By:Larm 2009

Pitching itself somewhere between the urban sprawl of the Camden Crawl and the industry heavy In The City, Scandinavia’s By:Larm festival arrives this year back in Oslo with four days of gigs spread across the city centre crossing borders both geographical and musical with a massive array of music on show. When your seeing dozens of bands in such a short space of time it gets tricky to keep up (hence the beauty of the mp3 blog we ran over at thenationalstudentatbylarm.blogspot.com so taking a deep breath… here goes…

 

 

Day One sees us slipping out of the snow and into some kind of country and western based parallel universe as local boys Little Hands of Asphalt kick proceedings off with a literate set of Bright Eyes-esque alt folk - all swooning vocals and pedal steel – before Lucky Lips go further back to the likes of Dolly Parton for inspiration in turning in a polished (if “by numbers”) set of vintage country and western.

Heading back to the centre of town, Norway’s Bellman, throw in a set of epic, widescreen acoustic balladry while hotly tipped Sally Suicide disappoint with half an hour of lumpen electro pop that ends with the vocalist making his guitar sound like a seal.

Meanwhile next door Lydia Laska turn things up with a, heavy as you like, show of punk metal. At one point the vocalist puts down his megaphone to put his attentions into whipping the guitarist… surreal and mind numbingly loud it’s a surprise highlight of the evening. Moving into the annex Underwater Sleeping Society pull some great post-Radiohead shapes without ever really impacting while Iceland’s Hjatalin throw a bassoon against some quirky Kings of Leon tinged numbers to steal the show from right under the nose of countrymen Retro Stefson who flit from rock to ska to pop on a skateboard of parping synths.

Meanwhile at Gamla Little Steven (Bruce Springsteen / The Sopranos) is running a showcase for his Wicked Cool records which sees the likes of recent signings The Cocktail Slippers revisit the highlights of garage rock’s past with turbo charged sets that end the night on something of a Cadillac-toting high.

With the snow mercifully staying away for Day Two, things get off to a decidedly noisy start with Merlin’s set of classic rock informed emo (think Thursday playing Aerosmith songs and you’re getting there) and shoegazing quintet Simon Says No! who whip up a feedback laden maelstrom of My Bloody Valentine dynamics and Jesus and Mary Chain noise.

Meanwhile across town, backed by mandolin and banjo, local chanteuse Sailorine gets the place stomping along to her quirky blend of bluegrass tinged folk. Back in the Kongressenter Iceland’s Olafur Arnalds calms everyone down with a beautifully poised set of classically tinged ambience. Joined at the piano by a string quartet and with a tasteful smattering of glitches and beats Arnalds has already sold out the Barbican and toured with countrymen Sigur Ros – on the evidence of tonight’s show were going to be hearing a lot more from this young man in the coming months.

Swedish sisters First Aid Kit prove to be one of the highlights of the evening with a well judged set of perfectly harmonised ballads (including their calling card covers of Fleet Foxes and Bob Dylan) to a packed out crowd while in the huge tent occupying the main square in Oslo It’s Fjorden Baby throw all kind of happy Mondays shapes (including some truly terrible neon t shirts) which for all its guitary bluster never seems to get very far. Finishing up the evenings festivities are The Alexandria Quartet who’s well received indie pop throws up a couple of arms in the air ballads as well as some serious Snow Patrol tinged rockers to provide an unexpectedly euphoric end to proceedings.

With the snow firmly back in abundance Day Three dawns and kicks off with Cyaneed’s one-dimensional take on riot grrrrl punk, taking its cues from the likes of Hole and Bikini Kill it’s all a bit thin of execution and has us hankering with some serious noise. Providing just the kind of kick in the head we need, Blodspor and Haust both deploy blistering sets to the gathered metal heads at Sub Scene. Even for two bands who bill themselves as “necro/sludge” these are both staggeringly loud sets as Double bass drums and low-down guitars combine with devastating effect. Akin to the sound of a tank reversing through a plate glass window it’s an hour that leaves our ears ringing and glad to stumble across local girl Storvor Vermeer in the Auditorium who soothes the audience with a gossamer voice and a handful of piano led numbers before the band arrives behind her and lifts the set to a nerve tingling crescendo; Vermeer, eyes closed at the piano swaying in the whirling wash of indie pop filling the room.  

As the headliners begin to take to the stage the busiest ticket in town is Erland Oye’s Whitest Boy Alive who despite treading a fine line between terminally naff and achingly cool cut some excellent “dad dancing” moves in a robo funk set that sees the weeks first encore granted as the local boy returns to a heroes welcome. Following the party funk climax of WBA’s set was never going to be easy and sadly Lindstrom fails to capitalise on the party mood with an interesting if underwhelming set of laptop led dance. Live dance never really works in this kind of venue and it’s a sadly anticlimactic end to the evening.

Back in the main tent however Danish three piece WhoMadeWho know a few things about starting a party and so their dance/metal riffing brings the curtain down (quite literally – the tent has sprung a leak and is emptying gallons of water into the room underneath) with a wonderfully oddball set of house tunes played by a funk metal monster, they even include a wonderfully bonkers cover of Beni Benassis’ “Satisfaction” to bring the curtain down on what has been a great week of live music. As we scamper away from the impending scene of ‘Norway’s biggest tent based’ disaster our ears are ringing and our wallets are hurting but nevertheless it’s been quite something.

Add to all of this music, the fact that due to some clever programming of set times and close locations of all the venues the festival is a dream to get around and it’s been one hell of a week.

It’s clear that the rich heritage of Scandinavian music is in safe hands with some of these acts and if there’s any justice some of them will be heading to a venue near you very soon.

by Ben Mainwaring