release date: Nov. 8, 2019
format: digital (9 x File, FLAC - HFN 99)
[album rate: 4 / 5] [3,78]
producer: Blaue Blume
label: HFN Music / Universal - nationality: Denmark
Track highlights: 1. "Swimmer" - 2. "Someday" (live) - 3. "Morgensol" - 4. "Vanilla" - 7. "Sobs" - 8. "Loveable" (live) - 9. "New Navel"
2nd full-length album by Blaue Blume follows two years after the release of the 4-track ep Sobs and four [!] full years after the sophomore Syzygy (Oct. 2015). The band followed the debut by playing concerts and at festivals but were forced to withdraw from further band activities in 2018 as front figure and lead vocalist Jonas Smith was overtaken by depression, which explains the long time in between albums.
Bell of Wool sort of continues from Sobs with more instrospective songs - some of which is said to have evolved from Smith's lyrics about personal experiences and sentiments during his time out. It's still music bonded with 1980s dreampop but also with links to Talk Talk and Antony and the Johnsons, and then there's athe addition of a stronger electronic sound, which bonds with contemporaries like Beach House, ultimately making this the band's so far most varied album. And on top of the various styles, the songs are both with English as well as Danish lyrics, although, only "Morgensol" is in Danish. The track was released June 14, 2019 as the album's first single, and then followed by the singles "Loveable" (Sep. 13, 2019) and finally "Vanilla" (Oct. 11, 2019) before the album release.
Smith still executes the lyrics with his strong vibrant and technically skilled vocal, which perhaps forever will bring to mind Elisabeth Fraser of Cocteau Twins but Jonas Smith is much more than just a mere copyist and the production sound always delivers on highest level.
The album is without doubt one of the best Danish albums of the year.
Highly recommended.
[ bandcamp ]
[ Soundvenue 5 / 6 stars ]
