textura

Albums
Alejandro & Aeron
Balustrade Ensemble
Jeremy Bible
F.S. Blumm
Cadence Weapon
Cataclyst
Cepia
Chloé
Cooler
Disinterested
edIT
Erik Enocksson
For Barry Ray
Ernest Gonzales
Grand National
Hakobune
Halou
Frode Haltli
Arve Henriksen
Ielasi & Ratti
Jumpel
Lawrence
Lickets
Manual
Melodium
Mono
My Fun
Marissa Nadler
Prints
Rekalix
Remote_ vs Ontayso
Will Saul
Sixtoo
Small Sails
Songs Of Green Pheasant
Christian Wallumrød
White Rainbow
Xeltrei
Yndi Halda

Compilations / Mixes
Paolo Mojo
Ewan Pearson
VA: 5 Years Get Physical
VA: Monza Vol. 2
VA: U-cover mix 01 [a]
VA: U-cover mix 02 [d]

3"/ 7"/ 10"/ 12"/ EPs
Ateleia
Pier Bucci
Cio D'Or
Cloudland Canyon
Curium
Laurine Frost
Dave Graham
Hakobune
The Infant Cycle
Lerosa
Lullaby Leagure
Mole Harness
Mowbray & Sullivan
Ontayso
School of Seven Bells
Science Teacher
Sleep Robot
Unwed Sailor
VA: Spies & Lies
Rick Wade

Yndi Halda: Enjoy Eternal Bliss
Burnt Toast Vinyl / Big Scary Monsters

Name the ‘instrumental rock' group renowned for twenty-minute epics saturated with euphoric peaks and restful valleys and that features a front line of guitar and violin backed by a powerhouse rhythm section. Yndi Halda (Old Norse for ‘enjoy eternal bliss') might not be the first answer that springs to mind but the quartet satisfies the criteria just the same. But don't dismiss the Kingsdown, UK-based quintet—James Vella (aka A Lily) and Jack Lambert on guitars, Daniel Neal on violin, and Brendan Grieve and Oliver Newton on bass and drums—as a Godspeed You! Black Emperor clone as there are differences, probably the major one a fundamental difference in tone: where Godspeed in its quieter passages is somber and funereal, Yndi Halda—on its full-length debut, Enjoy Eternal Bliss, at least—is melancholy but not bereft, and, in fact, often pretty.

There's nothing unbearable about the group's lightness of being, though. “Dash and Blast” begins the hour-long album peacefully with a gentle whisper, then jolts to attention, slowly sets out on its long journey led by the yearning cry of Neal's crying violin, and then—just as one expects it will—detonates with an epic guitar wail. But though the upward trajectory is predictable, the stabbing crescendo is nonetheless awesome in its power and intensity—explosions in the sky indeed (though hard to imagine, that moment might be trumped by the lethal roar stoked halfway through the closing piece “Illuminate My Heart, My Darling”). In actual fact, though, it's the quieter passages where the group impresses as much if not more, as it's in such moments that its compositions' lyrical character comes most vividly to the forefront. When shredded guitars incinerate “We Flood Empty Lakes,” for instance, the firestorm is magnificent but the piece remains just as affecting when a gentle violin and glockenspiel rise from the ashes following the cataclysm. Similarly, the lulling flow the violin and banjo bring to the haunting intro of “A Song for Starlit Beaches” deserves mention, as does the gorgeous hymnal passage that surfaces three-quarters of the way through (Neal's violin playing, one might add, is a constant source of pleasure throughout). The band members are all in their early twenties, so let's hope Enjoy Eternal Bliss earmarks the first stop on what promises to be a multi-album trip worth taking.

October 2007