Papir, Troldmand, Hedgehogs- Loppen, Christiania 10/21/11

This was a very cool psychedelic rock night at Loppen and I had the honor of being the DJ! I also showed up and did a multitrack recording of all the bands. All these young bands are very cool people and it is so fantastic to see them all reaching out for the frontiers of music in search of their own musical realm of consciousness as the minds of the musicians meld together to create a unique musical experience. It is a very unique evening to have three ibasically instrumental bands on the same night. All adventurous and challenging, not just playing formula rock or metal, all seeking to find the muse!

           Hedgehogs, are a trio and have really chanced musical direction from their early more song oriented garage rock days and now are playing long jammed out pieces. I am pretty sure the band played their new album called Depths, which is just two long pieces and you can download it for free here from bandcamp. Anyway, the band started the concert with the drummer making some spaced out sounds with an Alesis Air synth and the guitar and bass player on the floor with their pedals and then they went into the first part was a bit like psychedelic surf garage to start and then really got going. The 2^nd part was when the guitar player really found himself and was really jamming and this was much more like 70s psychedelic rock with some long guitar solos and great jamming from the band. They played one last jam out track and the crowd of about 60 people or so was into it. Damn cool..

Hedgehogs

           Next up was the Danish band Troldmand (means like a mystic mand). This was their debut gig and they were pretty nervous. These guys are fans of my band ØSC and are quite inspired by Hawkwind and Acid Mothers Temple, etc.. They feature two guitars, bass, drums and two guys sharing a stand with different pedals and effects and one guy also did some spaced out vocalizations, which you could never really hear. Anyway, there was about 120 people at Loppen now and they flew straight out into Deep space rocking hard and spacing out for about an hour in 5 or 6 numbers as I recall. Very good dynamics and the guitar player with the Witchcraft shirt on did some very cool guitar solos and a long cool slide guitar piece. Kasper, the other guitar player (his mom works for the same company as I do and was there for the first song or two) was the heavier rifer with a more spaced out guitar sound. They blended well together. The sound man was very very good on this night. Fantastic space rock. Wow….

           It was pretty late by the time Papir started about 00:45. Jonas and Rasmus from Causa Sui were there as this was suppose to be the release party for Papir’s new double vinyl record on the El Paraiso label tonight but there were no records at the show. Anyway, the band played a mind blowing show. I have seen them many times but this was really the best I could imagine. Nicklas is a fantastic guitar player and very creative with his sounds and riffs, while Kristoffer and Christian just fucking rock out and are also great. The music is very dynamic, driving, engaging and sometimes psychedelic and always some great guitar solos in every track. They are hard to describe, they are for sure inspired by a band like Causa Sui but they have their own unique thing. They played for about 85 mins and at least 2-3 songs that I had never heard. It was a great concert.. Wow.. Check out this video of one of their tracks.