release date: Mar. 8, 2017
format: cd
[album rate: 4 / 5] [3,96]
producer: Mikkel Damgaard
label: A:larm / Universal Music Group - nationality: Denmark
Track highlights: 1. "Verdensmestre" - 3. "Skøjteløb på Bagsværd Sø" (4 / 5) - 4. "De forelskedes smag i din mund" (4,5 / 5) - 5. "Mørkets hastighed" (4 / 5) - 7. "Triumf" (4 / 5) - 8. "Mennesker har brug for at tale om natten"
11th studio album by Love Shop, aka the ongoing solo-project by Jens Unmack where he teams up with producer, keyboardist and co-composer Mikkel Damgaard and likewise plays with a small unit of 'usual suspects' including guitarist Mika Vandborg, bassist Nis Tyrrestrup and lon-lasting collaborative drummer, Thomas Duus. Aside from a few featuring guest artists it's worthwhile mentioning that Sune Rose Wagner (formerly The Raveonettes) plays additional guitar & keyboard on most tracks.
Stylistically, this is just the way it would have been expected with the small change that this is much more a fusion of what has been associated with Love Shop on one side - and here you can almost pin-out the exact tracks in their style - and with solo albums in Unmack's own name: The more quiet and lyrical compositions. This has both the uptempo dynamics and the slow subtle singer / songwriter fingerprints on it. I think that in the past, Unmack must have made clear decisions about the musical direction, and that you may confirm that he has done likewise with this, but with the twist of definite conviction that this album as well as the project Love Shop should have room enough for all of his varied expressions. Now, it would be really interesting if he comes out with a solo release after this, because that could only mean that it would be something completely new.
The radio hit "De forelskedes smag i din mund" is a typical Love Shop uptempo synthpop song without just being some old travesty, but the album contains other and more long-lasting quality songs.
Now that Kent is no more [sigh!] - and without further comparison - I do believe that the Love Shop-project could at least give us a bit of the same melancholic Scandinavian magic of Nordic noir, which is nicely present on Risiko.
I find that this is not only bettering the band's solid releases in the last decade, but it's simply the best Love Shop album since Billeder af verden from 1994, and it truly shines as the band's most coherent collection of compositions where music and lyrics make up a beautiful whole.
[ Gaffa.dk 5 / 5, Politiken 5 / 6 stars ]
2017 Favourite releases: 1. St. Vincent Masseduction - 2. Paul Weller A Kind of Revolution - 3. Love Shop Risiko
