Isolated Youth miserere mei

This band and their album are new to me, courtesy of Bark PR. I’ve given this album easily a half-dozen listens, and I want more. Addictive? Perhaps. It’s definitely music that I want to hear again and again. They churn out distortion-fueled post-punk that charges out of the speakers and assailes my ears. It is not dark, moody music. No, no! They serve the music up raw and gritty with lyrics that touch on faith and the search for meaning in life. Who isn’t?

From the press handout:

“Hailing from the remote coastal town of Norrtälje, Sweden. Isolated Youth’s debut LP is deeply shaped by the atmospheric Nordic landscape they grew up in. From the icy hooks of ‘Ghost Town’ inspired by the desolate streets of Stockholm to the ghostly ‘Psykosoma’, conceived in a studio nestled between a forested graveyard, the band channel the play of light and darkness of their region through a gothic, distortion-fueled lens. Formed by brothers Axel and William Mardberg, along with drummer Andreas Geidemark and bassist Elmer Hallsby, the band channels a raw and atmospheric style that draws influence from icons like The Chameleons, The Gun Club, and Siouxsie & The Banshees. With Axel’s piercing falsetto and William’s intricate, Johnny Marr-esque guitar lines, Isolated Youth have crafted an album that feels both nostalgic and deeply contemporary.”

The song Love Locked In A Dark Room mesmerizes me. It has a jaunty rhythm that reminds me of someone but sounds fresh and original at the same time. It has crashing cymbals and chugging guitars that melt into the lyrics that cry out in longing not to be left alone in a dark room like a bird in a cage. As I listened to this song and meditated on the lyrics, I was reminded of a poem by Maya Angelou, Caged Bird.

Love Locked In A Dark Room:

“Hold me

Before the sun hits and the walls they turn

The dark room is bending

Bird in a cage

Dancing in the Devil’s lair

Love locked in a dark room

I can’t see where I stay.”

Maya Angelou, Caged Bird:

“The caged bird sings   

with a fearful trill   

of things unknown   

but longed for still   

and his tune is heard   

on the distant hill   

for the caged bird   

sings of freedom.”

I would love to hear Isolated Youth perform Love Locked In A Dark Room live. I may be in Sweden, their home and native land, in October. They don’t have any tour dates on their web page, but I remain optimistic. In conclusion, I rate this album as a 5 out of 5. It is a well-crafted musical experience with powerful music and insightful thought-provoking lyrics.

DISCOVER ISOLATED YOUTH 

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miserere mei is available via Memorials of Distinction and Birthday Productions

Joe Jackson Stepping Out

I hadn’t listened to the music of Joe Jackson other than competing with road noise on the radio back in the days when listening to the radio was a thing. I popped this in the big stereo, sat back in my recliner, closed my eyes and let the music come to me. What I heard was a side of Joe Jackson that I didn’t know existed up to that moment. I could hear sumptuous bass underscoring the songs, powerful but understated. It starts on the first track, Is She Really Going Out With Him? The bass is the bedrock on which the rest of the song is built. I won’t do a long track-by-track review of Joe Jackson’s greatest songs. This listening session gave me another side of Joe Jackson I never knew. I’m listening to it again, focusing more on the vocals and the lyrical content.

Modest Mussorgsky Pictures At An Exhibition

From Wikipedia:

“Pictures at an Exhibition is a piano suite in ten movements, plus a recurring and varied Promenade theme, written in 1874 by Russian composer Modest Mussorgsky. It is a musical depiction of a tour of an exhibition of works by architect and painter Viktor Hartmann put on at the Imperial Academy of Arts in Saint Petersburg following his sudden death in the previous year. Each movement of the suite is based on an individual work, some of which are lost.

The composition has become a showpiece for virtuoso pianists, and became widely known from orchestrations and arrangements produced by other composers and contemporary musicians, with Maurice Ravel’s 1922 adaptation for orchestra being the most recorded and performed. The suite, particularly the final movement, “The Bogatyr Gates,” is widely considered one of Mussorgsky’s greatest works.”

Pictures at an Exhibition is easily my favourite classical music album, CD or record. It is a good bit of easy listening for winding down from some business. It is also a favourite of mine for what I call intentional or focused listening. I sit back with no distractions and just listen. I pay attention to different aspects of the music every time I listen to it. I listen to what instruments are used. What is the pacing of the music? Is it going faster? Slower? Escalating or depressing? And other aspects of the album. Yeah, Pictures at an Exhibition is my go-to for classical music.