Sunday Spotlight: Moddi

This is the spot where I introduce bands and artists that tickle me most. This time I'm talking about Moddi, the very multitalented fella from Norway.

Pål Moddi Knutsen (or as he goes by his stage name, Moddi) is a singer-songwriter from the island of Senja, Norway.

I first stumbled upon his music about six months ago, shortly after moving to Norway myself. I was scanning the databases of Google and Spotify for any locally made music and sure enough, his name popped up: Senja is an island located basically next door from where I've settled. I see the sun set behind its snow covered mountains nearly every day.

Even though he was touring the UK at that time I was simply amazed by how his name had never caught my attention before, back when I was treading the ground of my native Finland. Because the truth is that everything about this guy seems well worth looking up to. After a quick study I learned that he's not only a self-taught musician, but a political and a social activist as well:

• In 2010 he refused nomination for a 1,000,000 Norwegian krone grant (123,000 US dollars, or 116,000 Euros) by Statoil (a Norwegian oil and gas company) on environmental grounds, stating "I don't want Statoil for a friend. Who on earth accepts a friendship just because you get paid a million krones for it?"
• His song En sang om fly, from the album Kæm va du?, addresses the dilemma of harming the climate through travelling to spread a message to save it. In 2014, in collaboration with InterRail, he organised "The Train Tour", a two-week tour through Europe entirely on rails. It went through France, Germany and the Czech Republic.
• In January 2014 he cancelled a scheduled concert in Tel Aviv, Israel, because he did not want to be taken to support the Israeli expansion of settlements in the West Bank. Following the cancellation he released the single Eli Geva, a song about the Israeli officer who refused to lead his forces into battle in 1982.

I applaud the spinal column that is his backbone. Exactly the sort of role modelling I look for in my music.

Getting to describe his music. There's a nice balance of instruments (such as accordion and cello) in a sparse acoustic soundscape of very mellowed out, unhurried tunes that'll demand your full attention. They don't particularly raise hope in the listener, but neither do they leave you feeling dispersed: to quote Folk Radio, delicate guitar-playing and [Moddi’s] informal tone make for oddly comforting melancholy. I'd like to be able to pinpoint his voice as familiar to someone else's, but all comparison escapes me. It can be piercing, to say the least, and it carries the songs beautifully into the magnificent stories that they are; each one like a work of art on its own.

But it's also precisely the sort of music that I most enjoy throwing on when the mood is set to late night chill or the need is to tune out magnificently. It doesn't hurt if the music is made by beautiful human beings at the same time.

Finally, picture this: you move to a small island on the outer coast of everything, literally a thousand miles from home, relatives or friends. A beautiful gem, but where there are less people living in the entire village than there were in the mere apartment complex you set forth from. You don't know anyone around, hardly speak their language even. Thrilled at the prospect, however, you begin settling to both your new life and the new surroundings - an environment certainly so very opposite from the big cities and the concrete jungles you've spent your life growing up and living in. And as you do so, the one song you come across to declares:

They say home is the place where your heart is, 

then I am home now, though I am far away. 

For so long I've let deep forests guard it, 

and now it's begging me to stay. 

And I’m trying my best to be tough, 

to pretend I am strong and can siphon it off. 

But I’m not who I wanted to be, 

in my heart I belong in a house by the sea. 

That is an excerpt from Moddi's House by the Sea and it was my initial contact with him. Although I imagine the song to be written from a reversed point of view, hearing it (at the particular epoch) certainly made my settling to the previously mentioned situation somewhat easier to manage, and will therefore most likely always hold a special meaning in my life. So thank you, takk, Mr. Knutsen. I look forward to hopefully seeing you in show one day. I'll be the +30-year old kid in the front row, probably wearing a Danko Jones t-shirt and giving you the thumbs up.

Hilsen,
The Seldom Seen Kid


Discography:
Random Skywriting (self released EP, 2007)
Rubato – split LP with Einar Stray (EP, 2008)
Live at Parkteateret (self released live album, 2009)
Floriography (2010)
Rubbles (EP, 2010)
Set the House on Fire (2013)
Kæm va du? (2013)
Live at Jakob Church of Culture EP (live EP, 2014)

Moddi that I listened to while blogging this. [via Spotify]

Breaking out of hibernation!

I know - two years, right? 

Guess I chose my blogger's handle quite appropriately, because it's been almost that - to date - since I founded this blog. And nearly the same amount of time has passed since I actually blogged about anything. I'm not making any excuses. I just never picked up from those two opening posts, but I'm gonna try again. So let's start picking.

Because, you see, last week a topic came to mind. I guess at the same moment a spark ignited to rewake this beast of a blog. Sadly I forgot what the topic was by the next day. But the spark remained, so you could say the idea wasn't left to ruins. The founding purpose was to speak about my relationship to music and that is still the general idea. I might stray, but who likes talking about themselves all the time, eh? And who knows, maybe the initial topic'll come back to me.

Since last visiting the subject I've emigrated to another country and turned 30, and even though I might not be able to claim having as much interest to spare (or energy to spend) for the same kind of intensity as before, that's not to say I'm not as passionate when it comes to the power of music. It's just that a lot of the stuff I listen to only work their way as background music these days, compared to the situation of two, three years ago. I don't know whether to pin it on the general downtrend in today's music or just my declined rate to keep up with it.

I mean, even back then I'd still be on the lookout for new exciting stuff and get excited. It's what kept fresh the whole concept of listening. I'd hate being stuck to the same stuff for years on end. It would be like hearing that one song you really like, play over and over on the radio until you get sick of it. I admit, every now and then there are sudden spikes involving some beloved-but-forgotten blast from the past - I just went through a streak of some old school Oasis, for example - but in general it's been pretty quiet on the front and sure, laziness to keep one's ears open all the time is in part to blame.

That's not to say good music isn't produced anymore; to say so would be a blunder. 2014 gave birth to many great debut albums. My personal favourite has to be the self-titled release from Royal Blood. Twenty-fifteen is also off to a solid start, with new albums already out from Raised Fist and Danko Jones.

In the last couple of years there have also been some new acquaintances, pre-existing groups that have left a solid impression to my preferences. Bands that make me go what's wrong with me for not checking them out sooner? I'm just gonna mention The Heavy, Afghan Whigs and The Raconteurs right here. Seriously, look 'em up, if you have to.

Despite all the above-mentioned, and this is getting to the bottom of this post, you know what I still find a great and much welcomed phenomenon? Goose bumps.

Because by God they're still there and for me they're clear proof that the affection to music is still there, even if I walked away for a while and gave it a rest. An emotionally charged song in any context - may it work as a memory trigger or simply blow me away - will continue to send me shivers. Anything from Slash climbing that piano and hitting the first chords to the solo of November Rain, A Great Big World being sorry to James Blunt - well, whatever he does here.

It also closes the circle on the subject of my first post from 2013 quite nicely. Music really does work as a medium to express "feelings and emotions that mere words define". It'll never cease to stand the test of time. And as a side note I'm quite pleased to have come to that conclusion again by just typing out random thoughts after another. Very therapeutic.

I said I won't make any excuses but it partly ended sounding a little like it. I'm not though. Honest. I would've written earlier, but an old friend came in from out of town. Someone stole my computer. There was an earthquake. A terrible flood. Locusts!*

And now that I've stretched some brain muscles, I'll keep in touch. In the meantime, check out my top 100 songs from 2014 as Spotify kept track of them.

See? It's all good.

*Anyone getting the reference without resorting to the asterisk is fine by me.

Sunday spotlight: Elbow

So, a friend of mine messaged me today with a suggestion. She asked if I could, in the hope that she might learn something new, blog about some of the bands I've explored and grown to like.

Now, I'll admit off the bat I'm not a very trivial person when it comes to musical knowledge. I don't really care about genres, sub-genres, dates and such but rather focus that zing into pure listening. But still, my first thought? Fantastic idea! I'm all for educational purposes. Hell, I'm even pro-mixtape. And I do believe she called me a 'guru' on the subject, which inherently tickled the ego of this audiohead and lead me to agree. And, you know, there's always Google, Wikipedia and such to draw upon and give the illusion I might know something. Ok, so it might be a field trip for yours truly also.

Then I started thinking. Everyone knows Metallica, right? So maybe I should focus on some of the lesser-known groups that are out there. Not necessarily at grassroots, but with the bar being set to "Metallica" I think I'll be safe regarding the volume of bands. Enough being said, let's start with Elbow.

They're a relatively new addition to my collection. When I first heard of them it was through my former colleague, and a present dear friend, in the June of 2011, just weeks before he was set to go see them at Ruisrock, a rock festival where they have so far made their only appearance on Finnish soil. This story ends up with me agreeing to drive him and his friend to the concert and back without actually going to see the show. And although their alcohol-fueled Chewbacca-impressions on a 24-hour roadside gas station at 4 o'clock in the morning have nothing to do with it, it is a story I regret to this day. Buy the ticket to see the show, ok people? Always buy the ticket.

Hailing from Manchester England, Elbow play easily identifiable alternative rock. Their songs are usually slow tempo in the style of Radiohead, with much emphasis given to keyboards and percussion. Singer Guy Garvey manages to produce a dreamlike sound that is very much to my liking. The music asks much from it's listener: they hardly produce party music. But I've discovered that the more you give them, the more they give back.

Now, some of you looking at the discography listed below might already find where the author of this blog took his name from. Even more so, I challenge you to get a hold of the track listing on that album and find even more similarities.

Discography:
Asleep in the Back (2001)
Cast of Thousands (2003)
Leaders of the Free World (2005)
The Seldom Seen Kid (2008)
Build a Rocket Boys! (2011)
Dead in the Boot (compilation) (2012)

elbow that i listened to while blogging. [via Spotify]

"When words leave off, music begins."

These words uttered by 19th century German poet Heinrich Heine are, imho, the single greatest summarisation anyone has used to describe music. Ever. I imagine it was a moment proud & wise, definitely one for the books.

So I'm what you might call a heavy consumer, an audiohead I've dubbed myself. And I consider myself pretty darn good at it. A healthy dose of self-praise seems appropriate here. Based on my last.fm account (which I avoided joining until February this year), I scrobble on average over 150 plays per week. And that's counting the tracks that playback from start to finish, point zero till the very last second. Add the stuff I don't keep track of, and the numbers might double. But that's just statistics I wanted to illustrate my point with, they have no particular meaning to me. Quality over quantity, as with all.

I totally get what Heinrich meant though. At it's best, music really can be an extension of speech. A way to communicate without borders or language barriers. Means to bring out feelings and emotions that mere words define. Even set out entire mood scenarios that affect the way people react to them. But also, and this is equally as important, entertain the hell out of people. That's the power of music.

I owe much of my love for music to my family. Even more so to my stepfather of 18 years. You know how there's a difference between hearing and listening? That's what happened to me once I hit my teen years. Suddenly hearing turned into listening. Listening turned into understanding, and out of understanding grew love. Of course, his taste in music was and is mostly 80's hard rock and heavy metal, so my breeding ground was set with the likes of Iron Maiden, Dio, Tarot, Peer Günt, Ozzy Osbourne and Motörhead.

And then there's my older brother. Outgrowing me by 9 years, he was obviously my go-to guy when looking at example. In fact, some of my earliest childhood memories include him and this big yellow cardboard box he had, full of cassettes that defined the era of late 80's / early 90's. Metallica, Anthrax, Suicidal Tendencies, Overkill, Megadeth and Faith No More spring to mind. So I listened alongside him. Even though I couldn't understand what they sang about. Sometimes I would ask him to translate, and note that the lyrics seemed funny to me at the time. But to this day some of those bands still belong to my heart and my record collection. So the seed was planted.

Moving into modern times, what really revolutionised my taste acquired was the introduction of streaming platforms, or Spotify. Wow! Suddenly it felt like I had the musical reach of a giant. And that feeling remains. What most people use as a platform for listening, I do for learning. I keep active. New bands, new genres, new experiences, click, click, click. How else is one able to evolve? And in the process of all this, after a few years, I realised just how much my preference had indeed unconsciously shifted and expanded. It's quite staggering really, to change one's musical identity. And while it might be the biggest cliche to state your music taste as "all kinds", at the same time it's been the most liberating thing I've gotten to experience. Breaking out of genre-oriented preferences might've been as educational of an experience than most of the school I attended. Which is not saying much though, because I was a poor attendee. Really rubbish.

Ok, I might've exaggerated to make a point. But since then I really did notice the amazing variety that reminded me why I fell in love with music in the first place and brought back much of the same feeling I had during my previously mentioned teens. Hearing turned into listening, turned into understanding, grew into love once more. And it keeps on happening.

Honestly. What greater feeling can there be?

Go out there and be passionate about it!

a playlist of what i listened to whilst writing. [via Spotify]