Dungen - 'Skit I Allt' (Subliminal Sounds) Released 30/08/10

In some parallel universe, Dungen may at this very moment be drawing
huge throngs into sizeable arenas, having followed their (deservedly) wildly acclaimed retro-rock breakthrough ‘Tar Det Lungt’ (2004) with more of the same, accompanied by an international market-friendly language switch from the band’s native Swedish to English.

In our realm, however, bandleader Gustav Ejstes responded to the undoubted pressure to boost the band’s profile in the short-term with the most obvious means by echoing the title of this, Dungen’s sixth album (‘Skit I Allt’ translates roughly as ‘to hell with it’). Out went most of the scorching Hendrixian fireworks and vintage psych-rock extravaganzas, replaced by a striking, genuinely one-off blend of bucolic jazz polyrhythms, soaring pop melodies, hazy folk-rock and occasional forays into brain-scrambling freak-outs. The process culminated on 2008’s ‘4’, a slow-burning masterpiece and surely one of the more criminally unsung albums of recent years.

‘Skit I Allt’ proves the stunning strike-rate of its predecessor was no fluke.
The musical points of reference remain the same, as does Ejstes’s hip hop-and electronica-inspired obsession with texture and combining unpredictable elements on the arrangement department – for example, flute and strings jostle for the spotlight with the more conventional electric guitar on the jaw-dropping, The Who playing rough with ‘Bryter Layter’ instrumental ‘Vara Snabb’.

This time, though, building blocks are used more sparingly, resulting in the superb ‘Min Enda Vän’, which carves considerable atmospherics from little more than ghostly handclaps, Reine Fiske’s characteristically brilliant, spidery guitar lines and a dreamily ascending melody. As such, the album can at first appear deceptively subdued, but the detail-heavy tracks soon reveal ample riches.

Songwriter, arranger and producer Ejstes remains the undisputed chief, but the Dungen of 2010 is unquestionably a proper working band. Paradoxically, then, whilst the powerhouse stomps of ‘Tar Det Lungt’ – normally the kind of stuff you’d credit to a tight-knit group – was largely Ejstes’s solo project, the less high-octane, carefully orchestrated cuts found here are the work of a real living and breathing four-piece, their seamless teamwork injecting an organic pulse and sense of spontaneity into tracks such as the lovely ‘Nästa Sommar’ and the majestic closer ‘Marken Lag Stilla’, which could’ve easily otherwise collapsed
under their painstaking arrangements. Of the other highpoints, it’s impossible to argue with the sprightly power-pop of the title track and the superlative-exhausting, spooky folk-funk instrumental ‘Blandband’, which is driven into ever-headier gallop.