There is a near jazzy like Gorillaz step to the way the EP opens with the title track. The mood is late evening, relaxed with Fabian’s tones adding the cherry on top. This could be music from a different age, before or after where we are now or just the ideal temperature adjuster. I felt compelled to dim the lights and get with ‘In the Dungeons of Bäckabo’ and its charming patter set amid the soft swing in the playing. There may be a waltz like reaction from some because there is a sway encouraging quality to the way this song seesaws back and forth rhythmically.
Easy to see why ‘Nightwalk’ was chosen as the promo single as it illustrates the Fabian Brusk Jahn sound perfectly. Subtlety is all around, words are released slowly amid acoustics and trailing strings. But for all the forlorn mood there is more than a shard of hope at a chorus that might have most closing their eyes, but dreaming of the joy of the stillness that is happening all around. This is studied folk, finely knitted arrangements but with all the encouragement we need to let go of all that burden we’ve been shouldering. ‘Nightwalk’ is an escape from the confusion of interaction, interruption and notifications for something a whole lot more benign.
‘In the Dungeons of Bäckabo’ provides a soundtrack for the grey days of winter, better still if the misty plumes are forming just outside your window. That is because songs such as ‘Staging’ offers refuge from that feeling of a lack of hope. The trick employed however is not immediately apparent, for this is a slow cooked charm. Once it rises to its feet though the romanticism is clear for the depth of love allows the rest of us to leach off it. Candlelight dinners may never be the same with ‘Staging’ encouraging glassy-eyed stares into the soul of your better half. Fabian Brusk Jahn understands of course and his gift is for spelling it out to the rest of us is what makes this track such a crucial crutch in the vagaries of building a robust relationship.
This EP is a most spiritual record, the lyric sheet just confirms it. These five tracks take stock of what we already have but how we forget to open our eyes to the greatness and rather focus on what we perceive we lack. And if that feels like something a bit too weighty to take on board there is the light and airy ‘Skepp Ohoj’ to distract us for it proves to be something to lose ourselves in, a little lollop in a traditional casing that boasts plenty of charm to a point that it could be just the tinder for a winter jig over the next few months.
Oddly enough I have a thing for final tracks, they can often be the jewel in a collection so hopes were high for ‘Gubbskrutt Trudilutt’ which heads down the Spanish guitar end of things. Of course this being Fabian Brusk Jahn it is never as straight forward as that with something rather psychedelic in the pastoral aura this is evoked. A dream-like state is evoked, offering a perfect and seamless full stop on what has passed before. Eyelids may get heavier such is the tenderness of the acoustic swell to set the seal on an EP that is a lesson in how to escape this hurried world of ours. KH
More Info: Official
Hear More Songs: Fabian Brusk Jahn
Year: 2024
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