David Åhlén - We Sprout In Thy Soil

David Åhlén – We Sprout In Thy Soil
Compunctio 2009

Listen while reading:

Arise (from We Sprout In Thy Soil)

 Altar (from We Sprout In Thy Soil)

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We Sprout In Thy Soil is as fragile as a snowflake – you think it’s melting away as soon as you put your fingers on it. David Åhlén from Bargamossen/Sweden created a melancholic and sad masterpiece with his first full lenght album. These Swedens are just great in everything they do: they had the best film director and writer of all times, Ingmar Bergman, the best film actress who ever lived, Liv Ullmann (at least for me), and they have incredible talented folk singer-songwriters which will and already have heavy impact on the folk scene around the world (not to mention that Sweden has developed a steadily growing indie scene).

I don’t know how they do it but Swedish musicians throw all their emotions into the music they make and this is something I often miss in comtemporary folk music from inside the USA. Ok, ok, don’t beat me for this, but you know, if you listen to to the music of David Åhlén you become a part of it, you can swim in it, you can let yourself fall and you will be carried away with the music. It’s hard for me not to overestimate We Sprout In Thy Soil because this is folk music, pure folk music. And I’m not talking about American roots music or folk in the vein of country music here, I’m talking about a neutral term to describe what’s going on at the moment. I think Europe (the USA and Candada anyway) is in the middel of a big folk revival or should I say folk rediscovery.

Åhlén’s guitar play is hushed and his vocals are haunting and burdensome at the same time. In some tracks he sings to the piano and in others there are additional strings or female vocals supporting him. There is nothing what is not just plain perfect and I really dig this album. If you love fall as much as I do you have to get We Sprout In Thy Soil because this makes every dark hour to a dark hour you wish would be everlasting (even though it was released back in April 2009). Buy your physical copy over at Compunctio or get the mp3s at your iTunes store. Click here to vistit David Åhlén’s MySpace.

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