Browse by Label: SILENCE (SWEDEN)

Artist:	HANSSON, BO
Title:	Sagan Om Ringen
Label:	SILENCE (SWEDEN)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	SRSCD 3600CD

Silence back catalog finally available again! Reissue of what was the first ever release on Silence, initially issued in 1970. This was also the first Bo Hansson album, the Swedish legend known to be one of the earliest to place "space music". Produced as a tribute to the Tolkien trilogy, this is stunning instrumental psychedelic music, with plush atmospherics -- Don't Fear The Hobbit! This version is the original Swedish titled version, with one bonus track ("Tidiga skisser Från Midgård"); there is also an English-titled version with different bonus tracks. This is a digitally remastered issue from 2001. Performed by: Bo Hansson (Organs, guitar, moog, bass), Rune Carlsson (drums, congas), Gunnar Bergsten (saxophone), Sten Bergman (flute). "Lord of the Rings was released late in the fall of 1970 and became an immediate success. Bo himself was in the midst of a very creative period, new melodies were constantly popping up in his head, so when Lord of the Rings finally got released in other countries there were already three more tracks added compared to the first Swedish issue. In the encyclopedia Guide to Progressive Rock, Bo Hansson is mentioned with reverence and respect. He is the first to play 'space music', he is a precursor to the French prog-celebrities Gong and English Henry Cow, and contemporary style-formers as Genesis and Yes. Bo Hansson is an innovator in the most noble sense of the word."

Artist:	GUDIBRALLAN
Title:	T-Doja
Label:	SILENCE (SWEDEN)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	SRSCD 3601CD

2002 reissue of the first two Gudibrallan albums, Uti var Hage (the first ever Silence label album, originally issued in 1970) and Gudibrallan II (1971), with a bonus track. Gudibrallan was the very first punk band in Sweden and that was long before the word was even invented! They had the perfect punk-rock attitude: no one could really play and some friends, or any one who felt like it, used to join them on stage. They made fun of the intellectual left wing and the government and they showed solidarity with the lowest dregs of society. They didn't exactly try to hide their opinions; they shouted them out loudly and straight on, no poetry. Gudibrallan could be one of the reasons why the Silence label was investigated by the S-PO (The Swedish CIA) for years.

Artist:	TRAD, GRAS OCH STENAR
Title:	Träd Gräs och Stenar
Label:	SILENCE (SWEDEN)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	SRSCD 3602CD

1995 reissue of the first Träd Gräs och Stenar album, originally issued on the Decibel label in Sweden in 1970. Their name translates to "trees, grass & stones." A rock group led by Bo Anders Persson (after his works with Pärson Sound, Harvester, International Harvester), this was their first of three albums, a definitely more "rockist" continuation of the post-minimalist experiments of the earlier groups, but still with that undefinable Swedish underground feeling. Similar in vibe to the live document on Subliminal Sounds, Gardet 12.6.1970. This will be the only record in your collection to start off with covers of "All Along The Watchtower" and "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction" that you won't want to kill somebody with. Totally heavy Swedish underground rock from the dawn of the era.

Artist:	SAMLA MAMMAS MANNA
Title:	Samla Mammas Manna
Label:	SILENCE (SWEDEN)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	SRSCD 3603CD

Exacting reissue of the 1970 debut album by this trailblazing Swedish quartet, led by composer/pianist/organist/accordionist/vocalist Lasse "Lars" Hollmer, just prior to any knowledge of anything called "RIO" (Rock In Opposition). Formed in the late late '60s in Uppsala, SMM canvassed the festival circuit (appearing on the same bill that Träd Gräs och Stenar recorded their mammoth Live Gardet 1970 album) to popular and critical appeal. Later SMM would team up with groups like Henry Cow and such to affix a politically-bent moniker to their particularly labyrinthine chord progressions. Here we get a few prog-polkas for the kids, a bit of tasteful Rhodes bob, a few Swedish-folk sounding numbers, a fast carnival segue or two, near Deep Purplesque organ snaking, etc... Altogether pleasing, crude at points, plenty of humor, handclapping.

Artist:	SAMLA MAMMAS MANNA
Title:	Måltid
Label:	SILENCE (SWEDEN)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	SRSCD 3604CD

The second Samla Mammas Manna album, originally issued by Silence in 1973. With two bonus tracks. Two more albums would follow on Silence under this spelling of the name, then they would change it to Zamla Mammaz Manna and finally, Von Zamla, going into the mid-'80s. This group falls well into the "progressive weirdness" category that Gong, Area, and Pell Mell were part of. While some of the many short tracks have a considerable amount of "noise" (screechy vocals, strange sounds), the band has, not unlike Gong, a killer musicianship that makes Måltid a listenable (and enjoyable) offering. Not unlike early Magma or Moving Gelatine Plates, but with more of a sense of humor.

Artist:	KEBNEKAJSE
Title:	Resa Mot Okänt Mål
Label:	SILENCE (SWEDEN)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	SRSCD 3606CD

First ever reissue of the first three Kebnekajse albums on Silence. This debut album (the title translates to (Journey to Destination Unknown) was originally issued in 1971. Liner notes for these three are in Swedish only, but English translations can be found on http://www.silence.se/nyheter/english.htm. Kebnekajse were a loud and hard Swedish rock band. References abound from Cream, Mountain, November and even Jimi Hendrix in a perfect amalgam of British hard rock and psychedelia from the American west coast enhanced by cryptic Swedish lyrics. There is something unmistakably Swedish in Kenny Håkansson's way of handling his guitar -- something unspecified, a tone, a Nordic mood. Kebnekajse did not play electric blues, or have its roots in Afro-American music but was rather torn up and then replanted into the Swedish soil --just to see if it could grow and flourish. Their name is taken from Kebnekaise, the highest mountain in Sweden.

Artist:	PHILEMON ARTHUR AND THE DUNG
Title:	Musikens Historia Del 1 Och 2
Label:	SILENCE (SWEDEN)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	SRSCD 3607CD

CD release from 1992 which compiles the complete works of this strange Swedish duo, including their lone self-titled LP release from 1972 (which supposedly won a Grammy in Sweden and is considered "the most cult album in Sweden ever") and a cassette-only follow up from 1987 (sounds like outtakes of the '72 sessions). The group is two Swedish males, who apparently have never been positively identified. The music they perform is in the realms of experimental folk-rock, with the opening track "In Kommer Gösta" featuring a devastating Godz-like brilliance (easily one of the most memorable tracks in the entire Silence catalog). Shakers, wobbly effects, lethargic acoustic guitars, bedroom percussion and one of the most idiosyncratic band names ever -- for shambling stoner nonsense, this is Sweden's finest entry into the field by far.

Artist:	KEBNEKAJSE
Title:	II
Label:	SILENCE (SWEDEN)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	SRSCD 3608CD

First reissue of the second Kebnekajse album, originally issued on Silence in 1973. "It was something in the air," said Kenny Håkansson in the booklet to their first album Resa Mot Okänt Mål (Journey to Destination Unknown). He was then referring to the Swedish lyrics and the name of the group. In the early '70s Swedish folk music was also "in the air." The progressive rock history book Scented Gardens Of The Mind says of this time-period: "...a clear change of direction towards a new kind of Swedish folk-rock with fiddle and electric guitar to the fore, but it also added the hot African percussion of Hassan Bah and jazzy experimentation." This is exactly the type of recording Kebnekajse hoped for with their second release: country fiddles flirting with jazz rock and plenty of African beats.

Artist:	KEBNEKAJSE
Title:	III
Label:	SILENCE (SWEDEN)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	SRSCD 3609CD

This is the first reissue of the third Kebnekajse album, originally issued by Silence in 1975. Kebnekajse's music ignored traditional musical boundaries (which must be a hallmark of the term "progressive music"). III continued very much in the same vein, but this time with a more sharply honed politicized edge. This was programmatic, instrumental music with a message. Here you'll find mostly folk tunes but also an instrumental country tune by Kenny called "S:t John" and Ingemar's instrumental ballad called "Balladen Om Björnbär Och Nätmelon" ("The Ballad of Blackberries and Netmelon"), where jazz and rock are glued together by a pure, Swedish folk-tone. The album is finished with an African melody "Mariamá!" pointing towards the next album Ljus Från Afrika (Lights from Africa).

Artist:	ZAMLA MAMMAZ MANNA
Title:	Schlagerns Mystik
Label:	SILENCE (SWEDEN)
Format:	2CD
Price:	$20.00
Catalog #:	SRSCD 3610CD

Year 2003 reissue of this 1978 double album. Members of Zamla Mammaz Manna included: Hans Bruniusson (drums, xylophone, chimes, vibraphone, song), Eino Haapala (electric guitar, acoustic guitar, vibraphone, song), Lars Hollmer (electric piano, Korg polyphonic, Hohner-symphonic grand piano, accordion, song), Lars Krantz (electric bass, double-bass, acoustic guitar, song). Samla Mammas Manna started in the early '70s and are still a vivid band. This is their second name in their three different progressive guises, reflecting the beginning of their more experimental aspects. This intense and energetic music is filled with happy pranks and fast turnings and has for more than 25 years amused its listeners all over the world. This double album consists of an album of live improvisations from 1977 and an album of more typical Samla/Zamla material, although with more of a folky influence that shows through more than ever before. Frontman Lars Hollmer has beside his solo career also been part of several international musical constellations (Ramlösa Kvällar, Fem Söker En Skatt, Accordion Tribe).

Artist:	ALGARNAS TRADGARD
Title:	Framtiden är ett Svävande Skepp, Förankrat i Forntiden
Label:	SILENCE (SWEDEN)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	SRSCD 3611CD

1995 reissue of this Silence album, originally issued in 1972. Älgarnas Trädgård's name translates as "Garden of the Elks" and this debut album has always stood as one of the pinnacles of underground psychedelic rock -- comparable to early Pink Floyd, Group 1850 and other world masters of space-out genius. The title translates as The Future is a Hovering Ship Anchored in the Past. The group employed an instrumental array made of: violins, rebec, cello, guitars, sitar, piano, zither, organ flutes, zinks, jew's harps, tablas, percussion, Moog-synthesizer & VC-3 Putney-synthesizer. Recorded at Studio Decibel in 1971, this CD reissue adds two bonus live tracks from 1972. From Dan Söderqvist's notes: "We have known each other since 1968, when we met in our home neighborhood Västra Frölunda, Gothenburg. We listened to everything; Perotinus heavenly choirs from the 13th century, Messien's heavy works for orchestra, Beefheart's Safe as Milk, with it's surreal lyrics, King Crimson's endless string of chords, the beautiful acoustic Third Ear Band, Terry Riley's minimalism and above all the psychedelic music of early Pink Floyd. Sometimes we played our 'dägga-däng-music', crazy rhythmical plays with acoustic guitars and hysterical giggles. Sometimes we just sat and listened to the sounds slowly disappearing into space ... We experimented with getting strange sounds out of our instruments, started to use amplifiers and played with echoes ... We constantly expanded our possibilities to get new sounds, with organs, mouth harps and pedals ... We got our hands on the first Moog module system that just about had reached Sweden. We mixed Middle Age instruments such as zinks and rebecs, sound effects, church bells, fragments of both Bach and The Beatles and improvised our way through the first album."

Artist:	ZAMLA MAMMAZ MANNA
Title:	Familjesprickor
Label:	SILENCE (SWEDEN)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	SRSCD 3612CD

Their third album under their second band name, originally issued by Silence in 1980, now reissued. Familjesprickor (Family Cracks) was the last album recorded by Zamla Mammaz Manna, until the group went back to their original name. This release was recorded over a long period of overseas touring and affiliation with Chris Cutler's Rock in Opposition project, and the results are reflected. Zamla lost their original drummer, Hans Bruniusson, and was replaced by Vilgot Hansson, with the band duly noting in the liner notes "a period of transition," with the music not as "optimistic and happy" as on previous releases. This is by far the most avant prog release from the Samla/Zamla body of work -- Familjesprickor is a tense mixture of Henry Cow-like jams, interspersed with frenetic cartoon piano, hyperkinetic rhythms, and high-energy weird folk. Recorded March to June 1980 in the Cocky Chickenhouse, Uppsala, Strassbourg, France and Germany. Mixed at the Silence Studios, Värmland, Sweden.

Artist:	INTERNATIONAL HARVESTER
Title:	Sov Gott Rose-Marie
Label:	SILENCE (SWEDEN)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	SRSCD 3614CD

First ever CD reissue of this all-time Swedish underground classic, originally issued on the Scandinavian Love label in 1968. International Harvester were the second incarnation of Bo Anders Persson's group, after Pärson Sound (whose early sound experimentation was finally documented in 2001 by Subliminal Sounds). Early in the 60's Bo Anders Persson had envisioned a new kind of communicative music -- would it be possible to create a more contemporary kind of rhythmic music that could play the same role as traditional folk music, a music that was both sensual and transcendent? In 1967 came the answer. The hypnotic feelings of Terry Riley's eternity music + the rough-riffing of The Rolling Stones = a new alchemical wedding. Pärson Sound was formed, which started to perform publicly in the summer of 1967. The next year they changed the name into International Harvester, taken from the American company manufacturing agricultural machines, trucks and ambulances. The astonishing thing about their two official recordings is the complete freedom of the music, inspired by a Terry Riley-esque repetitive song structure. The atmospheres of these songs are both utopian and dystopian, mixed with an early environmental awareness. Sov Gott Rose-Marie starts with the strongest of statements: the Latin death hymn "Dies Irae," played like it was a medieval heavy rock-theme. This was music of turmoil and inner upheaval, mostly played in the slowest of rhythms, but still with a sense of constant change. There's constant juxtapositions going on between documentary sounds and floating states of mind; hard rocking tunes, demonstrations against the war in Vietnam, bird song, sounds from police radio, psychedelic tranquility, lullabies.

Artist:	HANSSON, BO
Title:	Ur Trollkarlens Hatt
Label:	SILENCE (SWEDEN)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	SRSCD 3615CD

2002 remastered version with extensive (Swedish-only!?) liner notes of the 2nd Bo Hansson album. More elevating and plush psychedelics, ala Lord Of The Rings. With 2 bonus tracks. "By 1972, as his first album was being promoted worldwide to critical acclaim, Hansson had already recorded his second album titled, Magician's Hat or Ur Trollkarlens Hatt (in Swedish). This time round all recordings were at Studio Decibel, Stockholm with the services of Lind, Carlsson, Bergman and Bergsten retained from the Lord Of The Rings album. More importantly, the sound was further augmented with the introduction of a guitarist (Kenny Håkansson).

Artist:	HARVESTER
Title:	Hemåt
Label:	SILENCE (SWEDEN)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	SRSCD 3616CD

2001 CD reissue of this psychedelic underground masterpiece from 1970, with a 12-page booklet, including English liner notes and photos. Includes one bonus track not found on the original LP. Recorded 1968-69, digitally remastered in 2001. The lone album by this post-International Harvester group, originally issued in 1970, once again led by the academic tape-composer turned radical folkie psychedelicist Bo Anders Persson. Accompanied by an able body of co-conspirators including Thomas Gartz (drummer/glue of the Mecki Mark Men, whose LPs on the Limelight label are not to be missed), Torbjörn Abelli, and let's not forget Ulla on small cymbals. Thunder-plod of magnificent tidal proportions, recalling the burnt splendor of the Träd Gräs och Stenar Live Gardet 1970 set -- TGOS in fact were nothing more than a stripped down quartet version of Harvester! Another piece to the incestuous little jigsaw that was the 1967-1972 Swedish druggist music school dropout sector. Completely burnt, devoid of restraint, massive (some of the best sounding drums this side of Zeppelin, to boot). Blown through and through and through.

Artist:	SAMLA MAMMAS MANNA
Title:	Klossa Knapitatet
Label:	SILENCE (SWEDEN)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	SRSCD 3617CD

Their third album, originally issued by Silence in 1974, now reissued. Klossa Knapitatet is one of Samla's most exuberant excursions into fusion/avant-garde jazz-prog. A heady mix of Zappa-esque ridiculousness, Scandinavian folk, bent guitar, tinkering piano, circus music, cheeky accordion serenades and yodeling, this is Samla bending all rules and being totally bonkers. For fans of Måltid, but with more electric guitars and high-pitched vocals.

Artist:	HANSSON, BO
Title:	Mellnväsen
Label:	SILENCE (SWEDEN)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	SRSCD 3625CD

"Hansson's third album, which according to many music aficionados was his strongest in musical terms, was released in 1973 as Mellnväsen on the Silence Records label; later issued with the English title Attic Thoughts. Much of the album was recorded at Hansson's home which had become virtually a studio with much of the same line-up of musicians/friends who had played on Magician's Hat. With this album Hansson confirmed his maturity as a musical composer, managing to slowly build upon his body of works without losing that feeling of a fairy-tale atmosphere, his trademark sound which was essentially laid down on his debut album."

Artist:	ALGARNAS TRADGARD
Title:	Delayed
Label:	SILENCE (SWEDEN)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	SRSCD 3626CD

2001 release of what was the 2nd Algarnas Tradgard album; originally recorded in 1973-74, but never released (until this CD rescued these recordings from oblivion). Exact same lineup as witnessed on their epic debut from 1972 Framtiden Är Ett Svävande Skepp, Förankrat I Forntiden (or The Future is a Hovering Ship Anchored in the Past). And what a fantastic offering...it slowly extends into meta-improvisations with distant guitars, heavily effected organs, swirling strings, plenty of space, reaching an early peak-build amidst the detritus floating through the 12-minute "Interstellar Cruise." Later, an Eastern-themed campfire freakout (sitars, tablas, Yod-chant) breaks out, then a bit of the mellow reverbed flute, later still a long vocal loop fade out over some well placed drones. One could say this record has a bit of everything. One would be correct. Astonishing that it has lain dormant in the vaults for so long.

Artist:	PHILEMON ARTHUR AND THE DUNG
Title:	The Very Pest of Philemon Arthur and the Dung
Label:	SILENCE (SWEDEN)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	SRSCD 3627CD

Swedish title: Far Jag Spy I Ditt Paraply. Philemon Arthur and the Dung turned the music industry upside-down in 1972 by getting a Grammy award for "Best Swedish LP" and the music industry stopped the Grammy galas for 15 years in protest! They decided to start recording again in 1987, and this time it was a cassette packed in a tin can. Not very many people heard the songs on the cassette since they didn't want to open the can....and the music industry was relieved. These 20 brand songs were recorded between 1967-1972 in the bedroom of Philemon Arthur, and also included are the rest of the 11 songs from the cassette. Just for your pleasure and wisdom. Still, nobody knows who they are. But they send their greeting.

Artist:	TURID
Title:	I Retur
Label:	SILENCE (SWEDEN)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	SRSCD 3629CD

A compilation featuring one of Sweden's best female singer/songwriters of the '70s. Turid became famous in the underground of Stockholm as a Swedish Buffy Saint Marie or a Lotte Lenya or a Joni Mitchell. Her voice has been described as "a thin thread of gold." She won a radio competition and was soon noticed outside the underground. She was chased by the bigger record companies but took a stand and chose Silence that just had started, and in 1971 her first record Vittras Visor hit the desks. She worked with the finest musicians around at the time, such as Kenny Håkansson (Kebnekajse), Björn Jason Lindh and Palle Danielsson. This record is half in English and half in Swedish. Silence released two more albums -- Bilder in 1973 and Tredje Dagen in 1975 before moving out to the countryside. Even if you don't understand her brilliant and poetic lyrics you can still enjoy this record and her beautiful voice and music. This release compiles the most and the best of the three albums and carefully tried to restore the sound quality. Famously referenced in the Swedish hippie-cult-classic film Together by director Lukas Moodysson, Turid represents a certain flowery apex and fans of eccentric folk vocalists such as Linda Perhacs, Vashti Bunyan, Karen Dalton & Joanna Newsom ought to investigate.

Artist:	TRAD, GRAS OCH STENAR
Title:	Ain Schvajn Draj
Label:	SILENCE (SWEDEN)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	SRSCD 4758CD

New reunion album, recorded 1998-2001! Featuring original members Bo Anders Persson, Tobjörn Abelli & Thomas Gartz (all related to: Harvester, International Harvester, Pärson Sound). This is a layered, textural rock record that draws its sound and meaning from the transitory places where the songs were recorded. A horse pasture electrical fence produced impulses on the recorded the tape, sounding like a stuttering metronome. A few tunes were recorded in a room in an old Öllösa school outside Stjärnhov. All the instrumentals were created at the very moment, the result of an accidental alchemist occurrence -- a meeting of four old men at the crossroads of an imaginary landscape. Ain Schvajn Draj is what ran out of the test tubes after Thomas Mera's experiments with cloning TGS. These recordings were made by Träd Gräs och Stenar during several occasions from 1998-2001 on 2 ADAT tape recorders.

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