Laulu laakson kukasta

Review

This Finnish collective will appeal to those who think Björk isn't quite experimental enough.
One of the oddest of this decade’s Finnish groups (which is saying something), Paavoharju are a musical collective of born-again Christians formed around two brothers, Lauri and Oli Ainala. The title of Paavoharju’s sophomore release translates as A Song about Flowers of the Valley, and the album has the feel of a song cycle or opera — albeit one fractured by short interludes and sound collages. The occasional voiceover narration in their native tongue and fever-dream juxtapositions of computerized and acoustic sounds make listening to Laulu sort of like watching a science fiction movie about aliens landing on a post-apocalyptic shoreline.

The music is a fairy-tale mixture of laptops, pianos, music boxes and field recordings of forest animals. While Paavoharju are capable of a Leonard Cohen-style accordion waltz like “Italialaisella,” they're also not afraid to break out a big Europop number (“Uskalian”). “Kevatrumpu”’s tremulous female vocals and jingling organ even recalls the great '60s/'70s Danish cult band Savage Rose. Citing influences as disparate as Portishead, landscape painter Caspar David Friedrich, director Ingmar Bergman and black metal band Burzum, Paavoharju create a compelling meditation on the dilemma of being caught between both the natural and technological worlds and the experimental and commercial music worlds. Fans of Björk at her most eccentric would do well to seek this album out.