Jaakko Eino Kalevi – Dreamzone

I get the feeling that I’ll get addicted to the LP when it comes out, as there is this nagging sense that Jaakko is onto something. Lord knows what.

I get the feeling that I’ll get addicted to the LP when it comes out, as there is this nagging sense that Jaakko is onto something. Lord knows what.

http://www.weirdworldrecordco.com http://www.v2benelux.com

I’m not sure what to make of this short EP /LP “taster”, frankly. I could list a whole set of descriptive words to emphasise that I haven’t a clue, or got a definitive handle as to what’s going on. Here’s some. We could say that Jaakko’s Dreamzone EP is morose, bland, quirky, funny, lugubrious, lazy, average, camp, interesting, droney, derivative, clever. I mean is it really worth my time writing much about it? Maybe. I just feel it’s worth noting that I’m annoyed by this short, pithy EP where you feel enchanted, but mugged at the same time.

Sonically, the EP has a lot of similarities with stuff you can hear on Norway’s Small Town Supersound label, an act like Meanderthals for instance. It’s maybe the groovy, soi distant indolence that a track like Memories gives off, or that soft rock, electro/jazz sound that is the basis for all these tracks. It’s slightly kitsch too; kitsch and retro in the sense that John Maus can be, and in When You Walk Through Them All, you have a strange sort of preacherman vibe tacked onto this perfectly pleasant, suburban, bedsit take on Thriller. It also reminds me of some of the more camp things that Lindstrom does. Uu Uu Uu has a smidgeon of John Shuttleworth in there as well a sort of bedroom take on Edgar Froese’s solo stuff. But Jaakko’s world seems to be very insular one, wrapped in some fuzzy, fuggy marshlight that sometimes enchants (as in No End where Jaakko duets with Suad Khalifa) and sometimes annoys or puzzles.

I get the feeling that I’ll get addicted to the LP when it comes out, as there is this nagging sense that Jaakko is onto something. Lord knows what.