Customer Reviews

Tra

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Gods? Yes, Gods. Hallbus Mattson, Bjorn Tollin, and Anders Stake are the music gods of Sweden. On Tra they are joined by female singers Sanna Kurki-Suonio and Tellu Paulasto. The Swedes do things different, just look at the Saab. And Hedningarna does folk music like no one does folk music. Hedningarna is Swedish for "The Heathens," standing for the group's radical reinterpretation of Scandinavian folk music. They play traditional instruments - lutes, fiddles, mandoras, flutes, accordions. Except, they are all plugged into amplifiers. The result is . . . well . . .

It begins slowly, like a far off storm approaching, a distant droning. Female voices begin, chanting in a language unknown to you. Slowly at first, very building... in tempo, in volume. A wail joins them. It is short . . . did you hear it? . . . yes, there it is again. The chant continues, faster, stronger. Then, suddenly horns, slightly unworldly, strange strings, winds, primal drums . . . bizarre noises carry a tune. The chant disappears to be replaced by this strange music at once haunting, chilling, yet strangely exhilarating. The sounds begin to swirl like a dervish, swirling upward, outward. More and more frenzied yet under control, tight, filled with tension, brimming with power. The chant returns, even stronger now it joins up with the music. Voices, horns, wailing winds . . . is it anger? Is it joy? You don't know, but it is strong, whatever it is is intense and beautiful. You begin to accept and revel in it, let it begin to life you with it . . . then suddenly - gone! All gone, only a brief echo remains of all the energy that once was there.

. . . and that is just the first song.

I could go into such depth on every one of their songs, for their songs have that much depth, that much energy.

How to describe Hedningarna's Tra in a nutshell? Well, try to imagine playing the songbook of Arlo Guthrie or the Irish Rovers with the intensity of Metallica or the Sex Pistols. Can't imagine that? Can't blame you. You have to experience it.

Now, let me make it totally clear - all of the intensity and volume that Hedningarna brings to their music does not in any way detract from the folk purity of their music. It's still folk music tried and true, its just folk elevated to a heretofore unimagined level. The intensity comes from the lyrics deep rooted in basic human emotions of love, freedom, need, and defiance. For example, the loudest and fiercest song on the album is a man singing that he will not cut down his trees simply because the rich man next door objects to them. All of the songs are pure emotion, human desire, strength, and frailty at its most pure and primordial.

The rest of the album . . . Yes. That first song described above was Tass on nainen (Here's a Woman). Min Skog (My Grove - the one about the trees) crashes instantly into incessant drums giving away exhausted to fierce fiddle then electric guitar then to defiant chanted vocals. Then comes Vargtimmen (Hour of the Wolf) with catchy percussion, high energy melody and impassioned vocals:

It is in the heart itself
Lies live, and deceit
How can I speak thereof
wisely, with gentleness?

Gorrlaus (The Steed) shows a softer more melodic side to Hedningarna, while still being a high energy riding song.

Relent, stallion with frothing mane calm, even out your pace

Skrautval is an instrumental driven by dual fiddles and hurdy-gurdy. Almost a jig, but much grander in sweep. Pornopolka (Porno Polka - yes, really) is a very fast and energetic reel that tells the tale of a woman casting a spell to cause a man to fall in love with her.

Raven is an amazing song. Beginning with what I can only describe as breathing as singing, the song offers up a didgeridoo style instrument, Jew's harp, percussion and a chanted vocal deeper than Barry White. The decided gothic tones mingle with grating string bass and other decidedly other worldly music
SaglaTen (Say What You Like) is my favorite on the album. It displays the energy of youth thumbing its nose at their uptight elders.

Old crones have knapsacks of dung and disapproving airs
A merry lass and a whipper-smapper lad are of the same kind

Yet, the pure passion of Sanna's vocals create something so primal and earnest it is sheer beauty. The final chorus climbs to an intensity of emotion so high the group put in a five second gap of silence after the song so you can catch your breath.

In Tuuli (Wind) Sami singer Wimme joins the group to joik an homage to the fierce winds of the north. The women sing a chorus of supplication to the king and queen of the winds.

Rise wind to a gale
Gusts growing to a tempest
Rage on through the years

Tappmarschen (Sorrow is a Lonely Bird) is a traditional song of loss of a loved one with fiddles, string bass and a solo female vocal. We are now decrescendoing.

Finally (whew) Tina Vieri (Tin Rolling) lets us down easy with a beautiful ballad that begins with simply the sound of a babbling brook. The tin in the title though are the nails that sealed the coffin of the singer's mother and the song, though beautiful is the wrenching cries of a woman mourning her dead mother (traditional folk music sure is dark folks). Still, the final two minutes of the song is haunting chorus fading into the distance closed out by the babbling brook again that flows for a full 40 seconds before fading into silence leaving you to contemplate the enormity of what you have just experienced.

Tra is a masterpiece. More than anything I wish there was more music like this. Pure unabashed emotion and a willingness to express all of human feeling in song. Most other music pails in comparison.

This is tremendous stuff. From the stealthy opening rhythms of Tass O Nainen to the breathtaking climax of the final track Tiina Vieri there isn't a wasted moment. It's visceral, haunting, earthy, delicate, erotic, violent and ecstatic: music for non-robots. The close-interval vocal harmonies and the harsh drones of the bagpipes and hardingfele may not be Easy Listening but they are full of real life and ideas. Tra still seems as fresh today as it did in 1994, so for me it has now achieved the status of indispensable classic. In fact it's the cream of a rich crop of Nordic "Folk Under Influence" that takes traditional themes, rhythms and instruments, and injects a fierce energy while remaining firmly attached to its roots. Breton musicians were doing something similar in the early seventies but this is a superb antidote to the unimaginative power-chord folk-rock we've had so much of since then. Magnificent.

For all those Hedningarna virgins out there, "Tra" may be a tough first-time swallow. But if given the chance, its strange and heady flavor will become increasingly delicious with each progressive bite (and "bite" is the right word - this is certainly not timid fare by any means!)

Hedningarna is (in my opinion) Nordic Roots Music at its unbridled best, and "Tra" (the Swedish word for wood) may well be the prime example of the band's furious elemental energy. Raw, wild, haunting, and at times powerfully erotic (check out track 7 - Raven), this band of Heathens will take you places you've never dreamed of.

Much more challenging than say, your garden-variety Celtic folk, its somewhat harsh tone is crafted by fusing traditional Scandinavian instrumentation with contrasting Swedish (male) and Finnish (female) voices - and creating a sound that is both ancient and post-modern. If you are looking for something unique, and are not afraid of surrendering your soul to the intoxicating beat of the shaman's drum, then by all means get yourself a copy. Terrific stuff!

Traditional and reasonably ancient folk music of Finland and Lappland gets a modern treatment with Hedningarna's "Tra". A mixture of modern and antique instruments take the traditional styles of the Land of the Midnight Sun to the edge of a hard rock style and yet remain true the original folk sound. Some songs are in Swedish, but most rely on Finnish lyrics. The Finnish language is a true joy to listen to. Finnish is the sole surviving proto-language of ancient Europe. It is mostly devoid of prepositions, those useful words like "on, to, at, in, under, over" and so on. It solves this problem with conjugations of its nouns to indicate the relationship between objects in the sentence instead; not only each verb but also each noun has many tenses, if you will. This creates a linguistic soup of wild, inflected vowels arranged in short punchy phrases which give the lead singers a coarse yet smoothly sensuous and exotic tone.

My first reaction to this album was along the lines of "how bizzare". The second playing brought on the idea that, "actually, this stuff is quite good." As I slipped under its spell on the third and fourth go 'round, I became convinced that I had just stumbled into one of the 5 best and most interesting CDs of my collection (250+ CDs). A year later, this CD still gets a lot of play time at home.

Trust me, add this CD to your shopping cart!

I used to hate this type of music. Having been "brought up" by classical music, rock, and comtemporary film scores-I didn't consider these droning chants to be music at all-since I am more used to more melodious and polyphonic musical forms. My interest in folk started with Irish music, from which a love of drums and mouth music was born. While Irish music is powerful, for the most part it is very fair, calming and at times exuberant. The music of Scandinavia is pure power, raw, animalistic, and illicts the part that is most primal in all of us. It isn't exactly what you'd call a "pleasant listen." This is not for everyone and I usually don't listen to it around family for fear of getting kicked out of the house :) but it is very rousing and the beat and rhythm...like certain African or Native American soundscapes...gives you an interesting drive...like you could conquer all...not a safe thing to listen to if you hate someone...haha...I say this because certain tracks really resonates with emotions that associate with anger...but in a way, it helps you to let it out...

Wolves, foxes and hill-dwelling humans are regulars in Scandinavian story-telling, along with the dark woods in which they inhabit.And this, as with much Nordic mythology and literature, is not a distant reflective experience.Rather, the pretty wilderness is coloured with close-ups of violence- the wolf's teeth, the torn flesh, the vengeful humanity.
The women sing witchily, but in tune, except for some deliberate moments of vocal gymnastics.For example, you'll catch them panting like tiring animals.And despite their singing being in Finnish tongue, the music's overall feel is more notably Swedish.And though the Swedish men sing on a couple of tracks (and howl like wolves, successfully enough), their expertise lay in the pin-point accuracy of their instrumental pursuits.They innovatively pulse electricity into their traditional instruments.Bagpipes, hurdygurdies, zithers and primitive drums are already quite course even without such treatment.The modern drums on the album are used tactfully, as are most studio embelishements.Though, I think their electric guitar usage was better left absent.The skin of this music is modern, but the skeleton is ancient.Upbeat and downbeat tunes share the load.This art is quite aggressive, but always poetic and tuneful.The female singers bring in such sensitivity, considering the lyrical content.The themes are set in nature, with assorted creatures.Humans are often involved thru their spells and evils.'Lust' is a recurrent sin here.But Hedningarna address such things with respect and good judgement.Only rarely is there a semblance of gratuity.
Warning to teddy bears! If you're going out in the woods today to have your picnic ...don't choose these woods!

Third album from these folk wizards. Blending Scandinavian musical tradition with modern techniques, three Swedish masterminds and two Finnish female vocalists create the best folk/rock of the current age. The structure is very much based in popular music, as well as arrangements from older days, but Hedningarna, in contrast to many other bands in this vein, refuse to make these parts compromise each other, and instead always manages to reach beyond to create myths for the future.

Many of the traditional instruments are used as means of a rhythmic hypnotizing effect, under the pulsating repetition that is the core of heathen musical journeys. This music's spirit always lies somewhere between bouncy, celebrating joy and typical Nordic melancholy, a contrast difficult to resist, as this will put native Scandinavians under the spell of nostalgia in modern outfit. There is also a contrast between the obviously Swedish music and the Finnish/Sami ditto, as well as there are a few non-Nordic elements interbedded here, which can get disturbing as it distracts the cultural focus and purity. But Hedningarna are still arguably the very pinnacle of modern folk music, and "Trä" is one of their greatest moments.

"Otherworldly" is a word that does well to describe a lot of the vocals on this cd. The cd starts with a low rumble & then come the female vocals like a smooth curved blade. The traditional instruments are great, & the rock & other modern influences are utilized perfectly, without taking away from or competing with other aspects of Hedningarna's sound but working with them to make for music that you can listen to again & again & still hear new things in.

Hedningarna are, for my money, the most innovative band to emerge from the lately-popular Nordic music scene. There are plenty of other talented bands worth your time -- Vartinna, Garmarna and more -- but these folks have it down. Combining traditional Swedish instruments -- hardingfela (in ALL sizes), bagpipes, several ranges of lutes, flutes, all manner of percussion, and some of the most stunning vocals you're liable to hear anywhere. On this album the three 'core' Swedish members (Halbus Totte Mattsson, Bjorn Tollin, and Anders Stake) are joined by Finnish vocalists Sanna Kurki-Suonio and Tellu Paulasto to incredible effect. Their friend Wimme Saari, modern master of the joik, joins in on 'Tuuli' -- and his is a voice you'll never forget.

The harmonies produced by the two Finnish vocalists are strident and jarring -- and excruciatingly beautiful and evocative. The instruments are combined to produce a power as moving as anything I've ever heard in electric music -- to think that they're doing most of this in an acoustic setting is impressive, to say the least. The lyrics, of course, are all in Swedish (perhaps some Saami and Finnish) -- but their emotional power is not lost at the language barrier.

There is both darkness and light at work here -- blending and whirling together into a product that should appeal to anyone who enjoys adventurous, honest and energetic music. The group's later album, HIPPJOKK, features the three men without the women, and their latest, KARELIA VISA, sees the return to the fold of Sanna, along with vocalist Anita Lehtola. All of their work is of the highest quality -- interesting, entertaining, and stretching.

"Tra" by Hedningarna (aka "the Heathens") is a tremendously powerful album. It recalls Irish/Welsh/Scotch Celtic music, but with a feirce Viking style all it's own. Very unique!! Hedningarna stirs something inside, and "Tra" is one of their better albums. If you like Norse music, Celtic music, or almost any type of roots music, you will play the heck out of Hedningarna's "Tra"!