Museum Musica

Finland, 2003, avant-prog

Alamaailman Vasarat – Käärmelautakunta: This Finnish avant-prog is a pleasure to listen to. It’s got a mix of European folk, jazz, metal, and even a little known genre called klezmer, the traditional music of the Ashkenazi Jews of Eastern Europe, giving this album a strong ethnic underpinning, allowing the metal and jazz elements to explore what the folk has to offer at its core. I cannot be unhappy when the energy of the faster tracks overwhelms me, and in the album’s slower bits, I feel like a force is spinning me slowly and deliberately in a circle. Perhaps that’s the Jewish element.