30 September 2023

TUSMØRKE – Hestehoven (2023, LP Karisma Records)

 

 

RELEASE INFO:

Label: Karisma Records

Format: LP, Album, Limited Edition, Neutral Transparent vinyl (includes 4-page folded lyric insert), 650 copies

Release Date: 18 Aug 2023

This Norwegian progressive Folk-Rock quartet is back with their 11th album (established back in 1994 and until 2009 they were called Les Fleurs du Mall) – check here for our review of their 2018 album “Fjernsyn I Farver” (also released through Karisma Records) – the album is called “Hestehoven” and here’s the info taken from their Bandcamp page:

Norway’s most far-out and unique prog band TUSMØRKE is back! This album is not for the faint of heart. Like some great Babylonian harlot, the sinfully sweet sounds held within this record will deny no one, but they extract a great price! There will be no turning back should you proceed on this wretched path and cut your way through the thickets so green, for the path is fraught with danger and temptation. Proceed and you might find yourself sucked off, as it were, to a strange fairyland where every bush and clearing is gushingly alive with the brazen bacchanals of satyrs and nymphs. Continue and you will find yourself in a world where chance encounters of mildew-encrusted adult magazines, carefully stashed away in the shrubs are nothing short of erotic mysteries reminiscent of ancient fertility cults.
Life is never just sunshine and rainbows, and the same is true with Tusmørke, whose name means twilight in Norwegian. Like its namesake flower, the coltsfoot, Hestehoven swells forth from the underworld, and this chthonic aspect is heavily present in the conceptual undertones as well… Tusmørke may conceivably be heathens, but certainly not unenlightened ones. This is music to hum along with as you pass a devil’s pact through the keyhole of your local church or rock out as you ride backward on a dog all the way to the witches’ sabbath. Where warlocks cackle and witches blush. Where the priest, knowing-more-than-his-Lord’s-Prayer, binds Old Eric to his bidding. This is true Norwegian finger-clicking, butt-swinging prog rock. No more, no less – but cerebral in excess! Spring has sprung! If it is all too much to bear, close your eyes and think about the flowers. Hail Pan!”…

The usual suspects of Tusmørke are Benediktator, HlewagastiR, Dauinghorn, and Krizla while a host of other musicians are taking part in this album with a huge variety of musical instruments by the likes of Acoustic Guitar, Electric Guitar, Baglama (Saz), Mellotron, Synthesizer, Minimoog, Vocoder, Electric Piano, Glockenspiel, Percussion, Vibraslap, Cymbals, Shaker, Drums, Electric Organ, Flute, Congas, Tambourine, Clarinet, Hurdy Gurdy, Violin… And all these instruments, in PROG’s Majesty’s service! “Hestehoven” consists of 7 tracks in total, 3 on the 1st side and 4 on the 2nd side of the LP album. I may say that the album generally moves into a soft Proggy Folkie Rock motive, not Dark at all and way too luminous. The opener “Cycle Of The Gylfaginning” is a kind of sweet rhythmic Prog-Pop tune, the use of Flute is more than marvelous while the use of the female ‘la la la la la’ vocals are more than beautifully ethereal and sunny too, a song that sounds as a Flower Prog track! The self-titled “Hestehoven” follows, this is another brilliant piece of Proggy music, spacey-effected though and kind of Psych-flirting, lovely vocals (sung in Norwegian as all 6 out of the 7 tracks), the flute literally shines on, while the keys are artfully making short passages from “Lambada” (yes, that one!) and from some other kind of classical melodies (that I cannot recall if I heard them before or not), the sure thing is that the keys are adding a Super Prog atmosphere to the track without losing that ‘Folklore’ feel that runs through the entire album… “Den Behornede Guden” is a happy up-tempo groovy Poppy-Pro track, with a strong and kind of ‘Renaissance’ Flute sound, the clarinet adds a jazzy edge, and there’s a lot of rhythm/mood changes with a cool Psych-a-Proggy-flirting middle section, a track that somehow magically manages to end in a magnificent Folk-Gosper-Chorus-like unexpected way! Side ‘B’ opens with “Åndemaneren”, a faster and rockier tune, still Prog-flirting, but when Flute takes the lead, the metamorphosis of the track makes it even more Progressive! “Jeg Klumser Deg” is a cool tune that blends Pop, Prog, and Folk with nice vocals and a cool melody, including the ‘necessary’ PSYCH middle section… “Kyprianos” is the most ‘Psych’ track in here, a groovy tune with a haunted creepy-like beautiful melody, becoming fast, then slow, then trippy diving into some serious Prog-Folk, an Ultra-Psych behavior (musically speaking) that makes it my personal highlight of the album, of course along with the astonishing closing track of the LP, the magical “The Wicked Ways Of Witches And Wizards”, a creep-a-delic Folkie-Psych track (using the English language) and moving into a fascinating Progressive-Rock path… So, if you’re into some Scandinavian NeoProg Folkie-Rock, Tusmørke delivered a fine album, “Hestehoven” is a quite pleasant and easy album to listeners’ ears that will touch listeners’ hearts too… Also, let me not fail to tell you about the AMAZING artwork cover, the front, the back, the inlay, and the ‘naughty’ round labels of the record, too!!! TimeLord Michalis  

 

Tracklist

A1 Cycle Of The Gylfaginning 4:08
A2 Hestehoven 6:26
A3 Den Behornede Guden 7:50
B1 Åndemaneren 3:25
B2 Jeg Klumser Deg 5:46
B3 Kyprianos 5:12
B4 The Wicked Ways Of Witches And Wizards 7:31

 

Links

Listen / Buy through TUSMØRKE Bandcamp

Visit TUSMØRKE Facebook

 

 

 

 

1 Response

  1. Pingback : TimeMachine Productions » TimeLord Michalis’ Best Albums of 2023 (Top 50+1)

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