honest about who they are as players and creators. Sometimes a thing just needs to end, and the sense that “Veil” was edited to finish like that is part of Edena Gardens‘ aesthetic; the studio itself becoming another instrument in the realization of the songs.
The aforementioned and duly sentimental “Halcyon Days” follows to softly launch a procession of shorter pieces en route to the near-10-minute “Crescent Helix” at Agar‘s conclusion. “Dreich” follows “Halcyon Days” with a willful-feeling contrast in purpose, starting wholly exploratory with cymbal wash and melodic swell before working into a more grounded movement of subdued baritone and (regular ol’) guitar, doppler keyboard or synth or guitar effects or whatever that is going by at steady intervals as the trio figure out the direction in real-time, Skøtt again telling all when to bring it down. Toms, keys and especially floating, noodling guitar unfurl themselves across the two minutes of “Ascender,” some backwards soloing tucked away near the end but still leaving room for residual echoes to fade; an inhale, perhaps, before the deeper dive into the penultimate “Montezuma” and “Crescent Helix.”
In its underlying low-frequency strum, loose ’90s nostalgia and aspects of drone rock, “Montezuma” feels like kin to “Veil” and even “Halcyon Days,” and comes across somewhat as a combination of the two, while its central movement feels built off Chris Isaak‘s “Wicked Game” and is topped by a more sweeping solo. Edena Gardens aren’t so hook-minded, necessarily, but Agar has a number of standout moments and Sørensen crafts another as the record makes its way into its last section, a long note held at 4:25 like a howl before cycling through again to end “Montezuma” in appropriately thoughtful fashion before “Crescent Helix” announces its arrival with an immediate reorientation of focus on free jazz that feels like an extension almost of the setting-forth that began “Forst.”
Clocking in at 9:55, “Crescent Helix” has room to spread out, and is lush without being overbaked as it constructs and explores the space in which it resides, never quite completely giving up the bent-note skronk of its introduction even as it draws the multiple sides of Edena Gardens‘ approach together, fluidly jamming from the relative cacophony into a midpoint cymbal wash that’s ’70s sentimental in the guitar beneath creating an oddball languid motion, a melting of images still being drawn. The drums transition into more active toms before about 7:30, and Rude and Sørensen follow shortly thereafter, the whole band almost reluctantly hitting an apex before a gently winding final few measures close, a bit of hum and last cymbal taps end, either a tom thud or pedal clicking off calling back once more to the natural spirit in which Agar commenced, or, at very least, keeping in tune with the theme.
Where the self-titled was more tentative in its personality, Agar comes across sure-footed in the forward progressive steps it finds Edena Gardens taking. And while it signals clearly (with a universe of infinite possibilities as a caveat) that they’re going to keep the project going, it also asks more questions about what their ultimate stylistic reach is going to be. Agar rests well alongside some of El Paraiso‘s more psych-jazz offerings, but it’s not just that and it’s not just rock and roll either, and that’s part of what makes it exciting to hear, since by avoiding the trap of one thing or another, Edena Gardens invariably become themselves. To what it will lead, and when, are intriguing thoughts, but in just a matter of months, Edena Gardens have traced a path that is thoroughly their own and begun to survey the surroundings. One hopes that, if and when they continue with studio work, they can keep the sincerity that is so much a part of Agar along with the expanding scope at the core of their methods.
Edena Gardens, “Sombra Del Mar” official video
El Paraiso Records on Instagram
El Paraiso Records on Facebook
Tags: Agar, Copenhagen, Denmark, Edena Gardens, Edena Gardens Agar, El Paraiso Records
