This blog is going to be a useful tool for me, I can already tell.
For example, I reviewed the double-CD compilation Ruskeatimantti, by Avarus, in 2005. I did not like it. I did not get it. I made fun of it, even. I probably called it a nonsensical melange of wailing, pan flutes and hand drums.
I was oh-so-goddamned-wrong. Yes, Ruskeatimantti is a lumbering bitch of a beast with about 36 pairs of arms/legs ready to rip your ear a new (b)asshole. Yes, this is hippy-commune fare to the extreme, the product of several Finlandians with minimal classical training getting together and letting shit fly.
But it’s much more than that. It’s an artifact, a record of a collective with boundless fantasies as to how out-there a hive-minded group of anti-musicians can get if they improvise with a communal head. Originally recorded and slapped onto a few CD-Rs and a 7″ or two, these sessions are a brute-force example of how much noise a dozen-or-more folkheads can make.
It’s surprising how intense a din they kick up, the sort of nasty dust clouds you might assume a group off the Load or Not Not Fun roster would kick up, or maybe a No Wave or Sonic Youth acolyte. It’s all represented here in one giant, baby-making thrust that seems to last FOREVER if you try to slog through both discs at once.
My suggestion? Listen to these discs in half-hour doses. Like a super-dense movie or a state-of-the-union-style meeting with a significant other, you’ll want to split Avarus up into bite-size chunks, as the meat starts hitting the wall quickly. That is, if you’re sober. If you’re drinking, smoking or chasing the dragon, Ruskeatimantti will work just fine all the way through, guiding you into corridors you’d dare not touch without Avarus as your guide.
