in Review

Sleep Inducing Psychedelia


Dungen – 4

So I guess were going to count Colin’s unofficial top ten from earlier this week, as well official. So today I give you my review of one the various albums I’ve picked up this “Rocktober” season.

Known in the past for their heavy excursions into the psychedelic, we have Swedish Indie rockers Dungen, pronounced “DOONG-UN” releasing their fifth album, curiously named “4”. Where musical aficionado/brain child Gustav Ejstes usually does all the recording himself, he’s finally let his backing band take to the studio as he’s limited himself to vocals, piano and strings. Dungen is always game for testing out new musical waters but I’m sad to say this time that they’ve gone soft and a little too soft for my liking.

My initial reaction to 4 was of confusion and disappointment. First realizing that there is very little if any hard rock songs present and second is the significant lack of vocals. A majority of the tunes here are no more than laid back jazz progressions on the piano muddled in a sea of reverb. There’s actually a few songs I rather like, they’re just kind of buried within a wall of muddled and unrealized experiments.

Listening to a few tracks on their own,some songs are fairly pleasant but as a whole it’s sleep inducing and highly forgettable. It’s weird that the album is significantly shorter than Dungen’s previous works but as well the most tiring. Hearing experienced musicians jam is fun for a little while, but I could get that anywhere. I used to think that Gustav Esjstes was some kind of songwriting wunderkind but I’m starting to think he’s getting somewhat burned out. Come to think of it his songs have been kind of waning since 2004’s Ta Det Lugnt which was easily his best work.

I still have plenty of hope that Gustav and the gang will keep mixing it up and come back to something I can enjoy, so this isn’t too discouraging. I just hope that they can realize that they’re much more impressive as a psychedelic hard rock band then a psychedelic jazz/prog rock band.

Favorite Tracks: “Satt Att Se”, “Det Tar Tid”, “Finns Det Nagon Mojlighet”

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