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Record/Vinyl + Digital Album
Includes unlimited streaming of Johannes Björk
via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
Download available in 24-bit/44.1kHz.
ships out within 7 days
edition of 300
Purchasable with gift card
£20GBPor more
Record/Vinyl + Digital Album
Test Pressing of Johannes Björk's self-titled LP. Only 5 copies of these in existence, with 3 copies available for sale. Comes in archival grade poly-lined inner sleeve alongside an insert/cover from the standard LP edition.
Includes unlimited streaming of Johannes Björk
via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
Johannes Björk is a musician and literary critic based in Gothenburg. His music combines drones, pop melodies and field recordings to produce refined sketches rather than fully formed songs – resembling slowly refurnished interiors, rather than scenes with a clearly discernible subject. Originally released in a mini-edition of 12 copies for a show in Stockholm earlier on in the year, it is now presented in an expanded LP form with two tracks added in, and another two re-recorded. Accompanied in parts by renowned and emerging Swedish writers – such as Siri Ahmed Backström, Johan Jönson and Johanna Sköldbäck Martell – the music offers an electro-acoustic shelter, which houses both luminous and gloomy textures. Whilst the album shares an atmosphere with the emerging years of the Gothenburg scene to some extent, the songwriting bears witness to a production that treats lo-fi elements as integrated parts of the soundscape, though not in a way that overpowers the recording. For his debut solo album, Johannes carves out a landscape where pulsating drones form the background for the perfect melody, where field recordings and noise co-exist with harmonical dyads, and the feeling of an assuasive epiphany flow out of an ever-looming tragedy.
credits
released November 30, 2023
Recorded at Paletten, June 2022 - May 2023
A1: Lyrics, voice, field recording - Johanna Sköldbäck Martell; Synth, bass, drum machine, cello - Johannes Björk
A2: Synths, cymbal - Johannes Björk
A3: Saxophone - Erik Gustafsson; Harmonium - L.T. Fisk; Bass - Johannes Björk
A4: Synth - Johannes Björk
B1: Lyrics, voice - Siri Ahmed Backström; Synth, piano, bass - Johannes Björk
B2: Lyrics, voice - Johan Jönson; Synth, bass - Johannes Björk
B3: Accordion, cello, guitar, bass, samples - Johannes Björk
B4: Field recording, synth - Johannes Björk
B5: Lyric, voice, piano, synth, cello - Johannes Björk
Cover art - Erik Gustafsson
Layout - Andreas Christakis
Mastering - Mikey Young
Thanks also to Jens Ahlberg, Johan Hagler, Johan Samuelsson, Julius Pierstorff, Niels Nankler and Tom Gibbs.
Short and sweet, no wasted moments, subtle guitar lines make it easy to miss how inventive they are. I actually appreciate the live to tape recordings including whatever is going on in the background; it's not obtrusive. And some electronic dabbling. An intimate album fans of bedroom folk, Vashti Bunyan, etc will appreciate and love more with repeated listens. Anthony Childs