Posted in Reviews on December 20th, 2023 by JJ Koczan
When it was announced by El Paraiso Records earlier this Fall, it was suggested that Dens might be the final release from Danish instrumentalist trio Edena Gardens, who feature in their ranks drummer Jakob Skøtt and bassist/baritone guitarist Martin Rude and Nicklas Sørensen of Papir. The project is one of a slew in the orbit of Causa Sui and El Paraiso, which has become an ecosystem of sometimes-jazzy psych and heavy psych, with exploration as a core value uniting the works released under its banner no less than the themed layouts of the albums being issued.
That said, Edena Gardens has stood out both for quick turnarounds — their self-titled debut (review here) came out in Oct. 2022, and they followed with Agar (review here) earlier this year and still had room to put out the Live Momentum (review here) concert-capture LP, which if this is really it for them one will be glad to have for the documentation — and Dens brings seven pieces spread gracefully across 47 minutes brimming with mellow-psych meander. In Edena Gardens and in his own band, Sørensen has demonstrated again and again an ability to keep solid footing in a molten and shifting context, and whether it’s the brief drone-laced pastoral drift of “Vini’s Lament” (titled in honor of Vini Reilly of The Durutti Column) or the way “Morgensol” takes a conceptual cue from raga and sets itself not toward conveying the energy of the day but the slow-motion manner in which the sun hoists itself above the horizon.
If the first album was Eden — and it wasn’t at the time, but we’re all friends here, you and I, and we’re just talking, and maybe sometimes you want to make a revision so you can someday do a special 4LP box set or some such — and the second Agar, then Dens is the missing syllable to complete the band’s name spelled across their titles: EdenAgarDens. As the third in a maybe-trilogy, then, its shimmering resonance is leant that much more gravitas, but gravity doesn’t really apply here. “Morgensol” runs nine minutes long and is serene throughout, and while the organ and more active drumming in the crescendo of the 14-minute penultimate cut “Sienita” fuels a movement that is vibrant and energetic, Edena Gardens aren’t aiming for impact so much as ambience in terms of the general balance of what they do. Through opener “Wald” (‘forest,’ in Danish) and breeze that seems to blow “Dusted” along its light tumble, seeming to build some tension around three minutes in but resisting the impulse to break out volume-wise, the trio hypnotize in a way that feels multi-tiered, like they’re in it as much as the listener — the very epitome of ‘dug in’ — but if they ever actually get lost at any point, I can’t find where.
CausaSui‘s Jonas Munk engineered the recording and Skøtt produced — careful hands, is what that tells you — and it’s pretty clear there’s been some level of editing done, which is to say there are fades in and out and pieces like “Vini’s Lament” or the slightly-fuzzier-in-its-leads “An Uaimh Bhinn” (referencing a cave in Scotland) that separates “Morgensol” and “Sienita” were likely carved out of larger improvisations, whereas “Sienita,” reportedly, is the front-to-back live jam with only the aforementioned organ overdubbed.
It’s academic, ultimately, to most who will take on Dens or any other of Edena Gardens‘ output past or right-timeline future, but not at all irrelevant to the vibe, which it doesn’t take long to figure out is high on the priority list here, generally speaking. “Sienita,” named for a type of volcanic rock, unfolds with casual wistfulness early, the drums at a slow march, but takes off gradually as it goes and builds to a first head before the halfway point and recedes again to let the second build start from the ground as it meanders into a payoff that feels like it’s maybe speaking to more than just this record but the cycle of three of which this is part.
And maybe, if Edena Gardens do manage to put a batch of jams/songs-carved-therefrom together after Dens it will inherently feel different just because of some imaginary border between what’s their third and fourth full-lengths. I don’t know and when you’re locked into “Sienita,” it hardly matters. It is a worthy moment for mindful hearing, not the least because it isn’t perfect and isn’t trying to convince anyone it is. It is simply that 14 minutes of playing, represented.
Which of course is nothing so simple. Involved in that, and one might argue emphasized here in terms of the position ahead of closer “Dawn Daydreams,” which is nine minutes shorter than “Sienita” and the second inclusion to reference sunrise behind “Morgensol,” is the chemistry shared between Rude and Skøtt and Sørensen and the organic nature of the jam itself. It’s heady stuff, and one must perhaps be willing to grant that jazz- and krautrock-informed light-touch psychedelic instrumentals might not be a universal appeal — rest assured, it’s the universe’s problem — but Edena Gardens in about the span of a year went from being nothing to having an identifiable sonic persona distinct from both Causa Sui and Papir, the two acts from whom its membership draws.
One such record was not a minor achievement. Two felt like a bonus. The live record, well shit, if they’re gonna be on stage, then yeah. And this? I don’t want to call it a victory lap, because it’s too classy to rub your face in its own achievement, but maybe a celebration of the core collab that makes it up, at least, or a potential project sendoff — and nobody’s saying ‘never again’ here to start with — as well as a completion to the arc that was set out by the band. At the very, very least, it is a collection of thoughtful, malleable and immersive tracks put together by artists whose joy for the process(es) of its making resonates as clearly as Sørensen‘s lead lines in the dappled shimmer of “Wald.” If it’s to be a culmination, then yes, it is.
Posted in Whathaveyou on October 25th, 2023 by JJ Koczan
I like that Edena Gardens basically go, “Yeah, maybe this’ll be the last record or maybe not.” If I’d already put out a self-titled debut (review here) and the follow-up, Agar (review here) and put together a third LP for release — that’s Dens, out Dec. 1 as per the headline above — between 2022 and 2023, I might be somewhat cautious too. If they’re thinking of these three records as a trilogy — they might want to rename the first one Eden for subsequent pressings if they’re using the four-letter-words-from-the-band’s-name as a uniting theme — that’s fine, but they’ve already also done a live album (review here), so they’re not necessarily limited by anything other than what they themselves impose.
Dens is the third Edena Gardens LP. If it’s the last one, well, the collaborative outfit formed by Jakob Skøtt (drums) and Martin Rude (baritone and bass guitar) of Causa Sui and Papir guitarist Nicklas Sørensen didn’t owe anyone anything when they started and they certainly don’t now. If it’s not the last one, and maybe a fourth surfaces sometime in the vast unknowable future, be it six months, six years or whatever, I have no doubt the explorations will continue to resonate as they have through their efforts to-date.
“Veil” in the video below comes from Agar. I haven’t found any a/v from Dens yet but I’m sure both that and preorders are coming. El Paraiso Records knows what’s up, so keep an eye out.
From the PR wire:
Edena Gardens: Dens
Members of Papir & Causa Sui finalise Edena Gardens trilogy.
Formats: CD/LP (600 copies) / Digital Download Release date: December 1st, 2023
True to El Paraiso fashion, Dens concludes a trilogy of albums, aptly spelling out the last third of the group’s name. And true to form, the band turns inwards rather than outwards, drawing on deep shades of ambient, slowcore, and the ghost of Mark Hollis. While maintaining their psychedelic edge, the trio weaves the lines between genres in a way that’s becoming a signature of its own. Never in a hurry, but always moving somewhere.
Causa Sui drummer Jakob Skøtt & Martin Rude’s bass and baritone guitar lay out a robust yet fleeting foundation. Papir’s Nicklas Sørensen’s glistening guitar lines never felt more free and explorative. While The Durutti Column tribute Vini’s Lament is drenched in nostalgia, a cut like Morgensol (Morning Sun in Danish) explodes in Popol Vuh-esque gloomy euphoria.
Engineered by Jonas Munk & produced by Jakob Skøtt, the album culls hours of free improvisation into a coherent size. Seamless edits and studio wizardry enhance the feeling of an almost narrative nature as the album progresses. Invoking anything from a crackling campfire, rattling bones, and the singing of sand dunes. The culmination lies in the 14-minute track Sienita. A fully formed blistering improvisation, abandoning any studio trickery, besides a singly dubbed organ, rising and falling like the tide.
Is Dens the final chapter of Edena Gardens? Who knows, and who cares… Edena Gardens is all about the present anyway.
I’m drinking coffee out of a different mug today. It may not surprise you to learn that I’m particular about that kind of thing. I have two mugs — one from Baltimore, one from Salem, Mass. — that are the same. They are huge, blue and black, and they curve slightly inward at the top. They can hold half of a 10-cup pot of coffee. I use one of them per day for a pot in the morning.
Not today. The Pecan gifted me a Mr. Spock mug — he’s in his dress uniform, so it’s likely based on the TOS episode ‘Journey to Babel,’ where we meet his parents for the first (our time) time — and it’s smaller and lighter in the hand, will require an extra trip up to the kitchen to finish the pot, but I think she’ll be glad to see me use it, and maybe that’ll help her get a decent start to the day in a bit when she comes downstairs.
Today’s the last day for this week of QR, but we dive back in on Monday and Tuesday to close out. Hope you find something you dig, and if I don’t catch you at the closeout post for the week, have a great weekend.
Quarterly Review #41-50:
Motorpsycho, Yay!
Long-running and prolific Norwegian prog rockers Motorpsycho have proven time and again their stylistic malleability across their north-of-100-strong catalog of releases, and comprised of 10 tracks running 42 minutes of acoustic-led-but-still-lushly-arranged, melodic and sometimes folkish craft. If you ever needed an argument that Motorpsycho could have been writing simplified, ultra-accessible, soundtrack-to-your-summer fare — and I’m not sure you have — Yay! provides that, with a classic feel in the harmonies of “Sentinels” and “Dank State,” though the lyrics in that last cut and in pieces like the leadoff “Cold & Bored,” the later isolated strummer “Real Again (Norway Shrugs and Stays at Home)” and in the lost-love-themed “Loch Meaninglessness and the Mull of Dull” have a cynical current to their framing contrasts that the outwardly pretty face lent to it by the Paul Simon-style lead vocals from Bent Sæther (also guitar, mandolin, omnichord here and more elsewhere). If the record is a gimme for an audience looking for a more earthbound Motorpsycho, then the arrival of the 7:46 “Hotel Daedalus” is where they give a nod to the heavier heads in their fanbase, with one of several guest spots from Reine Fiske (Dungen, Träden, etc.) and a shift in the balance between electric and acoustic guitar and synth at the foreground. Standout as that is, it’s also consistent with the spirit of Yay! more generally, which is built to be more complex in emotion than it presents on its face, and the work of masters, whether they’re writing longform prog epics or sweet closer “The Rapture,” which paints the change of seasons through an image of unmelted leftover snow “sulking in the shade.” One should expect no less than that kind of reach and attention to expression, and one should never engage Motorpsycho with expectations beyond that.
“Apollo,” which was the first single released by Severed Satellites, opens the Baltimore instrumentalists’ first EP, Aphelion, as well, its uptempo blues-informed groove an enticing beginning before “Lost Transmissions” digs further into riffer nod. With five tracks running 27 minutes, Severed Satellites — guitarist Matt Naas, keyboardist Dave Drell, bassist Adam Heinzmann and drummer Chuck Dukehart, the latter two both of heavy rockers Foghound, among others — offer material that’s built out of jamming but that is not itself the jam. Songs, in other words. Recorded by Noel Mueller at Tiny Castle Studio, the EP proves solid through “Lost Transmissions” and the bassier “Hurtling Toward Oblivion” with its ending comedown leading into the coursing keyboard waveform at the start of “Breaking Free From Orbit,” which is the longest inclusion at 7:21 and uses most of that extra time in the intro, building afterward toward a ’70s strutting apex that puts energy ahead of largesse before the keys lead the way out in the two-minute outro “Reaching Aphelion.” Through the variety in the material, Severed Satellites showcase a persona that knows what it’s about and presents that fluidly to the listener with a minimum of indulgence. A rousing start.
The collaboration between baritone/bass guitarist Martin Rude, drummer Jakob Skøtt, both also of Danish psych-jazz and psych-as-jazz explorers Causa Sui, and guitarist Nicklas Sørensen of molten-but-mellow jammers Papir, Edena Gardens issue their first and perhaps not last live album in Live Momentum, a three-song set taped at Jaiyede Jazz Festival — their first onstage appearance — in 2022 and pressed concurrent to the second Edena Gardens studio full-length, Agar (review here) while still not so far removed from their 2022 self-titled debut (review here). “Veil” from the sophomore LP opens, with a thicker guitar sound and more active delivery from the stage, a heavier presence in the guitar early on, hinting at Link Wray and sounding clear enough that the applause at the end is a surprise. Taken from the self-titled, “Now Here Nowhere” is more soothing and post-rocking in its languidity — also shorter at seven minutes — an active but not overbearing jazz fusion, while side B’s 17-minute “Live Momentum” would seem to be the occasion for the release. Exploratory at the start, it settles into a groove that’s outright bombastic in comparison to the other two tracks, brings down the jam and pushes it out, growing in volume again late for a slow, howling finish. What should be a no-brainer to those who’ve heard the band, Live Momentum portrays a side of Edena Gardens that their ‘proper’ albums — which is also where new listeners should begin — hasn’t yet shown, which is no doubt why it was issued to start with. Only fortunate.
Following up 2022’s What Lies Beneath (review here) and the intervening covers collection, Cover Ups, and the Crack the Lock EP, prolific Pennsylvania heavy rock outfit Delco Detention, led by the son/father duo of Tyler and Adam Pomerantz return with their Come and Get It! is suitably exclamatory fashion. The nine-track collection is headlined by a guest guitar spot from Earthless‘ Isaiah Mitchell on “Earthless Delco” near the album’s middle, but stop-bys from familiar parties like Kevin McNamara and Mike DiDonato of The Age of Truth and Jared Collins of Mississippi Bones, among others, assure diversity in the material around the foundation of groovy heavy rock. Clutch remain a strong influence — and the record finishes with a take on “I Have the Body of John Wilkes Booth” — but the fuzzy four minutes of the penultimate “Rock and Roll God” and the swing in opener “Domagoj Simek Told Me Quitters Never Smoke” continue to show the band’s growth in refining their songwriting process and aligning the right performers with the right songs, which they do.
The second full-length from Montana heavy-funk shenanigans purveyors The Gray Goo, Circus Nightmare, sounds like there’s a story to go along with every song, whether it’s the tale of “Nightstocker” no doubt based on a 24-hour grocery store, or the smoke-weed-now anthem “Pipe Hitter” that so purposefully and blatantly takes on Sleep‘s “Dragonaut,” or even the interlude “Cerulean” with its backward wisps of guitar leading into the dreamy-Ween-esque, Beatles-reference-dropping “Cosmic Sea,” or the Primus-informed absurdity of “Alligator Bundee,” which leads off, and the garage punk that caps in “Out of Sight (Out of Mind).” Equal parts brilliant and dopey, “BEP” is a brief delve into surf-toned weirdness while “Wizards of the Mountain” pays off the basement doom of “Pipe Hitter” just before with its raw-captured slowdown, organ included in its post-midpoint creep and “Cumbia de Montana” is perhaps more dub than South American-style mountain jamming — though there’s a flute — but if you want to draw a line and tell me where one ends and another starts, I won’t argue. Bottom line is that after an encouraging start in last year’s 1943 (review here), The Gray Goo are more sure of themselves and more sure of the planet’s ridiculousness. May they long remain so certain and productive. Heavy rock needs more oddballs.
It’s like they packed it with extra nasty. The seven-song/27-minute Shit Hexis is the debut offering from Saarbrücken, Germany’s Shit Hexis, and it stabs, it scathes, it skin-peels and not in the refreshing way. Flaying extreme sludge riffs presented with the cavernous echo and murky purposes of black metal, it is a filthy sound but not completely un-cosmic as “Latrine Odins” feedsback and lumbers through its 92 seconds, or “Erde” drone-plods at terrifying proportion. On paper, Shit Hexis share a mindset with the likes of Come to Grief or even earlier Yatra in bringing together tonal weight with aesthetics born out of the more extreme ends of heavy metal, but their sharp angles, harsh tones and the echoing rasp of “Le Mort Saisit le Vif” are their own. Not that fucking matters, because when you’re this disaffected you probably don’t give a shit about originality either. But as their first release of any kind, even less than a half-hour of exposure seems likely to cause a reaction, and if you’re ever somewhere that you need people not to be, the misanthropic, loathing-born gurgling of “Mkwekm” should do the trick in clearing a room. This, of course, is as the duo of guitarist/vocalist Mo and drummer Pat designed it to be, and so, wretched as it is, their self-titled can only be called a success. But what a vision thereof.
That Sacramento, California, two-piece Oromet — guitarist/vocalist/layout specialist Dan Aguilar and drummer/bassist/synthesist/backing vocalist/engineer Patrick Hills — have a pedigree between them that shares time in Occlith accounts for some of the unity of intent on the grandly-unfolding death-doom outfit’s self-titled three-song Transylvanian Recordings debut full-length. Side A is dedicated solely to the opener/longest track (immediate points) “Familiar Spirits” (22:00), which quiets down near the finish to end in a contemplative/reflective drone, and earlier positions Oromet among the likes of Dream Undending or Bell Witch in an increasingly prevalent, yet-untagged mournful subset of death-doom. “Diluvium” (11:31) and “Alpenglow” (10:07) follow suit, the former basking in the beauty in its own darkness and sounding duly astounded as it pounds its way toward a sudden stop to let the residual frequencies swell before carrying into the latter, which is gloriously tortured for its first six minutes and comes apart slowly thereafter, having found a place to dwell in the melodic aftermath. Crushing spiritually even as it reaffirms the validity of that pain, it is an affecting listening experience that can be overwhelming at points, but its extremity never feels superfluous or disconnected from the sorrowful emotionality of the songs themselves.
Each of the four tracks of Le Mur‘s fourth record, Keep Your Fear Away From Me, corresponds to a place in time and point of view. That is, we start in the past with 15-minute leadoff “…The Past Will Be Perfect…” — and please note that the band’s name is also stylized all-caps where album and song titles are all-lowercase — moving through “Today is the Day/The Beauty of Now” (9:27) in the present and “Another Life/Burning the Tree/I See You” (11:19) confirming the subjectivity of one’s experience of self and the world, and closer “…For the Puzzles of the Future.” (12:12) finishing the train of thought by looking at the present from a time to come. Samples peppered throughout add to the otherwise mostly instrumental proceedings, focused on flow and at least semi-improvised, and horns on the opener/longest cut (immediate points) sets a jazzy mindset that holds even as “Another Life/Burning the Tree/I See You” forays through its three-stage journey, starting with a shimmy before growing ever-so-slightly funky in the middle and finishing acoustic, while the (electric) guitar on “…For the Puzzles of the Future.” seems to have saved its letting loose for the final jam, emerging out of the keyboardy intro and sample to top a raucous, fun finish.
Pushing through sax-laced, dug-in space jamming, Tunisia’s 10-20 Project reportedly recorded Snakes Go Dark to Soak in the Sun during the pandemic lockdown, perhaps in a bid just to do anything during July 2020. Removed from that circumstance, the work of the core duo of guitarist Marwen Lazaar and bassist Dhia Eddine Mejrissi as well as a few friends — drummer Manef Zoghlemi, saxophonist Ghassen Abdelghani and Mohammed Barsaoui on didgeridoo — present a three-track suite that oozes between liquid and vaporous states of matter across “Chutney I” (25:06), “Chutney II” (14:32) and “Chutney III” (13:00), which may or may not have actually been carved out of the same extended jam. From the interweaving of the sax alongside the guitar in the mix of the opener through the hand-drumming in the middle cut and “Chutney III” picking up with an active rhythm after the two pieces prior took their time in building quietly, plus some odd vocalizations included for good measure, the 52-minute outing gets its character from the exploratory meld in their arrangements and the loose nature with which they seem to approach composition generally. It is not a challenge to be entranced by Snakes Go Dark to Soak in the Sun, as even 10-20 Project seem to have been during its making.
If one assumes that “Side A” (19:58) and “Side B” (20:01) of Landing‘s are the edited-down versions of what appeared as part of the Connecticut ambient psych troupe’s Bandcamp ‘Subscriber Series Collection 02’ as “Motionless I-III” (29:56) and “Motionless IV-VI” (27:18), then perhaps yes, the Sulatron Records-issued Motionless I-VI has been markedly altered to accommodate the LP format. The (relatively) concise presentation, however, does little to undercut either the floating cosmic acoustics and drones about halfway through the first side or the pastoral flight taken in “Side B” before the last drone seems to devour the concept with especially cinematic drama. Whereas when there are drums in “Side A” the mood is more krautrock or traditional space rock, the second stretch of Motionless I-VI is more radical in its changes while still being gentle in its corner turning from one to the next, as heard with the arrival of the electric guitar that fades in at around six and a half minutes and merrily chugs through the brightly-lit serenity of what might’ve at some point been “Motionless V” and here is soon engulfed in a gradual fade that brings forward the already-mentioned drone. There’s more going on under the surface than at it — and that dimension of mix is crucial to Landing‘s methodology — but Motionless I-VI urges the listener to appreciate each element in its place, and is best heard doing that.
All of the music included in today’s episode of The Obelisk Show is new unless otherwise noted. There was some fresh-out stuff I knew I wanted to put in — REZN, Black Helium, Child, Edena Gardens, Santo Rostro, etc. — and then I kind of started digging back a little, and with the space of a year between went back to dig a few tracks out of 2021, the Thermic Boogie song from 2020, and so on, all with the semi-conscious aim of exploring the idea of what it means when one thinks of a band being ‘dug in.’
In the voice tracks, clever soul that I am, I call it “digging in to being dug in.” It’s not a special episode, really — apart from the odd deep-dive or memorial, getting to play new music someone might not’ve heard on a platform like Gimme Metal is pretty special already, as far as I’m concerned — but kind of an underlying semi-theme. At very least, something that was in my head when I put the playlist together.
So with the back and forth of new and old(er) material and longer songs generally, it’s a different episode for sure than the last one, but I wanted to see how this went and how it felt really picking tracks that unfold in their own way, letting them do that. I don’t know if it’ll work or not — if the chat is dead and nobody’s listening, I’ll have my answer — but it’s a little bit of an experiment on my end and I’m grateful for the opportunity to conduct it.
Thanks if you listen. Thanks for reading. Thanks in general. Your support is appreciated. I’m a real human being and it means something to me, genuinely.
The Obelisk Show airs 5PM Eastern today on the Gimme app or at: http://gimmemetal.com.
Full playlist:
The Obelisk Show – 03.17.23 (VT = voice track)
E-L-R
Forêt
Vexier (2022)
Santo Rostro
Matriz
Después no habrá nada
REZN
Reversal
Solace
VT
Thermic Boogie
A Herdhead
Sheer Madness (2020)
Child
Coming Up Trumps
Soul Murder
The Buzzards of Fuzz
Mostly Harmless
The Buzzards of Fuzz (2021)
Edena Gardens
Veil
Agar
Genghis Tron
Dream Weapon
Dream Weapon (2021)
Sermon
Golden
Of Golden Verse
Black Helium
Another Heaven
Um
VT
Witch Ripper
Everlasting in Retrograde Pts. 1 & 2
The Flight After the Fall
King Buffalo
Firmament
Regenerator (2022)
The Obelisk Show on Gimme Metal airs every Friday 5PM Eastern, with replays Sunday at 7PM Eastern. Next new episode is March 31 (subject to change). Thanks for listening if you do.
[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.
Posted in Bootleg Theater on February 24th, 2023 by JJ Koczan
El Paraiso Records posted the above image the other day on the ol’ social medias, and heck if it wasn’t an effective teaser. Sure, any El Paraiso release is going to be something at the very least worth checking out — and that is a layer of anticipation inherently — but those rich tones of the cover art, add intrigue as well.
A couple days later, the news is good as Edena Gardens — the Danish instrumental three-piece comprised of Jakob Skøtt and Martin Rude of Causa Sui and Nicklas Sørensen of Papir — unveil a video for the new song “Sombra Del Mar” and announce that their second full-length, Agar, will be released April 7 on El Paraiso. Oh, and there’s a live album coming too, as if to get the “hey we’re an actual band” point across that much clearer.
I don’t think anyone would’ve been surprised or even held it against them if it was a while before they followed up last year’s stunning self-titled debut (review here), but you won’t hear me complain about the quick turnaround either. “Sombra Del Mar” is a dream, perhaps given to some of the stoner folk vibes discussed in the announcement copy below but sweetly melodic and boasting some fascinating intricacy between the guitar and lower end (may be baritone guitar, I don’t know) progression. Easy vibe to get into, and I have a hard time imagining you won’t if you do.
So hey, here’s something awesome that I didn’t know existed yesterday. And I’m glad they turned out to be a real band — their record was pretty well received, which is always nice — and are doing cool stuff like playing Esbjerg Fuzztival in May and putting out new albums. That’s pretty right on.
Enjoy:
Edena Gardens, “Sombra Del Mar” official video
First single off their 2nd album, Agar, out on El Paraiso Records April 7th, 2023.
On their 2nd album, Edena Gardens manifests itself as a permanent fixture in the El Paraiso catalogue.
Edena Gardens could have flickered and disappeared in true El Paraiso fashion with a single session album, but the trio emerges with both a new studio album as well as a live album (Live Momentum). It’s part of the band’s DNA: it contains multitudes. There’s always a variation or open path, shifting with ease from heady cosmic stoner folk-vibes, to the scorched earth of 12-minute centrepiece The Veil. Halcyon Days opens up a panoramic interlude of beautiful analogue warmth, while closer Crescent Helix opens in full free-jazz mode, only to travel into an endless crescendo of alt. rock proportions rarely found on this side of the 90’s.
Somehow, Edena Gardens combines the sum of its multifaceted parts in a unified way, Perhaps due to Causa Sui drummer Jakob Skøtt’s transparent edits and layered treatments. Or perhaps the trio’s level of experience and joy of playing simply connects whatever direction they pursue – Nicklas Sørensen of Papir’s glistering guitar lines, backed up by Martin Rude’s rumbling Baritone guitar strums or solid basslines. It’s an album that showcases not only the spontaneous paths taken but also the vast well of ideas or sounds only implied or briefly touched upon, creating an aggregation of sounds just out of reach.
Posted in Whathaveyou on February 2nd, 2023 by JJ Koczan
This is a good way to spend a couple of nights in Denmark. Hot damn. I missed I think, wait, let me check, yes, all of the batch announcements for Esbjerg Fuzztival 2023 due, I assume, to the whims of the algorithm, but when it finally occurred to me to check in on the fest precisely because I hadn’t seen anything about it, well, there was the full damn lineup waiting for me.
And it’s looking sharp, as well. There isn’t one band on this bill I wouldn’t want to see, from Nebula and Greenleaf to Slowjoint and Vestjysk Ørken. Not a clunker in the bunch. And hell, I’ve never seen Clouds Taste Satanic and they’re from New York, so catching them in Denmark would be a hell of a way to see them for a first time. And Ecstatic Vision, High Desert Queen, Edena Gardens, Kryptograf, getting to check Causa Sui off my all-time must-see list? Yeah. Sounds fucking amazing, actually. Throw in Kanaan, Valley of the Sun and oh, say, Deathchant, and you’ve got yourself a deal. I’m not trying to be glib when I say this, but it looks like a lovely time.
I pieced the below together out of the aforementioned posts I missed, so if it reads clunky or they come off as excessively proud, perhaps, that’s why. Here you go:
Complete lineup for Fuzztival ’23!
Who are you most excited to see this year!?
Get your tickets in now!
Fuzztival are PROUD to announce our Friday night headliner NEBULA, bringing the desert to Denmark! ECSTATIC VISION, VALLEY of THE SUN and KRYPTOGRAF will be joining! And as always the Fuzztival house band VESTJYSK ØRKEN will be opening the festival for the 6th consecutive time!
We are PROUD to present another round of bands! Adding KANAAN as well as EDENA GARDENS (feat. members of Causa Sui & Papir) and CLOUDS TASTE SATANIC to Fuzztival 23!
We are proud to be adding the OG desert Rockers FATSO JETSON alongside DEATHCHANT and HIGH DESERT QUEEN! The riffs will be plenty and scorching hot! SLOWJOINT will be returning to Fuzztival with a special surprise set!
The almighty riff machine GREENLEAF will be headlining Saturday at Fuzztival ’23! Closing the fest with a shake and a bang so bring your dancing shoes!
Last but not least we are PROUD to welcome back the KINGS of Heavy Psych CAUSA SUI to Fuzztival ’23!
This wraps up the bands announced for this year! Final call to save some dough for more Fuzz Ales!
[Click play above to stream the self-titled debut from Edena Gardens. Album is out Oct. 28 via El Paraiso Records with preorders here.]
The meeting of vibes taking place throughout Edena Gardens‘ self-titled debut is not entirely unexpected, and it’s in keeping with the Causa Sui/El Paraiso Records psych-as-jazz-and-also-sometimes-psych-jazz ethos that, like collaborating soloists, Martin Rude and Jakob Skøtt of the venerable Danish explorers should unite with guitarist Nicklas Sørensen of established countrymen post-jammers Papir for an album that harnesses strengths from all of them. With Skøtt on drums and Rude swapping between bass and guitar, and Sørensen stepping into a kind of featured role, Edena Gardens offer mellow-psych immersion throughout the entirely-instrumental 44 minutes of their self-titled debut — on El Paraiso, naturally — echoing through synth-laced cosmic pastoralia on “Now Here Nowhere” and, crucially, seeming to find its way as it goes, with cymbal wash and guitars waking at the outset of 10-minute opener and longest track (immediate points) “Aether,” which marks out the fluidity with which the proceedings will play out.
Rude, on guitar or bass, is the unifying factor in bringing together Sørensen‘s guitar and Skøtt‘s guitar, and while it’s a jazz-born ethic, one might also recognize it from a near-infinite number of rock power trios, including to some extent Papir, so the argument might be made for some carryover on Sørensen‘s part there, but the thunder-rumble under “Aether” as it comes gradually to life is the rhythmic center around which the song takes shape, a light lumber with a correspondingly light warning of the tonal heft that may or may not follow.
It does, at least a little, but it doesn’t really have to. And that’s not a complaint in the slightest. These seven songs find Edena Gardens willfully embracing the tenets of heavy psychedelia, whether it’s the gathering-consciousness-for-exhale taking place in “Aether” or the immediately more active “Sliding Under” picking up from that extended leadoff with what sounds like Yawning Man-style pedal steel or slide; dreams cast in intertwining lines of guitar, hear-every-string strums and a soft, ethereal, jammy roll.
The song might be titled after its ending fadeout, in which indeed the guitar and drums slide under a line of synth to finish and give way to “The Canopy,” which follows the guitar’s deceptively plotted course — that is to say, just because the listener doesn’t yet know where Sørensen is headed doesn’t mean he doesn’t know either — sweet detailing of synth/effects and quiet drums behind, maybe some chime percussion? It’s hard to know what’s real and what’s imaginary after a while, but the drift factor in “The Canopy” is a righteousness unto itself, finishing with a brief moment of drone that is like a reveal for what’s been filling the song out all the while.
So much flow. And whether or not you can go with it is going to determine basically the entirety of the impression Edena Gardens is making, but it’s hardly an effort to follow Rude, Skøtt and Sørensen through these pieces that make up the whole of the album. “The Canopy” wraps side A with the exact opposite of a feeling of ceremony, as if just to quietly note the passing of time, the fleeting nature of even the universe itself, let alone anything to temporary as art, music, humanity, and so on. One of just two songs under four minutes long — the other is the penultimate “Iod” — it leads to the centerpiece/side B opener “Hidebound,” which pushes the synth forward in cyclical washes alongside a steady progression of guitar and drums, the spirit more cool-river than molten-ooze, with a rise in volume serving as a perfunctory crescendo as that synth line runs by again for the comedown.
This they follow with the aforementioned “Now Here Nowhere,” putting Skøtt‘s drums along with the synth and Rude‘s bass out there on the quick with Sørensen joining a moment later, a perfectly executed, smoothly realized methodological swap that puts the listener in a different place almost without realizing it. All they had to do was change up who starts playing and where the drums are in the mix, and it works to give a different vibe, more like some lost Hendrix studio track, readily meandering blues licks and tripped-out effects for aural detailing coinciding with a progression that, I’m not sure it’s right to call it straightforward, but perhaps on a relative level.
“Now Here Nowhere” pays off the light warning of “Aether” in its apex, and prefaces the rock aspects in the finale to come, with the droner “Iod” ensuring breath and breadth alike, the ambience so much a factor in what Edena Gardens have been able to conjure in this material. Even in what’s essentially an interlude on a completely instrumental record, the band manage to offer headphone-worthy depth and mood, and though it’s over quick, the open spirit plays well into “An T-Eilean Dubh” (say “anti-alien dub,” which I guess/hope means they’re worried about invaders from outer space), with a far-away-at-first rush on the drums and a central figure of guitar that feels specifically like homage to Colour Haze in its movement.
That also, not a complaint. With Rude‘s bass underscoring the tom work from Skøtt and Sørensen‘s solidified but still laid back lead lines, the volume swells subtly as the closer moves through its 6:51, seeming to come to a head near its halfway point but saving its standout moment for the improvised-sounding dawn-of-enlightenment solo that rounds out before the entirety comes apart and the record ends in duly understated fashion.
I will not pretend to know what will become of Edena Gardens, if it will be an ongoing collab between Sørensen, Skøtt and Rude or if it’s a one-off happening, but it’s hard to listen to the songs on Edena Gardens and not appreciate the fact that somebody in the studio that day hit ‘record.’ The tracks have obviously been edited with the fadeouts and so on, but they’d have to be to accommodate format, the mix becomes part of the art, and accordingly, the album feels like glimpses of and short visits to another world, where at least today it’s sunny and warm if not all the time.
The potential for expansion on what they do here is likewise planetary in scale, but the sweetness of Edena Gardens is something essential and organic that arises from the music, and toward whatever reaches they might ultimately adventure (or not), there will only ever be one first time out. This is it, and they make the most of the occasion.
