• Music

    Linnea Hjertén – Nio Systrar

    From Linnea Hjertén’s Bandcamp site: “Born from the synthesis of Swedish folk melodies and ritual ambient, Linnea Hjertén’s debut album “Nio systrar” (‘Nine sisters’) is a wordless invocation of primordial energy – a psychoacoustic gateway to altered states of consciousness. Each of the nine tracks brings us deeper into the cycle of spiritual death and rebirth, stripping away the old to make way for the new. With a musical maturity far beyond her years, Hjertén channels the ethereal beauty of Dead Can Dance, the spellbinding chants of Kari Rueslåtten, and the minimalist Nordic atmosphere of Forndom. […] With an expansive…

  • Music - Qobuz

    Skáld – Huldufólk

    Your browser does not support iframes.    The French collective Skáld come as a revelation to me.  These are Frenchmen who expertly perform Nordic music and imbue it with everything from folk music to metal. From the band’s press release: “As the heirs of the ancient poets known as skalds, the SKÁLD group, with one song after another, tames this folk tradition. We can lose ourselves in the hills of Danish elves, and meet Swedish nymphs, as we listen to the ballad of Herr Mannelig, the tale of a female troll who hopes to become human (by attempting to wed…