ME AND MY KITES – A Safe Trail (2023, LP Porcelain Records)

RELEASE INFO:

Label: Porcelain Records

Format: LP, Album, Limited Edition, Black Vinyl, 300 copies

Release Date: 7 July 2023

Me and My Kites is a collective Folk-Rock-Hippie-Pop Swedish band releasing their music since 2013 and “A Safe Trail” is their 4th album released through Porcelain Records (probably their label). The musicians/artists that took part in this release are David Svedmyr (Grand piano, Wurlitzer 200A, Mellotron, guitars, vocals, cithers, percussion, recording, mixing), Lisa Isaksson (flute, harp, vocals), Petter Owen (drums), Joel Öhlund (bass guitar, vocals), Agnes Nykäsenoja (violin, vocals), Mikael Lennholm (Electric guitar), Karin Engqvist (ARP Odyssey), David Victor (trumpet, live sound), Emma Nordenstam (cello, vocals), Magnus Forsberg (vocals), Hanna Pauser (vocals), Johan Svedmyr (percussion), Alexander Pierre (mixing), Rubén Widén (cover photo), Mattias Gustavsson (layout), Fortuno (vocals).

“A Safe Trail” contains 14 tracks, 7 on each side of the LP album with a total duration of 42:25min, clock-ticking from 1:11min to 5:25min. The opener “Simons Sang” has a cool dreamy-like relaxing Folkie background with sweet and soft female vocals, introducing a magical flute sound while your Mynd automatically starts to project images from the beautiful Swedish countryside. The happier “With The Sun In Your Face” follows, emerging a glorious playful carefree country-folk feel, male/female vocals, and a short Psych passage in the middle, this is so cool. “Guardian Of The Garden I” is a rhythmic short (1:18min) instrumental piece of jazzy-folk-rock while “Psykjuntan den III:e (for Each their own Apocalypse)” is another short (1:32min) kind of interlude that acts as a poppy-folkie Beatlesque song with a rather weird instrumentation. With “Aurora” the band returns to the dream-alike Folkie environment, performing the track with a kind of Hippie-like attitude and a Progressive touch… “Regnbågen (Djurby)” is simply a wonderful piece of Prog-Folk with strings, violin, harp, and piano, creating a dreamy instrumental, quite sentimental, flirting with Psych towards the end. The “A” side closes with “Guardian Of The Garden II”, there’s the same soundscape as “I”, with the addition of a magical harp sound and some heavenly-sent female vocals… Side “B” opens with another short instrumental, “Kon Kong Maa”, dreamy and folkie with a pinch of some tropical cinematic sunshine. The self-titled “A Safe Trail” is a cool Folk-Rock poppy song with a nostalgic feel, warm vibes, and soft male vocals, a track that could have found its way to a Sir Mac or Sir John solo album from the 70s… “Leken” is another short tune (1:40min) acting like a folkie-jazzy interlude while the also short “Nejden Och Lockelsen” (1:11min) acoustic folkie interlude, follows… The next two songs are my personal favorites, “Recipe For Disaster” is slow, with a kind of creepy scenery, under an eerie psychedelic background with female vocals, and strange instrumentation, a track that enters a Dark Psych trail, while “Next To A Castle” is a Pop-Psych-a-Folkie brilliant song! Eventually, the album comes to an end in a mellow and poppy way with “Fortuno”, the magical trumpet sound steals the show while there’s a strong “renaissance” feel all over… So, Me And My Kites, delivered another astonishingly GOOD album, dreamy, Folkie, Poppy, Hippie-like, 42 minutes of pleasant listening, an album that will not disappoint All Believers out there… TimeLord Michalis

Tracklist