Sontag Shogun - Valo Siroutuu '2022

Tracks list

       Valo Siroutuu ("The Light Scatters") is a collaborative song cycle
written on and for the island of Kimitoön, Finland. Incorporating in-situ
field recordings, impromptu outdoor songwriting, contemplative and patient
chamber arrangements and lyrics delivered both in Finnish and English, the album
thematically pursues observations of and meditations on place, time, nature,
home, play, and language. Less a record of songs and more a continued, braided
rope of ephemeral moments and turbid musical events, this work exists in a
suspended dream or flow state, billowing up momentarily like wind breezing
through spruce leaves or cresting over like the initial breaking waves of an
oncoming high tide, yet always eventually rippling out back into quietude and
solace like the patient floating fractures of light scattered across water's
surface.

"Valo Siroutuu (The Light Scatters) begins with endearing sounds: a
child’s voice, a badminton game. Guitar plays; water splashes; a bell
rings; birds tweet; cars pass. How can one not love this album? And it’s
only just begun. As is typical for Sontag Shogun, the sound design is
spectacular, with full use of the stereo field... As their sonic world expands
on “Leikkikalu” (“Toy”), we begin to drift backwards
into nostalgia and forwards into hope... Light comes into play midway, the
closing lyrics of the title track leading to “Suddenly This Darkness Comes
Over Your Face,” the repeated title battling the perky music. It’s
as if the observer knows the darkness will not last. The song summons the mood
of late 2019, and is extended on “On Perceiving Time,” but
forestalled by a return to intimate sounds such as piano, rooster and cat (none
are hurt) and a feeling that the light scattered is being collected." – A
Closer Listen

"One of the year’s most enchanting collaborative records... Valo Siroutuu
is alive. Beyond the lilting soundscapes and hushed vocals, the sound of
children playing, obscured conversations, or scratchy footsteps are the living,
breathing tendrils spreading into infinite directions. Questions become
assertions; conjectures become memories... The way Valo Siroutuu springs from
spacious, emotive sonic environments to intimate vignettes adds to the feeling
that this is a sprawling life story; the narrative of a place through time.
“Kuiskaan Itseleni” begins with bubbling modular synthesizer and
acoustic guitar laying a latticework of aural mycelium that spreads wildly into
verdant swathes. Lau Nau’s voice flickers, breaking off pieces of the
primordial web so that the distant path can drift forward, becoming ingrained in
the sounds of tomorrow." – Foxy Digitalis 

Laura Naukkarinen - vocals, violin, modular synth, glockenspiel
Jesse Perlstein - vocals, synths, field recordings, tape
Jeremy Young - guitar, oscillators, radio, amplified objects, tape
Ian Temple - piano, Moog minitaur

Tracklist:
1 01. Sontag Shogun - Badminton Motif (02:20)
1 02. Sontag Shogun - Leikkikalu (04:45)
1 03. Sontag Shogun - Dusk Bells (01:27)
1 04. Sontag Shogun - Valo Siroutuu (06:36)
1 05. Sontag Shogun - Suddenly, This Darkness Comes Over Your Face (05:06)
1 06. Sontag Shogun - Hämeentie (01:05)
1 07. Sontag Shogun - On Perceiving Time (06:12)
1 08. Sontag Shogun - Aaltoja (01:08)
1 09. Sontag Shogun - Hidas Laulu (04:27)
1 10. Sontag Shogun - Kuiskaan Itselleni (04:59)
1 11. Sontag Shogun - Hares Motif (02:00)
1 12. Sontag Shogun - Trampoliinilla Ikuisuuteen (03:33) 

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