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Written in fRoots issue 325, 2010
 

DEN FULE
Halling I Köket
Footprint FRCD 048 (2010)

A reassuring return for one of the leading bands of Sweden’s hefty-roots period in the 1990s; no re-run, it’s a reboot that finds new idea-files.
      The line-up is a slightly slimmed-down version of the old one, now without vocals (no Henrik Wallgren), or designated fiddler (no Ola Bäckström nor Ellika Frisell), but guitarist Henrik Cederblom continues to do some fiddling. The main melody instruments are Jonas Simonson’s flutes and bass clarinet and Sten Källman’s soprano and baritone saxes, but it’s not a clear-cut case of melody plus accompaniment; Cederblom’s electric guitars and mandolin, Stefan Bergman’s bass and electric guitar, and Christian Jormin’s drums and percussion all contribute melodically too.
      While polska is the most prevalent dance-rhythm of Swedish roots music, the Norwegian/Swedish loping rhythm of halling has always been strong among the hefty bands, and so it is here, joined by schottis, shuffling waltz and Norwegian springleik.
Increasingly Swedish and Norwegian musicians in the course of their working musician lives play in African bands with African musicians – indeed here Boubacar Jagne guests on djembe – and picking up ideas for new ways to get inside Scandinavian dance rhythms. A prime example here is Glimten, where the guitar skips and skitters in a very African way, to a cricket-like guiro double-beat, joined by bubbling African-style bass and offset drum patterns, across which the sax and flute float and parallel-harmonise a melody written by bassist Bergman completely in the Swedish tradition, creating an impelling network of cross-rhythms.
      Elsewhere, as well as dance-swinging along in typical Den Fule house-style, tunes morph across genres: Grums/Delta moves from airily skipping and swung into deep-grinding reeds and slithering slide guitar southern-boogie, echoey deserted-dance-hall lead guitar is joined by breathy flute over an insistent riff in the sprung walking-rhythm of Cederblom’s Rökschottis (‘Smoke Schottis’).
      Welcome back, and to the 21st century, Den Fule.

      www.footprintrecords.com


© 2010 Andrew Cronshaw
 

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